PERFECTMATCH
VOLUNTEER Park. Guys Meadow. Paties Road Stadium.
They are not Camp Nou or Old Trafford. They make Stark’s Park and Firhill look pretty fancy.
But there are some who would argue that it’s the humble bases of junior football that represent the real heart of the game.
Photographer Jim Ryce certainly thinks so. He has been covering the Scottish Junior Football Association (to give it its Sunday name) for the past 20 years. As he is not in the least bit interested in the ball-kicking bit, he soon turned his camera away from the pitch and towards the supporters.
The result is a set of pictures that he calls “a labour of love”, recording the highs and lows of supporting the likes of Yoker Athletic, Dundonald Thistle or Bonnyrigg Rose.
“Junior football is not just about the match,” Jim said. “It’s about the people, the sense of the community, the feeling of belonging to something.”
In his decades of driving around Ayrshire, the Lothians and up to Fife, he has become part of the wider team.
He said: “Every junior football ground is good to you. They welcome you in, give you tea and coffee and something to eat.
“These photographs are not a documentary. They’re more of a celebration. I’ve photographed them from the inside because I’m part of it now.”