Cup run is Roy of the Kello Rovers stuff
HEARD the song about the time nine men went to mow the Meadow?
I has been top of the charts in the deepest corner of the junior football map for the last month and is the soundtrack to potentially the greatest story in Kello Rovers’ 117-year history.
The Kelloholm side – for those who don’t know that’s a little village on the Dumfries and Galloway side of the Ayrshire border – have reached today’s Junior Cup quarter-finals for only the third time where they face Beith.
It comes on the back of the most remarkable last-16 victory over Irvine Meadow – giants of the game in comparison to the modest Kello.
The fact they were a man down in 18 minutes and lost a second player to a red card in 79, survived Medda’s version of the Alamo and eventually scraped through thanks to full-back Sean Bennie’s showstopping 35-yard drive has some locals believing this might just be the year they finally attain the Holy Grail.
Everything about that sensational tie screamed fairytale, magic of the cup and Roy of the (Kello) Rovers all rolled into one.
Diehard local Jim Murdoch – dubbed ‘The Kello Kangaroo’ for his exuberant celebrations over the past five decades – summed up the sense of anticipation.
He said: “I remember the glory days of the 70s when we used to win cups in Ayrshire and it got to the point I was actually bored of beating Auchinleck.
“It’s a bit different now. I was anxious about getting through the first round this year – even though we got a bye!
“There are four buses going to Beith but if we win we won’t need them on the way back, everyone will fly home off their own esteem.”
No wonder. Kello are 9/1 outsiders for the tie and a 150/1 to go all the way. But if the Junior Cup isn’t about fairytales, giantkillings and community rivalries then it is nothing.
Kello are Dumfries and Galloway’s only junior football team and, having grown up just down the road, I know the importance of the club to the community.
It has helped produce a number of top players including David Irons, George Cloy, Kris Doolan and my uncle Jock Kirkpatrick who now lives in Tasmania but assures us he will be looking out for the result at roughly 3am tomorrow morning in Hobart.
Believe me, if they manage to defeat ‘The Mighty’ in Beith this afternoon it might just eclipse everything that has gone before in this brilliant little club’s storied history.
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