BANKS for the MEMORIES
Glorious tales are part of their history, but ambitious Junior side are also looking with confidence to the future
IT is easy to talk about the romance of the cup when a football ground shimmers on a sun-kissed day and a club envelops a big occasion in a warm embrace.
In truth, Banks o’ Dee certainly have passion but it is a sober purpose that marks them as one of the organisations seeking to rise through the pyramid system.
This disciplined sobriety would earn the plaudits of the club’s founders in 1902 who initially named the team the Rechabites, a term denoting abstention from alcohol.
This name was abandoned in the 1920s when a committee man discovered players were observing teetotalism as a theory rather than as a practice. No one has quite explained why the committee was visiting the public house in question but one must assume it was a matter of investigative duty rather than sating a thirst.
Banks o’ Dee took the name of the Rechabites and they have consistently adorned it with silverware. The eventual outcome on Saturday did not lead supporters or board to the consolations of drink. There is more on the Dee agenda than a Scottish Cup match.
Raith Rovers were too good for the SJFA North Superleague side. But the Dee are also too good for local football. The Highland League may beckon, and soon.
It would be another step on the journey for a club that is constantly seeking to drive on. Its past is illustrious and its future is, at least, intriguing.
An articulate chronicler of the ways of the Dee appears in what has become almost an On The Road staple. Gordon Christie, vice president of the club, stands in the Gordon Christie Stand. He has earned the honour.
Christie, 74, played for the team, joined the committee, ran a youth team, managed the club, and was president for 20 years. When he stepped down, he became vice president.
His links with the club are bound with family ties. His father was also the president of the club and his grandson, Conor Hall, is outside the ground, organising parking on the big day.
But, perhaps not the biggest of days.
‘May 1957,’ replies Christie without hesitation of the greatest moment in the club’s history. ‘I was at every match in that run.’
He is referring to the Scottish Junior Cup final when the Dee beat Kilsyth Rangers 1-0 front of 30,000 fans.
‘For the young people this is the biggest game,’ he says looking out over a stadium record crowd of 870 souls. ‘But, for me, nothing can match 1957. I still remember bits and pieces of that day.’
He knows the time has come, though, to honour the past rather than stay in it.
‘We have grown,’ he says. ‘We were amateur right up until this century. The team has been fantastically successful and played so well over the past couple of seasons and if we win this league this year there is an opportunity to enter the pyramid system and play in the Highland League.’
He adds: ‘Ten years ago I was very much against it. We weren’t ready on or off the park but we have stepped up.’
Christie then reflects on an odd moment in history when the club went on a tour of Canada in the summer of 1980. Funded by sponsors, social club and players, the team embarked on a schedule that involved nine matches in 18 days.
‘We were undefeated,’ says Christie. From the banks of the Dee, across the Canadian Prairies, it must qualify as one of the longest winning runs in terms of miles.
THE cup runs of John Greer have stretched across seven decades and his memories run closer to home. Greer, editor of the club programme and peerless Raith Rovers historian, has no need to consult reference books when asked about the Scottish Cup. He knows the history. He has been there for a considerable chunk of it.
‘I believe football is about great times, certainly,’ he says. ‘But it is mostly about nostalgia. It is about the memories it creates.’
He adds: ‘For example, there is something about a Scottish Cup replay under the lights that sticks with you down the years.’
He thus revels in the run to the Scottish Cup semi-final in 2010. ‘We did that the hard way. Drew with Peterhead, won the replay, won against Airdrie after a replay, won against Aberdeen in a replay, beat Dundee... wonderful times. It was the first time I had ever saw us win at Pittodrie.’
Dundee United, who went on to beat Ross County in the final, proved too strong.
Greer, though, has a stoicism bred in the trials of Kirkcaldy and beyond.
‘I remember going to a game with my father’s uncles as a wee boy,’ he says. ‘It was Celtic at Parkhead. They were saying on the bus if we could keep it scoreless after 20 minutes we had a chance. We lost a goal in the 21st minute and we went on to lose 7-1.
‘But it’s about memories, I can remember the guys walking around the park and selling macaroon bars and spearmint chewing gum.’
He also recalls the inexplicable. ‘We once got beaten at Berwick Rangers 6-0 in the 1978 Scottish Cup when we were in the same division. The manager was sacked, the directors took over, and we beat them 7-1 in the league the next week.’
The trip to Spain Park on Saturday provided more memories and ones enhanced by victory. After missing several chances, Rovers won 3-0. They now head to Celtic Park in the cup. Greer will travel in hope, though his chances of a pitchside macaroon bar seem slim.
THE riposte is quick with no hint of malice. ‘Where do the press sit?’ I ask of a Banks o’ Dee blazer. ‘On their backsides, I suppose,’ he replies.
Conversation is duly engaged. Bil Falconer, ‘76 next birthday’, is a former player at the club, was once president of the social club and is now helping out with the match-day duties.
He points at the park, spotless in its artificial perfection, and observes that it ‘used to be up and down this way’, noting that it has been switched 180 degrees.
Much else has changed. President Brian Winton introduced a ten-yea plan at the club in 2011. Its principal aim was to achieve SFA licensing. That, and so much more has been gained.
The Albion boys’ club has been integrated with the club, an artificia pitch has been laid, two enclosures have been constructed and there is LED lighting surrounding the pitch.
Disabled facilities have been upgraded and the boardroom rebuilt. There is the sight and sounds of a robust wee club.
The next move is to install sola panels, making it the first club in Scotland to become self-sufficient in power requirements.
‘You have to plan for success then hope it comes,’ he says of the
uncertainties of football. There is still some dubiety about the precise route to the Highland League but the first step is winning the SJFA North Superleague. This is almost assured.
But what has made Banks o’ Dee the most dominant northern Junior club on and off the park?
‘Team work,’ says Winton. ‘I would tell any coach looking to work at a club to look at who the chairman is because he has to work with him.’
He also points to the alliance between the sports clubs at Spain Park and the football club. ‘That has been crucial,’ he says.
The boys’ club has provided a stream of players to the first team. ‘We have boys in the side who have been here since they were six,’ he says.
A younger boy was spotted on the touchline. Harris Shaw at five months of age was at his first game to watch his uncle Lewis Crosbie who came off the bench to play for Dee.
Harris may not remember much of his Scottish Cup debut. But one day he will have a tale to tell of a Scottish Cup day in the sun when Banks o’ Dee were in the Juniors and there was hope and expectation in the air.