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Third Lanark


Wilky1878

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Present day Labour run Glasgow City Council need to be very careful before they spend any pennies on Cathkin regarding a football stadium.

Within walking distance of Cathkin there's sports centres local and national plus Hampden and Lesser Hampden coming out of their ears.

4G pitches, floodlights, indoor and outdoor aplenty.

I'd be the first to cry wolf if places like Possil or the Garngad where passed over for sports money in Mount Florida.

There's council elections next year 2017 remember.

The city council wouldn't want history repeating itself 50 years later.

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With Garngad being the main concern judging by your username. Think the article in Scotland's Chimpion suggests that Third Lanark get a 25 year lease (I would assume with reasonable renewal terms written in) and then would do the rebuild themselves.

The whole North East of the city in particular is a forgotten zone.

In some cases we've went backwards.

Greater Springburn had three swimming pools, now it's one.

Broomfield Rd pitches are closed, old mine works it seems, the entire city is built on old mine works so that's nonsense.

Springburn Park up the road gets one flood lit AstroTurf which is fair enough but way short of what's needed.

The Royston Rd has a school with floodlights and......red ash pitches.

Glenconner has a caged grass pitch but no floodlights or dressing rooms and forget any security.

Glenconner Park should be a history story with a multi national company as its ending.

See ICI.

And St Rochs Junior team further up the road that has a committee that's fighting tooth and nail to not just keep the club afloat but open it to the community on and off the park.

Then there's Possil.

If any place stands out it over the years it Possil.

That community and its teams deserve the full bhoona with knobs on, 7 days a week.

One 21st Century pitch in the Milton doesn't cut it.

4G, floodlights, security, the works.

Glasgow Perthshire would be the perfect place.

I've nothing against Third Lanark.

I wish them well.

If they get the lease and locals don't object then fine and dandy.

In the perfect world the city could/should help them out.

The Glasgow Labour Party in particular probably owe the memory of Third Lanark big time.

If it happens i'll happily go along to their first game and pay at the gate.

Ps, I'm shocked that Baillie Reilly lived on till 2003.

Only the good die young right enough.

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When Third Lanark went bust Glasgow had a population of over 1 million. Now it's 600000. Queen's and Pollok are already in the area. I can't see the demand or the point.

The story comes up every few years.

The present Thirds guys want to have a go at it or more to the point they want to lease Cathkin to be used as a football stadium.

A long way to go on that story.

Think a few local homeowners occupiers might have something to say first.

Is there a support for them out there?

Probably not outside of friends and family at the moment.

The one guy that seems to know anything said he was a Fizzle fan!!!

Don't really know what to make of that.

Football is a results driven business so who knows what could happen if they got the lease to Cathkin.

Maybe a few ghosts from the Hi HI in Crown St bar could help out.

No leave that, the Hi Hi bar ran a Celtic bus.

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They could well pinch fans/punters if others are playing away or sick of their team for whatever reason. A lot of fans do stop going to watch their team whether it's manager board or the style of football being played and see what else is on offer on a Saturday afternoon.

Good luck to them.

Scotland needs a strong third lanark ;-)

Good luck to third lanark I

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They could well pinch fans/punters if others are playing away or sick of their team for whatever reason. A lot of fans do stop going to watch their team whether it's manager board or the style of football being played and see what else is on offer on a Saturday afternoon.

Good luck to them.

Scotland needs a strong third lanark ;-)

Good luck to third lanark I

Bet Pollok panic every time the Daily Record mention Third Lanark.

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On the whole, restarting failed football teams is a bad idea. It failed for a reason and it won't be as good as you hoped.

It worked out for Newport County and Accrington Stanley, Gretna 2008 in the Lowland league; further down the English pyramid Darlington, Scarborough, Nelson, Runcorn Linnets and South Liverpool are coming back quite strongly after disappearing for a year or two in the early 2000s. Doubt many of the support of those teams would agree with you. Not really sure what examples of "re-formed teams failing again" I can think of, other than maybe New Brighton, who folded for lack of a committee again, in 2012.

I wish Third Lanark well. If all of this comes off and it isn't (as many have hinted at) yet another space-filler for a quiet newsday in the Daily Ranger then I can see there being quite a good crowd at their first "senior" game, and a regular gate of 100 or so folks. As has been pointed out that's not too bad for a SOS / Lowland League crowd. The 50s glorydays of five/ six figure crowds aren't coming back for anyone.

A lot of work to do however and you do wonder who will share the load with the enthusiastic Mr. McGeady. As everyone on here knows a re-formed club needs a hard working committee in it for the long haul, if the comeback is to be little more than a short term novelty.

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It worked out for Newport County and Accrington Stanley, Gretna 2008 in the Lowland league; further down the English pyramid Darlington, Scarborough, Nelson, Runcorn Linnets and South Liverpool are coming back quite strongly after disappearing for a year or two in the early 2000s. Doubt many of the support of those teams would agree with you. Not really sure what examples of "re-formed teams failing again" I can think of, other than maybe New Brighton, who folded for lack of a committee again, in 2012.

I wish Third Lanark well. If all of this comes off and it isn't (as many have hinted at) yet another space-filler for a quiet newsday in the Daily Ranger then I can see there being quite a good crowd at their first "senior" game, and a regular gate of 100 or so folks. As has been pointed out that's not too bad for a SOS / Lowland League crowd. The 50s glorydays of five/ six figure crowds aren't coming back for anyone.

A lot of work to do however and you do wonder who will share the load with the enthusiastic Mr. McGeady. As everyone on here knows a re-formed club needs a hard working committee in it for the long haul, if the comeback is to be little more than a short term novelty.

I suppose so, and you could add Wimbledon, Aldershot and Halifax to that list. I meant there isn't much point in doing it if it's just revive the name and get 100 in. A lot of Airdrie and Rangers supporters will tell you that it's never quite the same. Existing clubs could do with McGeady's enthusiasm. However, I do realise there is no logic in football. It's all hope over experience.
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We've discussed Litster's book about Third Lanark, and the consensus was that whilst excellent on facts and figures much of it was revisionist nonsense. Litster came up with the ridiculous idea that somehow the move to the third Cathkin Park doomed the club to a prolonged death (a notion he seemed to have lifted from that other popular revisionist myth of Renton's supposed doom from blowing what money they had on Tontine). He glossed over the damning Board of Trade report which firmly placed the blame on William Hiddleston and his acolytes (that Hiddleston had his own daughter as the second highest paid member of staff when she was still at school says it all).

Lilster proffering the earlier Secretary of State refusal for building as any sort of "proof" Hiddleston wasn't trying to run the club to a fold to flog the land for housing is very much a red herring. In 1963, the Tory Michael Noble was the Secretary of State, Teddy Taylor the local MP: zero chance for the Labourite Glasgow Corporation to get permission to indulge in a bit of social engineering to try & pack the one seat in Glasgow not in their grasp with "good" (ie.reflex) Labour voters via council housing.

It set the precedent on any building on the site, but Councillor Reilly (Hiddleston's deputy) had assured him this difficulty could easily be overcome upon the next change of government: unfortunately for them Labour didn't have any sort of working majority until 1966, by which time the Board of Trade had already been alerted to the malpractices going on there by the club's former accountant and the rush to kill Thirds stone dead was on.

The death of Third Lanark was a matter of considerable embarrassment to Glasgow Labour as it brought into the open that "the people's party", "the party of the working class" was full of much the same money grabbing councillors having their palms greased by crooked businessmen and jerry builders wanting to cash in on the housing boom as the Tories - and it came as little surprise that they subsequently lost control of the council to a Progressive/Tory administration in the subsequent Corporation election in 1969.

Something similar appeared on a Celtic forum a few back and was closed and deleted shortly after.

Not so much a Third Lanark story but your man Baillie Reiily attempted to get on the board at Celtic.

Maybe a bit too close to home for some, ie there might have relatives on the forum that took the spur.

Who knows.

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I don’t see why a revived Third Lanark would be any less of a success than BSC Glasgow, Cumbernauld Colts or East Kilbride, who came from nowhere and are now plying their trade there. If they have serious backing financially as has been hinted, then their stay in the South of Scotland League (if that’s the route they want to go) may be a brief one.

I would assume all they need do in the short term is put up some portable building type changing/committee rooms/toilets and a temporary stand of some sort and you’d have a ground more than suitable for the SoSFL and to be honest the LL. Maybe a short-term ground share with Benburb whilst they get off the ground.

I see no reason why they wouldn’t capture the imagination of some floating fans and fans of other clubs who are playing away. They’d get more than BSC and Colts that’s for sure.

Personally I’d like to see them in the Juniors and that may be a better place for them, but that will probably go against the grain of what they are trying to achieve.

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I can't see Cathkin being used again. The work that would have to be done to renovate the old terracing, alongside the trouble of convincing locals to go for it, would be too much I assume, although I'd be more than happy to be proven wrong.

Could it not be feasible for a new Third Lanark team to use 'Lesser Hampden'? Maybe a little work would've to be done, but I'm sure it wouldn't be much.

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I dont see why a revived Third Lanark would be any less of a success than BSC Glasgow, Cumbernauld Colts or East Kilbride, who came from nowhere and are now plying their trade there. If they have serious backing financially as has been hinted, then their stay in the South of Scotland League (if thats the route they want to go) may be a brief one.

I would assume all they need do in the short term is put up some portable building type changing/committee rooms/toilets and a temporary stand of some sort and youd have a ground more than suitable for the SoSFL and to be honest the LL. Maybe a short-term ground share with Benburb whilst they get off the ground.

I see no reason why they wouldnt capture the imagination of some floating fans and fans of other clubs who are playing away. Theyd get more than BSC and Colts thats for sure.

Personally Id like to see them in the Juniors and that may be a better place for them, but that will probably go against the grain of what they are trying to achieve.

Maybe, but why prop up a financially unviable project? Money from the youth project can't be diverted towards entering a team in the SPFL Pyramid,
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Maybe, but why prop up a financially unviable project? Money from the youth project can't be diverted towards entering a team in the SPFL Pyramid,

Who says it's not financially viable though? are Colts financially viable? BSC? those two are propped up by their extended youth set-ups. Selkirk? Preston? Vale of Leithen? I can see Third Lanark getting more through the gate and stirring more interest than those examples and if they don't try to run before they can walk, they'll be an asset to the league (assuming that's where they're headed).

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Are the trees protected? A chainsaw would make short work of them and the terraces are probably in no poorer state than those at the departed Tinto Park!

The last time I had a walk around ( admittedly about the turn of the century ) the terraces were well overgrown but underneath was no worse than some I've watched league football from.

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Maybe, but why prop up a financially unviable project?

Because Third Lanark remains a name everybody knows before you even spend a single penny of marketing any on a new football club.

You've a far better chance with a revived Hi-Hi at Cathkin being a long term success than just about any non-league side in Glasgow or its surrounding environs, and for that matter a number of existing SPFL sides. That's not to denigrate those other clubs, merely a statement of hard fact: why else do Toffs only sell 24 Scottish club shirts, one of which last kicked a ball in anger in a Senior league 49 years ago?

As the Americans discovered when they tried to stop Seattle's franchise being Seattle Sounders, Portland's being the Timbers, Vancouver's being the Whitecaps and stopping New York Cosmos returning altogether, all the money in the world cannot buy the emotive side of football where well-loved clubs that died decades before still command enough loyalty from later generations who will cheer their return, but not a new club from scratch no matter how flash the ground or players proffered. And they're the ones needed to part with their cash week after week to make any such plan viable in the long term.

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