Cowdenbeath FC shirts may soon become much sought after historical items with the Fife club currently bottom of League Two in Scotland and facing a third successive relegation in three years, they are currently favourites to face a play off for SPFL survival in May with the winners of the Highland/Lowland League champions play off facing the bottom club in Scottish League Two over two legs for a place in the fourth tier of the SPFL in 2017/18.
Cowdenbeath would go into the Lowland League in Scotland if they were demoted and it would mean no Scottish League football in the town for the first time since 1905 (the club were formed in 1881 by the Pollock family who had settled in the town after moving east from Ayrshire).
This is the third season of the Scottish pyramid with Montrose surviving the drop in 2014/15 after beating Highland League champs Brora in the play off final but East Stirlingshire went down to the Lowland League last season at the expense of Lowland League winners Edinburgh City. Now Cowdenbeath are one of three or four clubs who could face the dreaded play off at the end of the current campaign. Clyde, Edinburgh City and Berwick Rangers are not out of danger yet but it's Cowden who have all the work to do after only winning for the first time in 2017 on Saturday 11th March with a 3-1 win at Berwick Rangers.
Cowdenbeath are often visited by Groundhoppers (simply because fans all over the UK find their name unusual) and just the curious and in the past have boasted supporters clubs in Yorkshire, London and Dublin (The Cornbeefies). Former Coronation Street actor Peter Adamson (Len Fairclough in the show in the 60's and 70's) once visited the town on a mission to see the team and 'drink Cowdenbeath dry', he managed the second but not the first, and Scottish crime writer (and creator of Rebus) Iain Rankin supports the club.
The nearby village of Hill of Beath is the birthplace of one of Scotland's most famous players, legendary Rangers, Forest, Sunderland and Scotland midfielder Jim Baxter, who a recently promoted Cowdenbeath actually tried to sign before he returned for Rangers for a brief second spell in season 1970/71.
Former Anglo Scots Tommy Hutchison (Man City, Blackpool, Coventry, Swansea), David Speedie (Chelsea, Coventry, Liverpool, Blackburn), Doug Rougvie (Chelsea, Brighton and Fulham) and Willie Johnston (WBA and Scotland World Cup Argentina 1978) were all from the local area as is current Celtic captain Scott Brown.
The 'butchers apron' kit in all its glory sported by Cowdenbeath's best post war side and the last 'Beath team to play in the Scottish top flight.
The shirt from Cowdenbeath's last spell in the Scottish League's top flight in 1970/1 is a candy stripe classic and brings back memories of 4 and 5,000 rather than 4 or 500 for home matches and a team of robust part time players who mixed it with the best of Scottish Football in the early 1970's.
John Dickson got homesick as a youngster at Don Revie's Leeds Utd and returned to Scotland to become the Stan Bowles figure of Cowdenbeath. Dickson could be anonymous for 80 minutes before deciding to run the opposition ragged in the final ten, he was also partial to a cigarette in the tunnel before emerging for a match and was not slow to sometimes disagree with the manager. Carrot top defender Dave Cairns was a Rangers reject who found his feet at Central Park and was later captain while Davy Ross was a mercurial winger in the Willie Johnston/Willie Henderson mode who often made a mockery of full time defenders. Andy Kinnell was the local lad born and bred who was captain of the last Cowden side to play in the top tier in Scotland while Billy Bostock, with a name right out of boys own comic fiction, cracked in goals from all angles. Young defender Billy McLauglin, the 'Private Pike' of the local Cowden Army, was tragically killed by dodgy wiring at just 21 while working as an electrician locally not long after top flight status had been achieved while diminutive goalie Billy McGann, capable of brilliance and buffoonery all in the space of 90 minutes, jostled for the number 1 shirt with ex-Motherwell stopper Alan Wylie and teenage reserve 'keeper Jim McArthur, who was later the subject of a transfer to Hibs where he played successfully for a decade and ended up in the same side as the nomadic George Best who pitched up in Edinburgh in 1979 after his spell in the NASL in America, McArthur later became a football agent in Scotland.
Jim Taylor was a rugged defender and midfielder popular with female supporters who went under the nickname 'Big Ty' as a homage to the Big Fry chocolate TV commercial of the late 60's which featured one George Lazenby, who later had a solitary outing as James Bond in On Her Majesty's Secret Service. Alan Kennedy got his moment of glory scoring v Rangers in the league at Central Park while Jim Moore was the solid veteran defender and the quiet man of the team, up front Frank Harper and Dave Marshall were contributors to a forward line that often clicked to devastating affect with goals a plenty although the juggernaut was halted for a season in the top division. Barnsley were thrashed 5-0 in a pre-season friendly before Cowden's First Division season while a Dundee Utd XI were swept aside 7-0 as the Fifers geared up for the big time and tested the waters of the matches to come. Sadly Cowden would lose 4-2 away and 2-0 at home to the 'real' United in the league. Cowden manager was former player and local Coal Merchant Andy Matthew and since his departure in 1974 no Cowdenbeath manager has matched his six year spell at the club with the average shelf life of a 'Beath boss since the 1980's being two years!
The striped shirt in their 1969/70 promotion winning season was known locally as 'the butcher's apron' and the candy stripes were proving popular at the time as teams such as Crystal Palace, Southend and Cowden's local rivals Dunfermline Athletic who were adopting them too, as were Bayern Munich, and other continental and UK teams. Cowdenbeath FC had been denied promotion to the top division in Scotland in season 1938/9 due to the start of WW2 and the Scottish League decided to declare that season void as far as promotion and relegation was concerned when hostilities ceased and football restarted in 1945/6. Cue 25 years in the wilderness before the Fife side finally claimed top division status again in a two division set up after finishing runners up to Falkirk (who had Alex Ferguson playing up front for them alongside another future Scotland boss Andy Roxburgh).
The strip remained for the solitary post war season in the top flight but as the only part time team in an 18 club league 'Beath struggled and were relegated as bottom side with 17 points from 34 league games, although they did reach the League Cup semi final losing 2-0 to eventual winners Rangers at Hampden in front of a crowd just shy of 40,000. The shirt remained until the end of season 1973/4 when the club returned to their usual all blue shirts. A version of the 1970 kit was brought back in the late 1990's but the players at the time didn't really do it justice and the local heroes who gained promotion to matches v the Old Firm, Hibs, Hearts, Aberdeen etc will forever be remembered as indeed will their 'butchers apron' shirt which was made by Umbro and sold in a local sports shop run by club director Dave Fowlis.
Those with a love of familiar names on the classified football results on a Saturday will be sad that that Fife's oldest league club now stand on the brink of demotion to non-league football after successive relegations from the second to fourth tier in Scotland, and to make matters worse, Cowden player Dean Brett was called up in front of the SFA recently after foolishly revealing he was betting on Scottish League matches involving his own team on Twitter, he was subsequently sacked by the club and given a fine by the SPFL and SFA. Tough times for Cowdenbeath then who also recently parted company with the second youngest manager in the league north of the border in Liam Fox, a former Hearts player then coach who resigned recently after a 15 game run without a win with another ex-Tynecastle fave Gary Locke replacing him at Central Park on 9 March.
So, maybe it's time to reboot the forgotten classic shirt from the early 70's to inspire a new generation of Cowdenbeath FC players because at the moment time is running out on 'Beath's status as a Scottish League club. Right now the team with the tragi-comedic nickname The Blue Brazil have absolutely nothing to lose so let the magic begin and pull on those candy stripes for the ten league games remaining (plus two play off games if the club are still bottom at the end of the current campaign).
If ever Cowdenbeath FC needed the spirit of Billy Bostock or John Dickson it's now!
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