FAO PtB

Could you tell me about clydebank, Ive only heard of them 'cos of their cardiff contingent, I did try looking on Wikipedia but its just too much writing

Could you tell me about clydebank, Ive only heard of them 'cos of their cardiff contingent, I did try looking on Wikipedia but its just too much writing

lol I'll drop you a pm over the next few days mate

In short, we were Wimbledon'ed out of the Scottish League

Clydebank, nickname The Bankies.

Founded in 1965, from the remains of a Junior(non league - not kids) side that played in the town.

Promoted from 2nd Divison as Champions in 1975
Promoted to the SPL in 1976 becoming the first club to play in all three Scottish Divisions.
First all seater stadium in Scotland by the early 80's just pipping Aberdeen.

Relegated at first time of asking, but had another 2 seasons in the top flight in the mid 80's.

Had ten years in the first division.

Our owners(The Steedman family) announced plans in 1995 to move to a new all coverd all seated stadium in the town.
Got knocked back for planning permission but sold the ground anyway and we shared with our local rivals Dumbarton.
The Steedman's sold the club in 1997 to a Bermuda based businessman called John Hall. He invested heavily on the park and we were running away with the 2nd division when news broke that he was planning to relocate the club to DUBLIN!

The fans started protesting and when some of the players started backing the idea we started supporting the other teams.
We had a game stopped at Forfar for ten minutes when we invaded the park and sat down and another game at Stenhousemuir held up for almost 20 minutes when we created a diversion to allow a fan to run on the park and handcuff himself to the posts, which Neil Alexander was guarding!

When the Dublin plans got knocked back, he tried to sell the club to Livingston, relocate to Galashiels, and then sell the lcub to Carlisle United to allow them to play in the Scottish League. After 3 years, and a season where we won 1 league game, he "appeared" to sell to another businessman who again gave us his grand plans.
Agian they invested heavily on the palying field and we were running away with the league. Suddenly team selections became strange and top scoreres etc were being dropped. As the season started to go to f**k, rumours came out that the owners had gmabled big money on us getting promoted to bankroll the next season. When it became clear that they were losing their money, they bailed out. It then became clear that the sale had never went through and that Hall still actually owned the club, which had been groundsharing from 1996 - 2002

I was on the supporters commitee by then, and Hall got someone to approach us with a view to us buying the club from, and him even willing to lend us the money to do so. AS we got things into motion, Airdrieonians
were declared bankrupt and wound up. An accountant from out there set up a new name called Airdrie United who applied for the space left by Airdrieonians. They lost out on a vote to Gretna. They approached us with a view to "merging"
which involved us moving to Airdrie(30 miles away), being called Airdrie, and playing in Airdrie strips. We told them where to go. tHey informed us that as our club was in administration, they would attempt to buy it. AS we had already
made moves to buy it, we were told that as long as we could mee the price of £165,000, then the club would be ours as it was not a bidding war. This came from the administrator, and Hall.

A deadline was put in place and we had the £165,000 bid lodged, having been told that this was all that was needed. Little did we know that Hall and the adminstrator had stabbed us in the back and told the Airdrie United guys if they could outbid
us then they would get the club. Them knowing we would be bidding £165,000 put in a higher bid and the club was gone.

Within weeks we had set up our own club to paly non league in Scotland. We found a ground in the town and spent thousands tidying it up. The club is owned 100% by the fans and is run by the fans. I was on the board of directors for three season
until I took a mad turn one day and went on the park looking for an opposition player lol We won the league right away and got promoted followed by another promotion two years later.

Last year we got to our Scottish Cup final, going down 2-1 before 9000 at Kilmarnock. Last week we got revenge by knocking them out in the 5th round on their own pad.

A host of well known names have played for us over the years, the late great Davie Cooper, Bobby Williamson, Gary Teale, Terry Butcher, Billy McKinlay, Alan Gow and Darren Jackson to name just a few.

We now share at another ground in the town, with plans afoot for our own home in the town.

Plenty more info out there on the WWW and at www.clydebankfc.co.uk and www.bankies.net

The City connection goes back to the mid 80's and a lad from the Tonypandy area. He saw our name in the Sunday papers and liked it. He wrote to our programme and someone(who follows the Jacks believe it or not) wrote back to him. After swapping letters, Dean/Semtex/tomato face/whatever you may or may not know him as finally made it upto New Kilbowie and it grew from there. There's been a shitload of City and Bankies fans travelling up and down the country ever since, and the sides met in a friendly at New Kilbowie Park in 1989

f*cking hell paul.........................Nice 1 long read but good

f*cking hell paul.........................Nice 1 long read but good

That's the short short short version.

I really wish I'd kept dates and notes form some of the meetings - really could have written a book about it.

A long haul, but when we knocked the holders out on Saturday there, it made all the shit worth it

wow, I wish you luck then mate.. your right about the wimbledon, its almost identical.
Good luck with it when I get older I will travel to see a match

wow, I wish you luck then mate.. your right about the wimbledon, its almost identical.
Good luck with it when I get older I will travel to see a match

Sounds like a plan mate.
I moved up north just over a year ago so don't get to as many matched now
Was down last week though and hope to sponsor our game next Saturday if all goes to plan.

f*cking hell paul.........................Nice 1 long read but good

That's the short short short version.

I really wish I'd kept dates and notes form some of the meetings - really could have written a book about it.

A long haul, but when we knocked the holders out on Saturday there, it made all the shit worth it

Excellent stuff mate, breaking things up is always better for reading....(Ask Annis...lol) Joke fella

I will probably be booking AAtours seats, Pls be nice to my wife

Banter......loves it!

Banter is becoming the new football

The City connection goes back to the mid 80's and a lad from the Tonypandy area. He saw our name in the Sunday papers and liked it. He wrote to our programme and someone(who follows the Jacks believe it or not) wrote back to him. After swapping letters, Dean/Semtex/tomato face/whatever you may or may not know him as finally made it upto New Kilbowie and it grew from there.

Tomato What a boy he is! and his old man! mad as a box of frog!!

The City connection goes back to the mid 80's and a lad from the Tonypandy area. He saw our name in the Sunday papers and liked it. He wrote to our programme and someone(who follows the Jacks believe it or not) wrote back to him. After swapping letters, Dean/Semtex/tomato face/whatever you may or may not know him as finally made it upto New Kilbowie and it grew from there.

Tomato What a boy he is! and his old man! mad as a box of frog!!

His old man is wilder than him - what a sight after the Jack's game at Ninian last season

How many leagues are you away from getting back into top flight footie? Any plans re the new ground on line or has it not gone that far? Really interesting story - i'm sure there's a book in there somewhere!!!!
Shit on the Aidire next time you play them..

How many leagues are you away from getting back into top flight footie? Any plans re the new ground on line or has it not gone that far? Really interesting story - i'm sure there's a book in there somewhere!!!!
Shit on the Aidire next time you play them..

There's no promotion from the non league game up here into the professional set up at present, although it's being looked at again. The only way in would be if someone dropped out and we'd have to be voted in but we don't have the facillities just now to go in for such a vote.

The stadium issue is ongoing, and we appear to have the council onside now. A feasibility study has been completed (www.teamclydebank.org.uk/) and I think the next step(to keep it short lol) is the business plan.

There's loads of info on that site. I'm no longer heavily involved as I had an unfortunate incident and have since moved from the area so only get down every 4 or 5 weeks. My dad is on the commitee which is following up the stadium though so he keeps me upto speed and I'm still in touch with all the guys invovled.

I still reckon we are around 5 years away from having our own home so at present we can only achiever to be the best at the level we are in. In 6 seasons we hav managed a league title, a promotion and 2 cup finals so we are getting there.

We look forward to the day we get Airdire

f**k aidrie.mon the bankies

f**k aidrie.mon the bankies

When are you coming up?

There's no promotion from the non league game up here into the professional set up at present, although it's being looked at again. The only way in would be if someone dropped out and we'd have to be voted in but we don't have the facillities just now to go in for such a vote.

As a matter of interest is it still possible to do an 'Airdrie?'

By that I mean do to them what they did to you (buy their place in the league) if the oppotunity ever arose or has that option been stopped?

There's no promotion from the non league game up here into the professional set up at present, although it's being looked at again. The only way in would be if someone dropped out and we'd have to be voted in but we don't have the facillities just now to go in for such a vote.

As a matter of interest is it still possible to do an 'Airdrie?'

By that I mean do to them what they did to you (buy their place in the league) if the oppotunity ever arose or has that option been stopped?

It would be down the SFL to sanction any such move.

We were offered the chance to buy East Stirling, but without the facillities in the town it was pointless. At the level we are at we can play in the town until such time as we have a place of our own.

http://images.google.com/images?um=1&hl ... i=&start=0 that will give you an idea of what our current place is like, and thats us having spent some money on parts of it! We had spent around £50k on another ground in the north of the town, but the owner passed away and the relationship with the new group of owners hit rock bottom.

The current place has a small bar that overlooks the park, with yours truly sitting drinking away :thumpup:


There's an article I've just found here http://pitchinvasion.net/blog/2009/09/1 ... debank-fc/