Ground 16: Ochilview

Game: East Stirlingshire 0 v 1 Berwick Rangers

Date: Sunday 25^th November 2012

Competition: Scottish Football League Division 3

Attendance: 327

Admission: £10

Programme: £2

Arriving at Ochilview, one thing is very clear: this is not East Stirling’s ground. Yes, they may play here, but they have a groundshare arrangement with Stenhousemuir, whilst they seek a new ground. East Stirling have been here since the 2007-08 season. East Stirling had to leave their ground, Firs Park in Falkirk and hope to return once it has been redeveloped. You can relive a season behind the scenes at East Stirlingshire in Jeff Connor’s excellent Pointless, one of the finest books about football I’ve read.

It’s a very tight ground – all the fans on this day arrived through two turnstiles and had no choice but to sit in the main stand. I very much wanted to stand and so to stave off the cold but sadly this wasn’t to be. I’ll write more about the ground when I return to watch Stenhousemuir later on in the season.

What was emerging that there was a theme for this weekend: coldness. In fact at certain points of the first half I felt that I might be forced to buy a hot drink at half time just to warm up my hands!

East Stirling took control of the match early on but the game was fairly even with Berwick still capable of creating chances. This was the first time I’d seen Berwick since the opening day of the season and my impression of them was similar – they are a decent, efficient side that doesn’t quite have enough quality to dominate games. However, they took the lead through Ross Gray scoring after East Stirling failed to clear their lines. This is a familiar trend to goals scored in games I’ve watched: a lack of composure in doing basic things leads to problems/goals.

The goal seemed to knock the stuffing out of East Stirlingshire which was a shame as they had looked promising. East Stirling looked happy to reach half time still at 0-1 and as the players and officials came off the pitch, it was up to the referee to pull out the half-time draw ticket. A nice touch I thought. There were a lot of elements about the matchday ‘experience’ that was refreshing – the PA system didn’t blare out music at half-time which was actually very nice (I’ve also never understood the propensity for football clubs to play the latest pop music at a high volume – have they seen who is paying it get through the gate? I’d imagine the majority of them are not aware of One Direction’s oeuvre). The man on the tannoy was also very entertaining if in a ‘scatty’ way, I couldn’t quite hear him a lot of the time, but his chat was full of information and cheeky asides about other clubs.

I couldn’t help but reflect that it must be difficult for the fans not having a permanent home to call your own. Your ground is an essential part of a club’s makeup and to not have one must hamper the club and its support.

The second half was much the same pattern as the first, with both teams scrapping it out. My enjoyment of the game was enhanced by the gentleman behind me who whenever a Berwick player committed a foul, regardless of severity, he would shout “Dirty, dirty, dirty.” Perhaps under the influence of this incessant pressure from a Shire spectator, the referee created a rod for his own back by booking players for challenges that certainly weren’t bookings. This led to the sending off of Berwick’s Steven Notman who was dismissed for two bookable offences within minutes. In another game they might not have been yellows, but it was clear what the standard the referee had set and Notman’s lack of game intelligence cost him dearly.

But not the rest of his team as East Stirlingshire struggled to take advantage of the extra man. It seemed as if they were afraid to shoot but were creating lots of good chances down the left with Ricky Miller overlapping Jamie McKernon (on loan from St Mirren). Even in the final minute, the Shire had a great chance with the ball whipped in from the left, the goalkeeper tried to claim it only to miss it completely, and yet the Shire conspired to hit the post. It really was an unbelievable miss – definitely the sort you miss when things aren’t going your way.

It was a shame that East Stirling didn’t get more from the encounter and they had a right to feel unlucky, perhaps a bit more confidence in front of goal would see them turning defeats into draws and draws into wins?