What's the Hampden Roar?

My reaction to the news surrounding Hampden Park

There was something unexpected about the news that the Scottish Football Association are considering terminating their lease at the national stadium, Hampden Park.

This being Scottish football, naturally things are not particularly simple. Chief Executive Stewart Regan has employed a consultancy firm to consider the practicalities of taking international games to other stadiums round the country. (We can assume the consultancy has been brought in to give the Chief Executive cover. Leadership appears to be an alien concept to some in Scottish football).

There are a number of good reasons for the SFA to quit Hampden. Most importantly, it’s just a not very good stadium. For fans behind the goals, you’d be as well watching the game on telly at home; the sunken bowl doesn’t generate a great atmosphere unless the stadium is packed (which more often than not, it isn’t); the transport links are poor (although it will be interesting to see if the extra funding for Glasgow 2014 has any impact). Visiting Hampden is frankly not an appealing prospect for many fans. You only have to visit the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff to see what could have been achieved with roughly the same resources.

If the SFA was to remove itself from Hampden, what would be the impact? Glasgow already has two better stadiums in Ibrox and Celtic Park and there’s another 60,000+ seater stadium lying largely dormant 40 miles away in Edinburgh too. With the creation of a national sports academy centre at Heriot-Watt University, we may see the thawing of relations between the SFA and Scottish Rugby, which could lead to Murrayfield staging some Scottish internationals and/or Scottish Cup games (I acknowledge that Murrayfield is far from being a perfect venue also).  

Rotating Scotland’s international fixtures around the country would be a sensible decision. This is what Germany and Spain already do and it was largely successful when England did the same when Wembley was being redeveloped. The last time Hampden came close to selling out was three years ago in the crucial game against the Czech Republic – since then, attendances have varied, so playing world class outfits at Celtic Park  or Murrayfield, top-ranking but unfashionable sides at Ibrox, mid-ranked teams at Easter Road and Pittodrie and friendlies against minnows at stadiums unfamiliar to international football (like McDiarmid Park or Caledonian Stadium) makes perfect sense.

The danger of leaving Hampden would be for an annual bun fight like we’ve seen this season about where semi-finals and finals of national competitions take place. But if a transparent system was put in place, then such conflicts could be avoidable. However, this returns to the idea of the SFA leading, which appears to be something they’re not entirely comfortable doing.

But leaving Hampden is, however, not a simple decision. If the SFA does decide to give notice on their contract, where does that put the bid for Euro 2020? Why would UEFA want to stage a game at a stadium that its home association doesn’t think is good enough? There’s also the relocation of the fabulous Scottish Football Museum and administration offices, although these are not insurmountable problems. The two that concern me the most are, firstly, what would become of Queens Park? The amateurs have called Hampden (in its various guises) their home since 1873. Would Hampden and its 52,000 seats be viable for just an amateur football club and a few music concerts during the summer? If the SFA quit Hampden, will it shun it for all future use? I can’t imagine that should the Old Firm make a cup final together either would be happy with playing at each other’s grounds, nor embarking on a trip to Murrayfield (nor would the residents of said area welcome them) when an adequate stadia is lying vacant within the city.

The biggest problem for me about leaving Hampden would be the heritage and history. My first ever game was at Hampden, on the terraces for Hibs’ Skol Cup win in 1991. I was there for the partial re-opening when we played the Netherlands in a friendly. I was there to some of my best days in football (Hibs trouncing Killie in the League Cup Final; coming back from 3-0 down to Falkirk in the Scottish cup semi) and some of the worst (that 6.05pm on a Sunday Scottish cup semi against Aberdeen and erm, well, the 19^th May 2012). To a lot of people, Hampden brings cherished memories, where the results were what mattered, not the horrendous queuing or being half a mile away from the goal; they associate Hampden with Scottish football. Would we lose that link? Would Scottish Cup finals be the same if played at Celtic Park or Ibrox or Murrayfield every season? I think the occasion would be ever so slightly diminished, especially in the first few seasons.

That makes the decision to rule out the redevelopment of Hampden by the SFA even more surprising. By pre-empting the consultants, you’re essentially asking them not to explore all the possibilities that face the SFA. It seems a bizarre approach and I don’t expect it to be fully explained.

Hampden, for better or worse, is our national stadium and I’d like to see the fans of Scottish football fully consulted on any changes. If the SFA is going to make a dramatic change, then surely it stands to reason that the lifeblood of the game deserves to have their views heard. But I’m not holding my breath.

Ross Jack's Five Year Plan

Today, the news broke that Ross Jack and Elgin City “mutually agreed” to part company. It followed Elgin’s 2-0 defeat to Queen’s Park on Saturday where his side performed abysmally. The fact that Jack did not fill the bench at New Broomfield has led many to suggest that relations between the manager and the board were not on an even keel.

Jack was Elgin’s longest serving manager since the club gained admittance to the Scottish Football League, lasting one day short of five years. When he took over the club they were positioned bottom and finished the 2008/09 season in that position. That was followed by 9^th, 7^th, 4^th and 5^th placed finishes. However, this season has started badly, with the club performing inconsistently.

It was clear that the past two seasons saw Elgin’s best chances of promotion since their arrival in the SFL in 2000. The playoff defeat to a poor Albion Rovers side in 2012 was pretty galling for the club and last year the club had numerous opportunities to secure a play-off place, only to squander them.

Elgin’s inability to be clinical last season arguably cost them the services of two of their star performers – winger Daniel Moore and striker Stuart Leslie, who both joined Nairn County in the summer. The former is allegedly pocketing £1000 a week from County, and Leslie was offered a four year contract to join the Station Park club. Money that Elgin just couldn’t compete with. The loss of Moore and Leslie was compounded to injuries to key players such as Mark Nicholson and Sean Crighton, who were unavailable at the start of the season and Paul Millar out long term. The midfield situation was made worse by the injury of key man Brian Cameron.

Since Cameron’s injury, Elgin have looked utterly imbalanced. New summer signing Shane Sutherland has proved wanting – undoubtedly there is a player of talent there, but his attributes were not being used to their optimum by Jack. At times this season, and especially in recent matches away to Annan and Queen’s Park, there has been no structure to the side beyond the back four.

The signing of former Peterhead goalkeeper, Raymond Jellema solved a perennial goalkeeping problem for Elgin but he has not had the luxury of a settled back four in front of him. Club captain David Niven has looked poor at right back where his selection is all the more galling when he has a perfectly capable natural right back sitting on the bench in the young Graeme Beveridge.

The defensive frailties are there for all to see. After the losing the lead to Annan on 28^th December, Elgin were in 9^th place having dropped 15 points from winning positions – they would have been in 2^nd place had they held onto their leads.

Jack’s biggest weakness has been the deployment of personnel in the midfield and forward line. Frankly, at points this season, the defence and the rest of the team have looked alien to each other. There are a number of talented players on the books at Borough Briggs – Mark Nicholson, Paul Harkins, Ally MacKenzie, Shane Sutherland, Brian Cameron, Dennis Wyness and Craig Gunn are, on their day, some of the most talented players in the league – but under Jack this season, there was no balance and no positional awareness from the players, which often lead the defence exposed.

There is no question that bad luck has played a part in Ross Jack’s downfall at Elgin, but Elgin under his tenure have simply not been clinical enough to see games out when playing with a lead.

The rumour mill is in full flow and the early front-runners for the job are John Robertson and former player Barry Wilson. Both would be intriguing appointments for the club, but with the impending relegation playoffs from the bottom division, the board must be hoping for a gaffer who can salvage something from this season, consolidate and build for next season.

There’s potential in Elgin – attendances were reaching 1000 when the going was good in the last two seasons. Whether the new man in charge can harness that potential is another thing altogether. The club has wallowed in the bottom tier for the last 14 years, a new manager backed by a board with ambitions above mediocrity coupled with the fear of relegation back to the Highland League could be catalyst that City require.