0 newsandstar.co.uk Close. This meant that if Hearts who were second in the topflight could stay in the top three that Gretna would have UEFA Cup football the following season no matter what happened in the cup final. The original Gretna Football Club resigned from the Scottish Football League on 3 June 2008 and was liquidated formally on 8 August. It was though as so common with Gretna that off the field more important things were happening. They were though knocked out of both Cups by Hibs, the League Cup saw Gretna get turned over 6-0 and in the Scottish Cup it ended 3-1. Soon it was clear that money till the end of the season was going to become even more difficult to find and in the end it took the assistance from the SPL to pay the players wages through to the end of the season just for Gretna to guarantee that all outstanding fixtures would be played by the club. It turned out that the wages weren’t paid direct from a club account but from one off Mileson’s personal accounts that only he could approve the transaction. On the 10th August 2006 Gretna’s European dream started. Mileson didn’t take up smoking until he was 48 years old. In the league things were very good Gretna had got to the top of the league and never really had much of a challenge. Rowan Alexander had become full time manager during the spring and when the summer came around everyone expected money to be spent. As that second season started Gretna were firm favourites for the title and everyone at Raydale Park believed that this was a special team. I’ll be help Rowan Alexander, Davie Irons and David Holdsworth to be the best they can beâ. It took till the 22nd September 2007 for them to get their first win against Dundee United winning 2-1. The first plan was to build a 4000-seater stadium, but this was soon changed to a 6000 seater ground as for entry to the Scottish Premier League required all clubs to have a stadium capacity of that number. Founded in 1946, Gretna FC enjoyed a rapid rise through the Scottish leagues before sadly dissolving in 2008. In the summer of 2005 things at Gretna seemed all good, even a documentary crew followed the club around for the season. Plus with a wage bill that was clearly unsustainable at that level the club still made a loss of £345,000 for the year ending 31st May 2004. Gretna’s first ever Scottish Football League game was against Greenock Morton and to everyone’s surprise a crowd off over 1800 people turned out to watch that famous first game. With such small numbers coming through the gate things needed to change and quickly. Before the game kicked off Brooks Mileson handed a cheque of £5000 over to the Arab Trust the supporters trust of Dundee United. Meanwhile Gretna would soon be playing their first game as a First Division side and this summer though things were a bit different they didn’t do a massive overall in the summer instead they brought in a couple of good young players in but for the most part the side looked the same as the one in the cup final a few months earlier. 03 Apr 2021 Sat. So, the club entered negotiations with Motherwell about sharing Fir Park 75 miles north of Gretna. Please click the button "Send inquiry" which opens a new e-mail message. As for Mileson’s Gretna the company and administrators would carry on until the 8th August 2008 when finally, the 62 years of history was ended in liquidation. Soon after Gretna played Dundee United on a Thursday night after it was twice cancelled due to poor weather and the attendance was a terrible 501 a then record low crowd for a topflight game. Gretna would drop out of the Challenge cup in a loss to Falkirk but in the league they had a run of 14 wins which meant Gretna were top at Christmas and when the Scottish Cup came round in the new year the club was in a buoyant mood. Just wondering if anyone had access to this documentary about the rise and fall of Gretna FC? Only 19 seconds into that game Gretna scored but couldn’t hold on and drew 1-1 in. His debts were over £8 million, and his assets only came to £2.5 million so it transpired that in February 2010 Brooks Mileson was finally declared bankrupt. âBut we had Mileson coming out of nowhere, paying wages to take a guy like our former player Steven Tosh ⦠A little over 8 months later he sold the club on making no profit. For the visit of United, Gretna had a temporary stand built for the occasion. The tributes paid to him were mostly kind but the authors off almost of them felt somewhat awkward when they felt it was there duty to the fans of clubs to have to add in the disappointment of Gretna’s collapse and that he had gone almost into hiding when Gretna needed him most. As the season 05-06 came closer it became clear that the club would need to move ground as if as secretly hoped they got promoted to the topflight they would need to ground share with another club. Making his money through Insurance and Construction companies. The village population was around half that number at that time. As clubs aim small digs at the club who many felt had brought there success. On the 21st December 1988 PM AM Flight 103 was blown up over the Scottish town of Lockerbie. County needed to win the match to avoid the drop whilst St Johnstone travelled to Hamilton knowing all they had to do was win and hope Gretna dropped points in a game that was far from a dead cert. Please add the homepage on which the squad is ⦠When the vote happened first time round it was a tie between Gretna and Airdrie but once the two Chairman went through again and Ron McGregor was able to confirm the figures Gretna were voted into the SFL and a new chapter would start. The draw was very kind to them when they got SPL side Dundee United at home. Some fans were starting to get annoyed with Mileson giving money away most notably the £600,000 he gave to Carlisle fans when some Gretna fans were stating that this money could have been used on his own club and improving the ground at which he was always in the media moaning about not being good enough. Scotland - Gretna FC - Results, fixtures, squad, statistics, photos, videos and news - Soccerway The action group with support from Supporters Direct Scotland and local MPs and MSPs a plan was put together to start raising money and in the worst-case start making preparation to create a phoenix club if required. It was in 1983 though that Gretna became the first Scottish team in nearly a century to play in the FA Cup. Gretna were favourites beforehand however, with Airdrie United coming into the picture and their chairman who had been in the league before so therefore would know all the chairman in the room it soon became clear that he held a good hand. The coming weeks would show that the debts were soon revealed to show the extent of debt owed and to who which included the non-payment of TV licences. Press J to jump to the feed. He also killed the club and disappeared from the club when the club needed him most, in the situation that he had put them in. All in all, 7 clubs presented to 27 chairmen from clubs within the league. A few days later in the society next to Raydale Park the supporters gathered in numbers to discuss the clubâs predicament and set up an action group. The only one to go on and make a name for himself was Kyle Naughton. However, to many fans horror 14 players could leave the club and the replacements were all young youth players from middle of the road English clubs. The club was still in a tight financial situation, but he had at least kept the club alive, the club would finally be liquidated in 2007 and a phoenix club would be born owned by the fans. Soon afterwards Clydebank was changed to Airdrie and the kit and badge would look very similar to the old Airdrieonians kit and badge. The Lockerbie Bombing cost the lives of 281 people. He was told he would never walk again but in a show of character of the man he in 1967 came third representing England in the World Cross Country running championships which as soon as he came third he stopped running saying âI hated running, I just had a point to proveâ. 1.7K likes. Whilst Gretna continued to stutter their way through the league the hunt for a ground if the club did go up would continue and with what now seemed like the inevitable truth the club announced that should they get promoted they would need to ground share for at least the first season. Gretna 2008 are now currently play in the Lowland League one tier below the SPFL. As such the SFL told Gretna that they could no longer sign players over the age of 21. Also he had played professionally for Blackburn Rovers and Brentford in the 20’s. One extra bit off controversy would be that Clydebank played in the in Division One and Airdrieonians played in Division Two but through the business transaction Airdrie United started as a new club in a league about the old Airdrieonians. There was even a television documentary talking it up. As the final whistle was blew and the trophy was flown to County among the fans that day was Brooks Mileson who had ignored doctors advice on travelling to watch the team win possibly the most dramatic title win in history. Gretna FC 2008âs latest feature, is now available in Online Magazine - Tickled Squirrel. Due to the evolving situation with Brexit and Covid-19 our orders are taking longer than usual to be processed and shipped. It is a small town off no more than 4000 folk. National teams ; Gretna FC » Players from A-Z. In the Quarter final against St Mirren 2850 people turned out to watch Gretna beat the visitors 1-0 with a single Kenny Deuchar goal and sent Gretna to a national cup Semi Final at Hampden Park. It was screened in ⦠In 1980 the Market became perminant and still continues to this day. Airdrie United would get into the league as well though, through somewhat unorthodox means. He was all but in name owner by this point but it wouldn’t be until the spring of 2003 when a share issue was launched and he brought 54,600 shares in comparison to the 1200 brought by other people he was only at this point the majority shareholder officially. It was only now that people started to realise just how strong his grip was on the club. In the second half Gretna got a lifeline when in the 75th Minute they got a penalty and Ryan McGuffie’s spot kick was saved by Craig Gordon but McGuffie slotted home the rebound. They soon created the new club calling it Gretna 2008 FC and began the hard process of applying to the East of Scotland League. Just after this on the 19th February to then vacant Greenock Morton job was taken by a former Gretna manager. Brooks Mileson would never have his day in court. The final hopes for Gretna to be saved were all but ended when the SFL announced that Gretna would be relegated to the bottom tier of Scottish football. After his death many questioned remained and still do remain unanswered. The very next day staff from Gretna met with an administration company. The failure to get out the league had come at a heavy price in the first accounts submitted since Mileson had become majority shareholder reviled that the he had injected some £741,000 of his own cash. It was in 1993 that Gretna made there final appearance in the FA Cup First Round Proper losing a tight game 3-2 against Bolton Wanderers. In a grim night United would prevail 3-4 in a game that attracted the record crowd of 3000 to Raydale park that night. As well as in 1984 creating a new constitution who main role was the growth of football in the Gretna area as well as helping raise money for Charity. Directed by Neil Jordan. The continued speculation about a new ground wouldn’t go away as it was becoming clearer that Raydale Park simply couldn’t be made big enough for the requirements of the SPL. On the 5th March 2005 Alan Main was confirmed as signing a pre contract with St Johnstone but was soon suspended by the club and would never play for them again. Mileson didn’t attend court that day instead he sent a letter to the court stating he was too ill to attend. Included in these sackings was Brooks Mileson’s son Craig. It is in this small period of 8 years of a overall 62 years of history that possibly the most amazing and outright remarkable story of not just Scottish football but possibly British football. In a game that was slightly delayed the teams kicked off in a nervy affair. The club did start receiving donations from fans and fellow clubs including £500 from Third Lanark who were the last Scottish League side to be liquidated in 1967 (to find out more about Third Lanark please read about it on our website). After approaching Hamilton but suffering a backlash they set their sights on Clydebank who had no permanent home and were in the hand of the administrators Airdrie brought them out on the 1st July 2002. However, the club at the time were nearly £8 million in debt to Mileson’s companies. The losses didn’t seem to affect Mileson’s dreams for Gretna though as he ploughed on with his plans to rebuild Raydale Park. Got The Battle Fever On. In the space of three months, his beloved Gretna FC, whom he personally transformed from an anonymous, English-based amateur organisation into a ⦠Gretna instead of travelling many hours down south they would now have to go north. What it did mean though as the ref blew up that in a couple of months times that Gretna would have both First Division football and UEFA Cup football to look forward to. On the 26th March 29 members of staff including 13 youth players and 9 senior players were given redundancy notices. The first issue was that around £35,000 would need to be raised just to play at Raydale Park and get it back up to standard for the SFL. In the end, Gretna (2008) prevailed 3â1 after extra time in front of a crowd of about 100, and a camera crew from the BBCâs Football Focus there to mark the passing of Mileson (see pictures). 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It is easy to sit back now and put up plain faced arguments for what could have been done or not done to help save the club. As well as nearly a full new squad the team in the bottom tier spent a week training in Verona, Italy before a week at an outward bounds centre in the Lake District the week after Manchester City had been there. Throughout his life he had a love of the lower football leagues in 1992 he was the main sponsor of Whitby Town FC and in 1998 he was the sponsor of the Northern League (the league Gretna had been previously playing in). Full OCSC documentary âPath to Gloryâ to be aired on CBS Sports Network + by Alicia Rodriguez Angels on Parade Dec 5, 2020, 9:55am EST This figure was impossible at Raydale Park but at the time people didn’t seem overall interested in the figures as long as the team were doing well, and the owner was happy to dip into his pockets no one seemed to be bothered. The game wasn’t easy though as the game originally planned for the 8th January 2005 but thanks to classic Scottish weather the game was twice delayed and finally played on Monday 17th January 2005 instead. It was a song that made it into the top 30 Indie Chart and is still available to listen to on YouTube. By 1999 though the clubâs finances had started to come into question and the then chairman Ron McGregor had to pay the players wages out of his own pocket to get them to the end of the season. After just over a week it was decided to put the club into administration to buy time and stop the winding-up orders. After the European fun was over the club got itself back into the grove of league business and any ground that Gretna visited the club would be subjected to the same songs on the tannoy of âIrish eye, big spender and money, money, money,â. Even though this happened people still believed in promotion and that it would happen. Some 6,000 fans turned out to watch Gretna play Derry City from the League of Ireland including a large travelling support from across the water. Gretna would beat Preston Athletic (6-2) and Cove Rangers (6-1) before the third round where they played St Johnstone winning 1-0 then they faced a Clyde side who had just beating Celtic famously 2-1 in Roy Keane’s Celtic debut. The administrators made a statement no long after saying that Mileson would not be putting money into the club in the coming weeks. Despite the staff finally being paid wages it was clear that this list of people owed money was huge. Whilst in there first ever appearance in the Scottish Cup they got to the Third Round beating Cove Rangers 3-0 in the Second Round before losing to First Division Clyde 2-1. SB Nation Rangers FC Community. It has since been rumoured that his family hid a lot of his money before he had died but this is nothing more than a rumour that every so often pops up in a newspaper. The final itself took place on the 13th May 2006. For all the great times he gave Gretna fans and there were many. It was reported that when he sold his businesses in 2004 it was for over 45 million pounds. Mileson was very much infuriated by this rule and stated he would be consulting a lawyer about this rule. As cup fever took over at Gretna the club needed to finish the league of first and did so with 4 wins and 2 defeats. Gretna’s keenness attracted some criticism when Greenock Morton was given only one month to get itself sorted or face being expelled from the league the then Gretna Secretary Ian Armour quoted in the press as saying there did not need to be any further debate about who should take Morton’s place if they couldn’t proof they were saving themselves. M6 Cumbria - One lane closed on M6 northbound from J44, A689 (Carlisle North) to J45 A74(M) Gretna Green, because of an accident involving two cars. On the park as the season started claims and counter claims were fired between the now ex manager and the clubâs owners. The reality is though that a fan base lost its club and with great dignity the new still refuses to be drawn into the blame game. Press question mark to learn the rest of the keyboard shortcuts. It was in this small town just after the wars end that a number of local businessmen, schoolteachers and solders met putting in around £10 each to raise money to start the club rolling. Gretna won the match 3-1 against Consett. When the club was first founded in 1928, it named itself Derry City Football Club, as opposed to using the official name of the city - Londonderry. As soon as the parties had ended from the league title win the club had to start preparing for the following season, noting that any chance of playing the SPL football in Gretna wouldn’t happen the club announced that they had come to an agreement with Motherwell to play there. Mick Wadsworth was a man who famously had been very good at either intentionally or unintentionally annoying the fans at the clubs he worked for. It was with his invaluable experiance that the club started taking its first steps into the footballing world. Which did receive some criticism when that was pointed out. On the 5th April Gretna vs Inverness Caledonian Thistle set a record low attendance for a topflight game in Scotland when just 431 lonely souls turned out to watch Gretna lose 1-2. This though was only after he had gifted the supporterâs society over half a million pounds which allowed them to build a new grandstand and in a strange turn off events somehow ended up paying a few of Carlisle’s better players out of his own pocket. As possible into the English Football systems and joined the Carlisle and District League weekly... To buy Carlisle United but couldn ’ t be until 2002 though that Gretna played a Glasgow XI! 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