Third Lanark

Rangers followers remember well, just how close they came to European Cup Winners Cup success.

Horse Racing enthusiasts will never forget the sight of Foinavon romping home in the grand national at Aintree.

BUT – for all Thirds’ fans of that era, it was a summer to forget. In June 1967, following a very full examination by the board of trade into all aspects of Third Lanark, the Club was forced into Liquidation. Their total debt of £40,000, a relatively paltry sum by today’s standards, meant that the famous Cathkin cry of Hi Hi Hi, would be silenced forever.& the City of Glasgow had lost a football treasure.

There was no alternative, no administration available, no second chance & no appeals.

Fans’ emotions ran riot, anger eventually being replaced by disbelief, and slowly a reluctant acceptance that Saturdays would be vastly different in the future.

Remarkably this sad tale carries much contemporary relevance today, when for a variety of very different reasons, not least the economic climate prevailing, several Clubs find themselves struggling to survive. Could Administration have saved Thirds.? We’ll never know.- Certainly in official Football Circles in 1967 it appeared that no one really cared.

Details of the Board of Trade report can be found by keying in “Board of Trade Investigation – Third Lanark ” into a PC search engine. Basically the blame was laid on Bill Hiddleston, who had been a Board member, in the mid fifties for a period of 2/3 months, before being forced to resign. Sadly for the Club, he re-emerged in the early sixties to become not only a Board member, but fairly quickly Chairman.
There followed under his direction a complete mismanagement of the Club’s affairs.- Years of haggling, internal Boardroom squabbles, & political intrigue,
all led to great players unrest. & closure

42 Years have come & gone since that fateful event, but the club name Third Lanark, lives on. Proof is evident, when every week, on my web site -
www.thirdlanarkac.co.uk I field an average of 20/25 queries on all aspects of the Club The response to my Talks on Thirds’ to all & sundry mens’ Clubs has further cemented my belief that the old Hi Hi’s are still remembered with much fondness.

During their lifetime They won every available domestic honour, their solitary involvement in Europe in the early sixties, saw them matched with Rouen (France) in the British Franco Cup. Rouen emerged triumphant winning 2-1 home & away.

Third Lanark were founder members of the SFLin 1890, but the club was born in November 1872, when a group of Soldiers from the Third Lanark Rifle Volunteers
returned from watching the first ever Scotland v England International Match at Hamilton Cres. in Glasgow. So enamoured were they, that they immediately set about forming their own Club. & became TLR.V.. In 1904 came the only change in name, when they became known as Third Lanark Athletic Club.

Their contribution to the Scottish Football scene, over an at times glorious 95 years was massive. They won every possible domestic honour (whisper it perhaps only once but !!!!) They played in the 1st Division ( equivalent to today’s SPL) for all but a cumulative 12 years, and entertained tens of thousands of fans, with an abundance of skill and eagerness to play for the jersey.

37 Players won full Scotland caps, and an additional 17 were given Scottish League Honours .

Time prevents naming so many worthies, so many wonderful games, so many memories, but they are well represented in my Book “Still Seeing Red”. I was thrilled to find that SSR & three re-prints sold out very quickly. I do know that the Mitchell Library in Glasgow has a copy for “browsing only” . Anyone interested can see this by Calling at Reception desk, Level 2 Mitchell Library. Glasgow. The ref No. is 796 3346309 41443 THI/BEL

Many football fans in Scotland today, have little or no knowledge of clubs like Third Lanark AC., and others believe such History is simply a warm wallow in nostalgia. They might well be right in that assumption – BUT in the football sense what else is left for those of us “STILL SEEING RED”.

Bert Bell. Third Lanark AC Historian & Author of “Still Seeing Red.”