Saints Sink the New Champions but Miss the European Boat (1981)

(first published in the match programme for St. Mirren v Rangers, 28^th April 2024)

The last League match of the 1980/81 season paired St. Mirren against newly-crowned Champions Celtic in a rearranged fixture at Love Street on 2^nd May 1981. The match was originally scheduled for 17^th January but, like most of the other fixtures that day, it succumbed to the wintry weather conditions. Due to the backlog of postponed fixtures that season, the League authorities were forced to extend the season by an extra week.

Although Celtic had nothing but pride to play for, St. Mirren were still in with a chance of repeating their feat of the previous season and securing a UEFA Cup spot. The Buddies were in fourth spot, level on points with Rangers but with a vastly inferior goal difference. With Rangers playing at home to Hearts, St. Mirren needed to better the Ibrox men's result in order to leapfrog them in the table.

A double-sided, single page updating insert accompanied the reissue of the match programme for the January fixture, which consisted of twenty pages measuring 24cm by 17cm. Since November 1980, the covers had alternated four images from the Drybrough Cup final against Aberdeen, played at the start of the season. It was long rumoured that the programme for the Celtic match had appeared with two different cover images, but this may now be considered as folklore, as a second cover has never been seen.

The inside pages were printed black on a white and yellow background and the January game marked Ricky McFarlane's first programme notes in "Team Talk". He praised the backing for the team at the previous week's away defeat at Kilmarnock and looked forward to the upcoming match against Celtic who, at that time, were chasing Aberdeen for top spot. He concluded by welcoming Erik Sorensen as Assistant Manager.

Page five listed the two team squads for the match, together with the match officials. Despite the delay between the postponed and rearranged matches, the squads remained relatively unchanged and Referee Andrew Waddell from Penicuik was retained for the rearranged fixture.

"Love Street welcomes" presented a two-page feature on the visitors, including a full-page team photo and "What the Papers Say" looked back at Saints' 0-2 defeat in Ayrshire.

A competition page and local news snippets in "Street Scene" preceded a double-page photo spread from the 1-1 draw against Aberdeen on 3^rd January, and "South of the Border" looked at the progress of Aston Villa as they led the way in the English First Division.

Towards the end of the 30p issue, "Buddies Business", an interview with Billy Abercromby, Reserve team news from Eddie McDonald and statistics brought the focus back to Paisley matters.

For the latter half of the 1980/81 season, the Saints' programme carried a syndicated insert reminiscent of the Football League Reviews which had been included in English programmes of the late 1960s and early 1970s. Although they were colourful, the subject matter was, quite frankly, irrelevant to the Paisley fans and it was a relief when it disappeared almost as quickly as it had arrived.

The updating insert for the 2^nd May fixture included three photos from the previous week's win against Morton, while the Manager offered his congratulations to Celtic on their League win and thanked the players and supporters for their efforts throughout the season.

The St. Mirren players formed a guard of honour to applaud the newly-crowned Champions on to the field and then proceeded to do battle and play them off the park.

 

Frank McDougall opened the scoring for the home side after 30 minutes. A Lex Richardson corner eluded Pat Bonnar in the Celtic goal, and the Paisley striker popped up at the far post to head the ball powerfully into the net.

There was controversy at the end of the first period when the linesman's flag ruled out a Celtic equaliser. Roy Aitken found Frank McGarvey out on the wing and his low cross into the middle was swept home by Charlie Nicholas, but his joy was short-lived, the goal ruled off and Saints remained a goal up at the interval.

In 57 minutes, Lex Richardson eluded a static Celtic defence to head home Saints' second goal from a Billy Abercromby cross and six minutes later Davie Provan reduced the deficit when he finished off some good work by Tommy Burns. In the final minute, another Richardson corner found McDougall 10 yards out and he netted to make the final score 3-1 and end the Champions' fifteen-match unbeaten run.

After the final whistle, the visiting fans refused to leave until their favourites came out to take the plaudits. Meanwhile, news filtered through that Rangers had defeated Hearts at Ibrox and so ended Saints' dreams of a second successive European adventure, but there would be more time for that in the remainder of the decade.