Somner Sinks the 'Ton in the Sun (1980)

(first published in the match programme for St. Mirren v Hearts, 16^th August 2025)

St. Mirren travelled to Cappielow Park to face Morton in a Premier League fixture on 16^th August 1980. Both clubs were looking for their first league win of the season, St. Mirren having lost 1-0 at home to Aberdeen in the opening fixture, whilst Morton had gone down by the odd goal in three at Parkhead.

The Morton programme for the St. Mirren match was a sixteen page, A5 sized issue, priced at 20p. The colour aspects of the programme (cover artwork and internal topic headings) were pre-printed in bulk at the start of the season and these "templates" were subsequently overprinted in black with the details and articles for each issue. The programme had a predominately blue cover and featured a photo taken from the away end at Cappielow during a previous Morton v St. Mirren encounter.

This style of programme production was used by a number of clubs at the time and sometimes resulted in the same issue having different programme covers and mistakes creeping in the internal pages. There were two different covers for the Morton v St. Mirren clash of March 1980 and the Greenock club's programme against Rangers later that season had to be withdrawn completely after glaring mistakes were found in the internal photos and team lines.

To the collector, such differences are akin to misprinted postage stamps and the rarer versions of any surviving programmes are much sought after, commanding eye-watering prices when they do appear for sale.

Inside, the list of Club Officials sat alongside a number of news snippets in "Sidelines". Morton manager Benny Rooney's "Cappielow Comment" expressed disappointment at having lost to Celtic in their first outing. He stressed the importance of picking up home points early in the season and recognised the stiff opposition that St. Mirren would provide, as they had been unlucky to lose in their match against the Dons.

There followed two pages of Reserve news, featuring Eddie Morrison's review of his side's 1-1 home draw against Celtic and fixture lists for the Reserve League West Section, Reserve League Cup and Professional Youth matches for the season.

An unusual topic to be included in such a short programme was "Premier Pin-up", displaying a full-page photo of Dundee United's Derek Stark, with no other text or comment. The centre pages then featured photos of Morton's clash with Celtic, courtesy of William J. Keough Photography.

"Spotlight on St. Mirren" occupied pages ten and eleven. After a potted history of the Paisley Club's history and achievements, there were detailed pen pictures of thirteen first team squad members, including a 5ft 1in version of John McCormack (!).

"Club History - Part 21" looked at season 1936/37, in which Morton reached the Scottish Cup semi-finals, only to lose 2-0 to Aberdeen at Easter Road. There was some consolation for the Greenock club that season as they finished runners-up to Ayr United in the Second Division and gained promotion. However, the gulf between the First and Second Divisions was too great and in the following season they were relegated, losing 29 out of 38 League matches and finishing seventeen points adrift of second-bottom Dundee.

Two pages were set aside for the 1980/81 league and cup fixtures and results, but the pages were virtually empty owing to the early nature of the season.

The back page was reserved for the team line-ups, which accurately represented both starting XIs. The only exception was the inclusion of John Craig in place of the listed Jimmy Miller on the Morton substitutes' bench.

A pleasantly warm day greeted the 6,504 spectators who descended on Greenock for the August clash, but it was soon to become red-hot for the home defence. After just two minutes, Morton's Billy McLaren was adjudged to have impeded Lex Richardson in the penalty area and Doug Somner despatched the resultant spot kick high into the net to put St. Mirren 1-0 up.

The home side continued to struggle and should have been punished for further defensive lapses but, against the run of play, they equalised eight minutes from the interval. Bobby Thomson took a clever pass from Jim Tolmie and crossed for Roddy Hutchison to head home past Billy Thomson.

Ten minutes into the second half, a long clearance from the Saints' goalkeeper found its way through for an advancing Somner to first-time the ball into the net amidst a statuesque Morton defence. Three minutes later, Billy Stark was given the freedom of Cappielow to control a Jackie Copland cross and steer the ball past home custodian Roy Baines to extend St. Mirren's lead further.

Morton's humiliation was completed in the final minute when George Anderson pulled down Stark in the box and Somner completed his hattrick to register a 4-1 final scoreline.