Abandon Chip twice cooked

Another favourite and brought to mind when passing the location of the former football ground now a supermarket just yesterday in the pouring rain...... 

Statistically it must be a sporting record.

I would be interested to hear to the contrary.

Scarborough Football Club, one of the oldest club sides in English Football founded in 1879 played for 120 years before suffering their first ever relegation.

It had been a modest start with a group from a cricket club in the North Yorkshire seaside town upping stumps in pursuit of another out of season sporting activity to keep limbs and minds active. The next 8 years were as part timers in local leagues and in 1927 the club turned Professional and was accepted into the Midlands League.

The inter war period represented the halcyon days for football at all levels in the country with good levels of support, both in feet on the terraces and monies in the club bank account. The 1937 to 1938 season saw a record attendance at the Seamer Road sports ground of 11,162 against Luton Town in the FA Cup.

In the 1970's Scarborough FC had some adventures in the same competition and also found themselves playing in the Anglo-Italian Cup where there were victories against Udinese and Parma.

Progress in the lower leagues had been slow but methodical and as Champions of the Conference Division in 1987 under Neil Warnock's managership Scarborough became the first team to reach the mainstream English Football League by such a tortuous route.

The Fourth Division then, or League 2 as it is now known, represented the big time for the club and town. In a pioneering sponsorship a major employer, McCain, famous for its oven chips, purchased the naming rights for the football ground and team shirts and Seamer Road became the McCain Stadium.

The small ground of capacity 6,408 was located on the south side of Scarborough on the western edge of a main approach and nestled below steep valley sides including the local landmark and occasional motor bike racing circuit of Olivers Mount.

A famous 3-2 win over Chelsea in the League Cup in 1989 gave the club a giant-killing reputation and there was another good run in the FA Cup in the 1992 to 1993 season before being knocked out 1-0 by Arsenal who were eventual winners over another proud Yorkshire Team in Sheffield Wednesday. The forays into the inter-league competitions were a bonus although the club's time in the lowest division was not without it's high points including just losing out in a promotion to Division Three after losing to Torquay in a Play-off.

The circumstances of Scarborough's first ever relegation in 1999 have gone down in football folklore although for the wrong reasons and in favour of another team. The final day of the season saw Scarborough at home to Peterborough United with rivals for the drop, Carlisle playing Plymouth Argyle. At the end of the match at the McCain Stadium and as it stood in  both games at 1-1 there was a pitch invasion by the Seasiders in celebration of surviving a twelfth season in the Football League. This was shortly to turn to despair as in Cumbria, in the last kick of the game the Carlisle goalkeeper, Jimmy Glass, in a legendary exploit came up the full length of the pitch and as a corner kick swung in he scored the matchwinner, saving his own team but pushing Scarborough out of the top flight.

It proved to be a very slippery slope and within a few years Scarborough FC were in dire financial crisis. It was hoped that the Stadium site could be sold for a housing development with the proceeds expected to clear the accumulated debts of £2.5 million as well as providing a surplus to fund a new ground farther out of the town. A old Covenant in the Deeds for the football ground dedicating its use for sporting activities only was an obstacle too big to surmount, any prospects of a last minute salvation foundered and in June 2007 the club ceased to exist.

The title of this blog is taken from a Fanzine for the club showing a sense of topical but black humour.

I drive into Scarborough on a regular basis and the sight of the abandoned and derelict former Stadium site is a poignant reminder of the fortunes of a football team and serves as a salutory warning to those clubs just about keeping their heads above the mire of financial meltdown.