History beckons for Brora Rangers - but not if Montrose have their way
Friday 15 May 2015 15:12, UK
Brora Rangers are one game away from making history as the first team to be promoted into the Scottish Professional Football League (SPFL) from the Highland League. Sky Sports News HQ's Charles Paterson has been to visit them.
Fifty-eight miles north of Inverness, on the road to John O’Groats, sits a tiny village famous for its golf course and whisky distillery. Brora inhabitants number less than 1,200 people, but remarkably, it could soon have an SPFL football team.
Brora Rangers take a 1-0 lead into Saturday’s second leg of the League Two play-off at Montrose. If they can hold their nerve on the artificial surface at Links Park, an historic promotion will be secured.
This match is a seminal moment for Scottish football, in what is the first year of the pyramid system being operational within the league structure. When league reconstruction in 2013 brought the SPL and SFL together to form the SPFL, the merger also opened a relegation trapdoor at the foot of Scottish football’s fourth tier to the regional leagues below.
This season, for the first time, teams from the Highland and Lowland Leagues have had the chance to gain promotion into the divisions above.
Brora Rangers are poised to make the most of this opportunity. They are Highland League champions for a second successive season, after winning it for the first time in 2014. The scale of their superiority is staggering. In two title-winning seasons they’ve lost just one league game. They’ve scored 257 goals in that time and conceded just 29; a goal difference of plus 228. Statistically, Brora are streets ahead of the opposition.
Financial backing
Much of this sudden success is down to pure hard cash, and the financial backing of one man in particular. Ben Mackay is the local boy who went away to earn his fortune, and returned to live out a dream.
Born and raised in the village, Mackay built up a successful business career in the oil and gas industry, and through his former company CRC Evans, has invested in his local team. The recruitment of, in particular, a number of former Inverness Caledonian Thistle and Ross County players, has jet-propelled Brora’s fortunes on the park.
But here is where a contradiction emerges. Brora – and their wealthy sponsor – have publicly stated they do not want to be promoted. Last summer, in the wake of their first ever championship success, Mackay was quoted saying: "Sorry to tell the Highland League - we're not going anywhere. We've got the pyramid system now - we have to deal with it. If it happens, it happens - we would never ever throw a game - but my preference is for Brora to go nowhere.
"I would like to do with Brora Rangers what happened with Huntly FC [in the 1990s] and dominate the Highland League. Nothing would give me more pleasure than that."
A year later however, on the cusp of history, it appears the mood in the north has changed.
“No, I think now we have overcome that,” said Brora Rangers director David Dowling. “I think we would far rather win, 100 per cent. There are two buses going and everyone who’s going down really wants Brora to get promoted.”
Travel
Brora’s concerns over logistics, travel timings and costs remain. If they prevail on Saturday, promotion to League Two would mean four league meetings each with Annan Athletic and Berwick Rangers – each round trip totalling nearly 600 miles.
There would also be 400-mile round trips to Arbroath, Clyde, East Fife and East Stirling. Brora’s nearest neighbours in the league would be Elgin City – still 92 miles away.
This season in the Scottish Cup fifth round, Brora lost 4-1 at Queen of the South, a weekend trip that proved extremely expensive.
“It cost about £2,400 to play the tie,” said Dowling. “Financially, I mean Brora is a village of 1,200 people and to get 150 to 200 people watching them, the sums just don’t add up.”
One of those to have entered the Brora story is Stuart Kettlewell, released by Ross County at the start of the season after a setback in his recovery from injury. Kettlewell scored Brora’s winning penalty in a shoot-out to beat Lowland League champions Edinburgh City in the first play-off round.
When he is not playing in midfield alongside other former top division players such as Grant Munro, Ross Tokely, Zander Sutherland and Joe Malin, he coaches the Ross County U20s squad.
“Montrose are possibly favourites if you like being the league side,” he said. “We are carrying a 1-0 lead but they might be slight favourites playing on their own surface, which they use used to. We will see how it pans out but I think it might be a culture shock for some people. I don’t believe some folk know how far Brora is, certainly from Inverness, so that could be a big change.“
Montrose concern
Now the undisputed kings of the Highlands, Brora’s rise has been meteoric. But as a bright new dawn beckons for them, so their opponents are staring into the abyss.
Formed in 1879, Montrose have been in the Scottish League for 92 years, mostly plying their trade in the third or fourth tier. Their glory years in the 1970s saw a third-place finish in the old Division One (now the Scottish Championship) and a League Cup semi-final appearance. But this season, after winning their first two matches, Montrose plummeted to the foot of League Two and have been unable to recover.
I said to the players, do you want to be the first group of players to go from the SPFL to the Highland league? That is what we will be remembered for. That will be on our CV.
The lowlight of this season’s campaign was undoubtedly a 5-1 thrashing at home by neighbours Arbroath. Ironically, it’s Arbroath who will suffer most if Montrose go down.
“The Montrose game is our big ‘Rangers-Celtic’ tie basically,” said Arbroath chairman John Christison. “Financially it would be a disaster if Montrose go out of the league - not just for them but for us as well. It’s probably worth the thick end of £30,000 to Arbroath. It would be a huge hole if Montrose went out of the league.”
The fear among supporters is that Montrose may never recover if relegation occurs. Climbing back out of the Highland League, ahead of hungry teams backed by wealthy local businessman paying bigger wages, and navigating the play-offs with the Lowland League in competition, appears too much to bear. The club warned fans earlier this week not to invade the pitch on Saturday in an attempt to cause the match to be abandoned, if defeat looks likely.
Rumours of closure and doomsday scenarios, though, are off the mark according to Chairman Derek Sim.
No fear
“The club doesn’t want to go into the Highland League but we are not fearful in the sense, will Montrose survive? Montrose Football Club will play in the Highland League," he said. “We are committed to that. We are putting down a new 3D synthetic pitch.”
Montrose was one of 23 SFL clubs to vote in favour of league reconstruction proposals in 2013. Now that the pyramid system is poised to claim its first victim, feelings have changed.
“Going back two years, when it was all being discussed with the amalgamation between the SFL and SPL, there were a number of aspects to the merger, which included the period system,” Sim said. “In retrospect there were a number of aspects to the period system that could have been improved, but at the time the SFA felt that everything had been looked at and that we should proceed.
“With other aspects of the merger clubs voted in favour, I’m sure as Montrose look back, being in this position, we may have reconsidered two years ago, as I’m sure other clubs would. Going forward, the pyramid system should be in place but I think there should be a proper pyramid system. Whether that includes north and south regionalisation etc, as is in place in England at the moment.”
Pride
Manager Paul Hegarty was appointed in February to try to rescue the fortunes of this proud Angus club. Hegarty once captained Dundee United to victory over Barcelona at the Nou Camp, and led his team out in a UEFA Cup final; as someone who has scaled the heights of the game, personal pride is paramount – and that matters in Saturday’s game, too.
“I said to the players, do you want to be the first group of players to go from the SPFL to the Highland league? I said, I don’t want to be the first manager. But that is what we will be remembered for. That will be on our CV," he said.
Hegarty was named League Two manager of the month for April after two wins and a draw from four matches, but he was unable to avoid entering the play-off. With a raucous home crowd expected, he is expecting an improved performance from the first leg at Brora’s Dudgeon Park.
“The reason why is because we didn’t play well as a team,” he said. “From my point of view we got out of jail because if Brora were more clinical that day then it could have been more. So thankfully looking at that picture, we are only 1-0 down.
“Obviously we are on our home patch, but they will come down full of confidence and rightfully so as they haven’t been beaten all season. That speaks volumes for David Dowling and his players. We have to try and change that and do that on Saturday. This is probably the most important football game Montrose have ever had.”
The creation of the pyramid system has opened up a wealth of opportunity to teams seeking promotion from outside the top four divisions. Clubs such as Spartans in Edinburgh and Inverurie Locos near Aberdeen have invested in infrastructure and community development as well as squad improvement.
At the same time, the old established order of the Scottish leagues is now under serious threat. Clubs that have existed for years in the lower divisions are now casting glances downwards as well as up. Saturday’s meeting between Montrose and Brora may be the moment when the dam holding back a tide of small, but ambitious football clubs, is finally breached.
