Annan to finish bottom eh! and it’s all about playing.

Posted on Sunday, August 3rd, 2008

Early.                                         Well done Annan. Well done to the team who finished 7th in the East of Scotland Premier Division last season. Now it’s early days but those who said they’d struggle big style might be wrong and those who said they wouldn’t win a game before Christmas are wrong.

What does yesterday tell us?  The biggest single thing is that the difference between SFL and Non League football isn’t all it’s made out to be. Don’t get me wrong the Annan boys will have been motivated beyond belief and the Cowden boys, after beating Hibs 2-0 during the week, will have under estimated them whatever Danny Lennon said before the game.

“Football is played in the head” I wish I had £1 for every time I’ve told a squad of players that.

Cowden will regroup and come back stronger and Annan will find it hard to churn out results like yesterday but yesterday helped disprove something. The perceived gap between the SFL and top non league football isn’t all we’re told it is.

I played wide on the left at school but in my 5th and 6th year at Forrester there wasn’t an “over age” team to play for so I played in goal for the 3rd year reserves. From then until I was 20 I found it very hard to get a game out field. Saughton Athletic, Palmerston Hearts, it didn’t matter where I went I ended up in goal. The big thing was that I played.

When I eventually signed for Portobello Volta I played up front and I scored a lot of goals. Mussleburgh Juniors came calling and I was a bit scared of signing as playing meant everything to me. I did eventually sign, score a few more and after winning the league decider at Broxburn, Bob Shankly trapped me in the shower room and thrust a contract in my face to sign for Stirling Albion.

I didn’t hesitate. I was stepping up. I didn’t seriously consider what would happen if I went “senior” but didn’t get a game. As it was I went straight into the team and scored 125 goals for the Binos in 5 seasons.

I see Smiler got on yesterday but no sign of Jono. Ross is doing better and I hope the other two soon get a regular start like him. They are not young lads and need regular football.

We have a very small pool this season and unless quality players appear from no-where we’ll go with a small pool. That will keep everybody involved if not starting regularly and we do have our Seconds and U19′s to pull players in from and in the case of the Seconds a place where those not starting can get a run out.

Football is all about playing.