My Matchday - 307 St Mirren Park

St Mirren 1v1 Aberdeen

Scottish Premier League

Saturday 25th February 2012

It’s four years since I made my last visit to Paisley to tick off Love Street, a year before retail giants Tesco got their greedy hands on St Mirren’s home for the previous 115 years. The noon kick off meant the possibility of bagged two grounds, so I set off on the 0738 to Glasgow Central for the first train journey out of a series of six in pursuit of a Scottish double.
As I’ve already featured St Mirren on 100FgC, any Googlewallers that have arrived at this page looking for information on the Saints, their ground history and the town of Paisley should check out my previous post - My Matchday – 157 Love Street.

I have a bit of a soft spot for St Mirren, the principal logic being that I have an affinity for clubs that wear vertical black and white stripes, well apart from Juventus of course, and Grimsby as well, and come to think of it I’m not too chewed on Notts County either, but apart from them I always cheer on the black ‘n’ whites.

St Mirren completed their move from one St Mirren Park to another in January 2009, or to use their more common names - from Love Street to Greenhill Road. The new stadium was officially opened by club chairman Stewart Gilmour and First Minister Alex Salmond, prior to the first match against Kilmarnock. The game finished 1-1, with the stadium’s first goal scored by Kilmarnock striker and former mackem lummox Kevin Kyle ,with Dennis Wyness grabbing the first goal for the Buddies.
St Mirren Park was built on a former housing estate site in Ferguslie Park by Barr Construction at a cost of around £8m. The ground is pretty basic affair containing four separate stands with an overall capacity of 8,023.

There are single tiered stands on three sides, similar in size with large windshields at each side. The North and South Stands have a capacity of 1,600, decked out in black with two horizontal white bands of seats.
The 2,200 Main Stand is taller than the others due to the large panel wall which rises up to the roof. This area contains office space, hospitality, press room as well as having the team dugouts at the front.
Opposite is the 2,216 capacity East Stand, which is similar to the stands behind the goals except it has SMFC in white seats in front of the TV gantry.
Outside of the stadium there’s plenty of car park space around three sides and next to the main reception is the club shop with a supporter’s wall of fame. There are also outdoor 5-a-side pitches behind the North Stand.

I arrived at Paisley St James just before 11am, then after doing a lap of the interior of the ground I picked up my press pass and got prepared for the noon SPL clash with Aberdeen.

I don’t know if it was the early kick off or maybe the cold breeze and rain showers but the match produced an uneventful first half. Aberdeen were the better side with Icelandic playmaker Kari Arnason going close with a header and shooting just wide from the edge of the box.
I welcomed the half time interval as I was pleased to get out of the wind tunnel stand and get stuck into the hot drinks, scotch pies and biscuits in the press room. The lads covering the game for ESPN struggled to find anything to discuss, focusing on the disallowed goal in injury time from Ryan Jack who was marginally offside, the linesman getting the decision spot on.

The game sprang into life with two goals in the space of a few minutes just before the hour mark. Danger man Nigel Hasselbaink (before you ask it’s Jimmy’s nephew…Eddy) got on the end of a Steven Thompson flick to race into the box and place his shot inside the far post. However the Dons reply was instant, a long ball from Mawene found Megginson in the box who calmly laid the ball into the path of Vernon, who rifled the ball high into the net.

The match improved as both sides looked for a winner and it was the visitors who went closest with substitute Pawlett going close and then Teale had a last minute strike which Brown dealt with comfortably.
After the match I legged it across the road to catch the Gourock train, the 30 minute journey gave me time to defrost before alighting at Cartsdyke for the second leg of today’s double at Greenock Morton.

SMFC 1(Hasselbaink) AFC 1(Vernon 59)att.3,627     Admission:Press (£20) Programme £2.50

Ground no.307 St Mirren Park - Matchday Web album (23 pictures)

St Mirren (Scotland)

Formed as a gentlemen's club in Paisley way back in the Victorian mists of 1877, St Mirren can rightly be described as one of the most historic teams in Scottish football. One of only five remaining clubs from the foundation of the Scottish League in 1890, they played one of the first night games in history that same year when Morton's ground was lit by gaslamps. They are named after St Mirin of Benchor, an Irish monk and missionary who was the founder of Paisley Abbey in the sixth century, and wenty on to become the town's patron saint.

There is some dispute as to why they play in the glorious black and white. Some say that the colours come from the black and white tiles that mark the floors of all Masonic lodges, others that it refers to the black and white river carts that run through Paisley. But the most likely, and more prosaic answer is that they just liked the look of Notts County's strip.

They played at their famous and evocative Love Street ground between 1894 and 2009, the stadium seeing their record, pre-health and safety attendance of 47,438 for a game against Celtic in 1949. However, in 2005 they decided to move away from their historic base and move to a new purpose-built stadium to help clear their significant debts. The last match to be played at Love Street was a goalless draw against Motherwell on 3 January 2009 - a highly emotional afternoon before a sell out crowd.

Their next home game a couple of weeks later was at the newly built St Mirren Park, an 8,000 capacity identikit stadium, not far from their old home, opened by Scottish First Minister Alex Salmond on 31 January. The first match, against Kilmarnock, finished in a 1-1 draw, the first goal scored by the Killies' Kevin Kyle.

As far as results go, they've won the Scottish Cup on three occasions, in 1926, 1959 and 1987, and have a long history in Scotland's top flight, their best finish being when they came in third behind Aberdeen and Celtic in 1980. They are also the only Scottish club to have ever won the Anglo-Scottish Cup, beating Bristol City in a two-legged final in their glory season of 1980.

They are perhaps most notable though as being the only club to have ever sacked Sir Alex Ferguson. In his second managerial position, after a brief stint at East Stirlingshire, he took the club from being a lower second division outfit with meagre crowds upon his appointment in 1974, to first division champs in 1977. And starting a theme that would stick with him to his Manchester United days, he won it with kids - the average age of his winning squad being a baby-faced 19 years. Little is known of the exact reason for his dismissal, but stories abound of his unreasonable behaviour to club staff and his being tapped up by Aberdeen for their managerial job.

But I'm sure The Buddies, as they are quaintly known, would much prefer to be remembered for their football and their long, proud history than some grumpy old bloke who briefly passed through their gates - and long may they honor their colours!

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