Tangled Up in Blue

by Stephen O'Donnell

  William McBeath was the only one of the Rangers founders not from the area around the Gare Loch in Argyll. Perhaps in recognition of his organisational skills, rather than his footballing prowess, McBeath was elected Rangers’ first president in time for the 1874 season. However, his association with the club ended as early as 1876, after he was replaced in the team by George Gillespie, and his name fails to appear in any records thereafter. By 1884, he had completely dropped off the club’s radar, when, at their half-yearly meeting in April, he was invited to dinner and presented with a gold badge by Tom Vallance in honour of his role in the club’s foundation.

  William’s work as a commercial traveller had taken him away from Glasgow, where he apparently prospered in Bristol, but by 1897 he had lost his job, his relationship with his wife had broken down and his family had split up. He accepted a position as a commissioning agent, selling advertising space in a holiday newspaper but, along with his employer, he was charged with obtaining money under false pretences, a crime for which his boss was convicted and sentenced to 21 months of hard labour. Happily William, by now 40 years old and known as William McBeth, was acquitted of all charges. Later, he moved to Bradford and remarried, risking the wrath of the law once more by falsely claiming that he was a widower.

  Perhaps to escape the charge of bigamy, he moved with his new bride to Lincoln, but the couple did not fare well. William spent time in prison, and was subsequently relocated to a poorhouse, from where his wife made numerous attempts to try and discharge him. She was unsuccessful and William frequently had to be escorted back to the residence by police officers acting as social workers. Like the amusing, but ultimately tragic half-man, Mr Dick, in Dickens’s David Copperfield, McBeath’s mental health seems to have irrevocably deteriorated and he was officially listed as a ‘certified imbecile’, an unforgiving diagnosis, although in modern medical parlance his condition may have been recognised as an advanced state of Alzheimer’s disease. He died in the poorhouse infirmary in July 1917, aged 61, and was given a pauper’s burial.

  For William McBeath and Peter McNeil in particular, it might not be too facile to suggest that we can perhaps see an early, extreme example of the often devastating impact on the lives of young players who fail to make the grade as footballers. It must have been especially difficult in their cases, because they were founder members of a club which became hugely successful, once they were overlooked in favour of others. They had been put aside by their peers at Rangers and although they were both given administrative roles when they dropped out of the team, they missed out on all the glory, as over the course of their adult lives the game of football grew more popular than they could ever have foreseen. Coupled with failure in their personal and professional lives, they were sadly unable to recover from such a series of blows to their Victorian sense of self-esteem, with ultimately tragic consequences.

  Rangers, meanwhile, the club which, back in the day, these star-crossed young boys had dreamt up and established, were continuing to grow on and off the field, although it seems that the club had a haughty, bad-tempered element associated with them, even from the earliest days. The young team had started to gain a bad reputation for themselves for persistently protesting results and decisions which had gone against them and there was growing indignation and criticism at the way their affairs were being conducted.

  There had been controversy on the field as far back as 1875/76 during a second round Scottish Cup meeting with Glasgow rivals Third Lanark. Rangers won the initial game 1-0 at Cathkin Park, but they had apparently taken the kick-off at the start of both halves, a clear breach of the rules, so a replay was ordered which Rangers lost. Suitably miffed, this time it was Rangers’ turn to complain to the SFA, on the grounds that Thirds’ goalkeeper had not been properly stripped for the match and, wearing his everyday clothes, he couldn’t be clearly distinguished from the other players. Rangers also claimed that Thirds’ winning goal should have been disallowed for handball, a dubious appeal given that the referee’s decision was final in these matters, and that the game had ended early after spectators encroached on to the field. Their protest was thrown out and Thirds progressed to the next round at Rangers’ expense.

  The following season saw the infamous, twice-replayed Scottish Cup Final of 1877, which pitched Rangers against a Vale of Leven side who, in an earlier round, had inflicted a first ever domestic defeat on Queen’s Park in the ten years of the formative Hampden club’s existence. After a 1-1 draw between the two finalists in the first game at Hamilton Crescent, the subsequent replay attracted a sizeable crowd, which estimates put at between 8,000 and 15,000, in all probability a British record at the time. Again the game finished tied at 1-1, but during the agreed period of extra time confusion reigned after Rangers claimed that, following a shot from Dunlop, the ball had passed between the goalposts and rebounded out again off a spectator. The Rangers players insisted that a legitimate goal should have been awarded, but the referee, after consulting his two umpires, who seemed to be divided on the matter, disagreed. The protests went on so long that a section of the huge crowd became restless and invaded the field and, amid chaotic scenes, the game had to be abandoned early when the Hamilton Crescent pitch could not be cleared. Vale of Leven subsequently won a second replay, 3-2 at the old Hampden Park, and took the cup.

  An even more serious incident occurred two years later, again in the Scottish Cup Final and again featuring the same two teams, Rangers and Vale of Leven, on Saturday, 19 April 1879. Having defeated Queen’s Park for the first time in torrential rain in the semi-final, Rangers were leading the final 1-0 when a second ‘goal’, a header from Struthers, was disallowed for offside. With Rangers holding on late in the game, and seemingly on the verge of collecting their first piece of silverware, Vale equalised when converted goalkeeper George Gillespie misjudged an angled shot from Ferguson at the near post. Almost as soon as the game had finished, Rangers let it be known that they were lodging an appeal, claiming that the earlier, disallowed goal should have stood. Quite rightly, the SFA again dismissed the protest on the grounds that the referee’s decision is final and cannot later be overturned by any means.

  Led by captain Tom Vallance, Rangers snootily refused to turn up for the replay, preferring a day out at Ayr races instead, and Vale were awarded the cup by default. Some measure of revenge was gained when Rangers defeated the same opponents 2-1 in the final of the Glasgow Charity Cup at Hampden later the same year, a notable achievement as the club collected its first ever trophy, but there was bad blood in that fixture as well, and several of the players were exchanging blows by the end.

  Despite their growing popularity at the turnstiles, it’s not hard to see how the still young club was starting to rub some people up the wrong way, as these protests became a feature of Rangers’ fixtures over the course of the next few years. The game’s administrators were appalled by their behaviour, as were certain newspapers and other sporting publications, with the Scottish Athletic Journal (SAJ) claiming that nobody outside of Kinning Park liked the club, and accusing them of bad sportsmanship, lack of humour and mean-spiritedness. In addition, the club’s followers were starting to gain a bad reputation for their loutish and foul-mouthed behaviour and Kinning Park was considered one of the most notorious grounds in Scotland for unruly conduct among spectators.

  If Rangers’ popularity had risen in the 1870s among a relatively small but select group, who admired their youthful energy and captivating style of play, it was a different story by the mid-1880s as football’s popularity continued to grow exponentially and the demographic makeup of the game’s followers began to change. In September 1882, Rangers were drawn to play Queen’s Park in the second round of the Scottish Cup at Hampden, a team that the SAJ, in April of the same year, had taken to task for their exclusivity and elitism: ‘Social distinction in the matter of admitting members must be purged away,’ the journal warned Queen’s. ‘It is true the men who upheld the name of the club so gloriously in days g
one past had a class connection of a kind, but then they were of the few who played the game. Now everyone plays, and the commonest artisan has the same chance of becoming a great player as the youth who can command a certain social position.’

  Despite being the home side, it was noted that Queen’s had to endure stony silence when their three goals were scored, whereas Rangers’ two strikes were greeted with enthusiastic cheering. By the time the sides met again three years later, again at Hampden in September 1885, the reputation of Rangers’ followers had plummeted so low that the residents of Mount Florida were reluctant to let them anywhere near their respectable part of town.

  Rangers’ fans seemed to be at the opposite end of the social spectrum from the upper-crust Queen’s Parkers, and they displayed their by now customary vulgarity during another bad-tempered 3-2 defeat for their team. The Scottish Athletic Journal called on Rangers to put their house in order, describing the atmosphere at Hampden as ‘a perfect pandemonium’. In November 1888, former player John McCartney summed up the general mood when he observed that, ‘the following of Rangers is the worst in Scotland’, after he was heckled by the home crowd at the old Ibrox while playing for Cowlairs.

  It wasn’t just the fans, however, as ten years on from the club’s foundation, Rangers’ players by now were also acquiring a reputation for drunken and boorish behaviour. Most were not deemed to be gentlemen, according to the standards of the day, and many were often seen to be the worse for wear at club functions. In November 1883, following a Charity Cup match against Queen’s Park, a rather sumptuous spread was set up in a nearby pub, the Athole Arms, for the players and officials of the two teams. Queen’s, however, refused to attend the post-match bash, maintaining that it was an unnecessary expense for a fundraising game, so the Rangers camp, undaunted, tucked into the repast alone. In 1885, the club tried their hand at the FA Cup, the competition being open to all British teams at the time, although the cost of travel and accommodation meant that few Scottish sides chose to participate.

  This changed, however, when the competition was regionalised and twice Queen’s Park reached the final, in 1884 and 1885, losing on both occasions to Blackburn Rovers. Rangers were drawn against a Lancashire team called Rawtenstall, but the Glasgow club’s participation in the competition got off to a false start when they refused to meet the Lancastrians, on the grounds that their team contained professional players. For their refusal to fulfil the fixture, Rangers were hit with a financial penalty of ten shillings, meaning that to this day the club retains the dubious honour of being the only Scottish side ever to be fined by the English FA.

  Undaunted, Rangers tried again the following year when they were drawn to face Everton at their Anfield ground in Liverpool. Despite turning up late and causing the kick-off to be delayed by 15 minutes after being thrown out of their hotel for excessive drunken behaviour the night before, Rangers managed a 1-0 win with a goal from Charlie Heggie. The Glasgow club made further progress in the competition after successive home victories in the following rounds and were eventually drawn against Aston Villa in the semi-final. In a game played in front of 10,000 spectators in Crewe, Villa ran out 3-1 winners, thanks in no small part to a poor performance by the Rangers goalkeeper Willie Chalmers, who had overindulged himself at lunch on the day of the game. The Scottish Umpire reported, ‘The weak points of the Rangers were in deficient combination and dash of the forwards, rather weak defence and downright poor goalkeeping.’

  It would be the last game played by a Scottish team in the FA Cup, as at the end of the season, the SFA, fearing a dilution of its influence, banned its members from participation in any cup competition other than those organised under its own auspices.

  Meanwhile, there was also trouble brewing behind the scenes at the Kinning Park club. On 11 November 1882, the team’s match against St Bernard’s in Edinburgh had to be cancelled at the last minute when club president Archie Harkness died suddenly from typhoid, aged 26. The untimely passing of Harkness had the unfortunate effect on Rangers of allowing the unscrupulous honorary secretary John Mackay to dominate the club and its business. Many clubs faced in-house difficulties around this time as the pressure to professionalise, in an increasingly competitive environment, clashed with the ideal of the amateur, Corinthian spirit, which was stridently cherished by some.

  Professionalism was more or less allowed in England from the mid-1880s, but the amateur game held on in Scotland until the establishment of league football at the start of the following decade. Some clubs did not survive the transition, while others, such as Celtic, continued only after internal bloodletting. Famously, Queen’s Park stood aloof from the societal changes in the game, even after the establishment of league football in Scotland, and they continue as an amateur club to this day, long after their counterparts in England, the military and the alumni teams from the boarding schools and universities who dominated football south of the border in the early years, have been consigned to the history books.

  At Rangers, however, the in-fighting was particularly bitter, amid serious financial problems and chaotic maladministration. The tragic Harkness had been replaced as club president by the builder George Goudie, who immediately lent the struggling institution £30 in order to stay afloat. The early pioneers had long since departed the scene and even Tom Vallance had moved to India in February 1882, although he returned a year later after contracting a debilitating illness which effectively ended his playing career at the age of 26. As well as playing for Rangers for ten years and winning seven caps for Scotland, Vallance, handsome and imposing at 6ft 2in tall, also excelled at rowing and was an accomplished athlete. Like many Rangers players at that time, he was a member of the Clydesdale Harriers Athletics Club, who were associated with Rangers through their respective membership lists and their joint use of the playing fields at Kinning Park.

  A socialite who liked to move in influential circles, Vallance diversified into the restaurant business and later became president of the restaurateurs’ and hotelkeepers’ association. Clearly something of a Renaissance Man, he was also a self-taught artist and his paintings were later exhibited at the Royal Glasgow Institute. On his return from India, Vallance assumed the role of the club’s president in May 1883, with Goudie stepping down to vice-president, and immediately promised that the three major cups would all be won by Rangers in the new season. It turned out to be mere bravado however, and when Rangers were duly knocked out of the three competitions and no trophies were forthcoming, the Scottish Athletic Journal mischievously promised to provide Rangers with three tea cups instead.

  Vallance’s return failed to provide Rangers with the stability they required, as the scheming John Mackay assumed the role of match secretary following Peter McNeil’s departure, increasing his stranglehold on power at the club as Rangers’ tribulations continued. In 1883, the club agreed to play against Dumbarton in a benefit game, following the capsize of the steamer Daphne at its launch on the Clyde, which had resulted in the loss of 146 lives, to this day still the greatest disaster ever witnessed in the Glasgow shipbuilding industry. Dumbarton were shocked when the Rangers officials, despite the game being played at Kinning Park, drew their expenses from the relief fund, and after Rangers subsequently received criticism in the local press for their mean-spiritedness, Mackay fired off an angry response to the SAJ, complaining of a ‘spiteful and baseless attack’ against the club and effectively stating that it was okay for big clubs like Dumbarton to play for nothing, but Rangers couldn’t afford it.

  On several occasions during Mackay’s troubled reign at the club, Rangers were also accused of fielding ineligible or professional players and, on at least one occasion, came close to having their membership of the SFA terminated as a result. In October 1884, the team faced Third Lanark in the Scottish Cup and selected former player Sam Thomson for the tie, a Scotland international forward who had previously joined Preston North End and was therefore no longer a registered member of the Kinning Park club. Thirds p
rotested but the controversy could not be cleared up and, with the original game finishing 1-1, the replay went ahead the following week. Again the match finished in a draw and again Rangers had fielded a professional player, Archie Steel of Bolton Wanderers, although the matter was not investigated and, under the rules of the day, both clubs progressed to the next stage.

  Perhaps inevitably, Rangers and Third Lanark were immediately drawn to face one another in the following round and once again the Kinning Park men were living dangerously. Mackay was suspected of doctoring documents, following the appearance of a T. Cook for Rangers, which Thirds were convinced represented another instance of Rangers fielding an ineligible player. The club had signed Tommy Cook in July, but it took until October before the player was properly registered with the SFA, although Rangers did have a J. Cook on their books at the time, who would have been authorised to play in the tie. The match card from the day subsequently turned up with the ‘T’ altered to look like a ‘J’, with Mackay implicated in the unauthorised amendment.

  Not for the last time in their history, Rangers seemed to be flouting the rules and getting away with it, as a proven case of forged documentation would surely have seen the club expelled from the cup, and possibly even suspended from the SFA. The SAJ, outraged at the apparent injustice following Rangers’ 3-0 win over their disgruntled opponents, described the affair as ‘one of the biggest scandals that ever disgraced the annals of football’, with the journal’s editor apparently so vexed by the whole commotion that he was moved to suggest, ‘I am certain the football world will agree with me that it is far better the Rangers should die than a noble pastime be dragged in the mire.’