Ever-growing Spartan army defy elements to maintain cup tradition

Published on Sunday 11 January 2009 22:57

IT WASN'T much of a day for sombreros. Or, indeed, for any kind of clothing designed to fend off the sun. The Lanarkshire wind and rain had done that already.

But, undeterred, the followers of Spartans, the East of Scotland League football club from north Edinburgh who have made a habit of doing rather well in the Scottish Cup, were still determined to enjoy their day trip to Airdrie on Saturday. All right, so some killjoys insisted on wrapping up to protect themselves from hypothermia, but there were more than a gallant few who turned up at the Excelsior Stadium wearing the Mexican head gear.

They had done it at Pollok in the first round, at Annan in the second – including the futile original trip when they got there only to find the match had been postponed because of a waterlogged pitch – and at Elgin in the third. So why not still do it during a major downpour on a freezing afternoon in a bleak post-industrial landscape in the fourth?

Of course, for many followers of the club, sombreros are no more than the symbol of a commitment to enjoyable football. The steadily swelling ranks of the Spartans support – numbering nearly 500 on Saturday – include those who once attached themselves to larger teams, Hearts and Hibs among them. They feel closer to the action, and to the team, than they did at bigger clubs.

"You feel connected," said supporter Andy Davies, who at first claimed to have travelled all the way from Abergavenny for the match against Airdrie United, but then admitted to being a Welshman long resident in Edinburgh. "And the pies are consistently good."

The consistency of the pies at Airdrie was a matter of debate, but what is not open to question is the commitment of the Spartans fans. The club's origins as a team for former university graduates has led to its being perceived in some quarters as one of Scottish football's more genteel institutions, but there was nothing genteel about some of their shouts. "We're from the capital," they sang to the tune La Donna e Mobile. "You're from a shithole".

Only, rather than being natives of Edinburgh, many of those singers were actually English soldiers. Stationed at Redford Barracks, they were looking for a team to support throughout their stay, and were not interested in either of the city's Scottish Premier League teams.

The squaddies would no doubt come in useful if there was ever a confrontation with militant opposing supporters, but the banter always remains good humoured and there was not a hint of misbehaviour on Saturday, when Airdrie ended up 2-1 winners.

The home team were a touch lucky to have won, and at the end everyone thought themselves lucky the match had managed to reach a conclusion. With the rain refusing to relent, swathes of the pitch had disappeared under water long before full-time.

A hoarding on the Main Stand side boasted "Root vegetables: naturally grown, naturally tasty". And, as the puddles worsened, the pitch came more and more to resemble a tract of arable farmland. But probably not Mexican farmland.