SFL in focus: Elgin aiming to come out of Highland shadows

The promotion of Ross County to the Scottish Premier League, confirmed earlier this week, will see the return of a well-supported derby from next season alongside a boost to the northern economy.

In their Highland League days, Elgin were routinely and rightly regarded as a bigger club than Ross County and challengers to the Inverness teams. Yet elevation to the Scottish Football League hasn’t so far proved anything like as valuable to Elgin as their Highland neighbours.

The coming weeks may change that. Elgin currently occupy a play-off place in the Third Division, a welcome and positive change from years of scraping around at the foot of the table.

“I can’t comment on what it was like before I came to the club but people are certainly positive around the place now,” explains Barry Wilson, Elgin’s assistant manager.

“You can see it in people’s reactions. We will go away from home and draw and the directors will be a bit disappointed. We have obviously come some distance for that to be the case.

“The biggest change at the club has been in the crowds. When I came we were averaging 300-400 for league games. We’ve had 1000 at one game and are averaging 600-700, which is the biggest in the league.

“When Elgin were winning titles and competing for cups in the Highland League, they would regularly have those high crowds. I wouldn’t say I knew this was a sleeping giant, but it was a club capable of pulling big crowds.

“Companies in the town are coming back out to help the club, sponsorship has improved and we’ll routinely have 100-150 in hospitality. So there are definite signs of improvement.”

Wilson played for both Inverness and County and still lives in Dingwall. Although he has cause to be less surprised than most by Highland progression, the 40-year-old never anticipated the rapid development of his former clubs.

“I don’t think anyone could have predicted both clubs would make it to the Premier League in 18 years. If they claim that now, I think they are lying,” he said.

“It has been fantastic for both of them. Inverness obviously did it in a pretty short time whereas County had some setbacks along the way, dropping into the Second Division and the like.

“What it has done is backed up the actions of people 20 years ago.”

And so to the chances of Elgin finally moving up a level. Alloa, the runaway champions of Division Three, thumped Ross Jack’s team 8-1 last weekend in claiming the championship.

“That was the worst day for me in 22 years of football,” Wilson says,

“We lost six at Queen’s Park earlier in the season and I thought that was bad, but last week was worse. It has been a strange season. We have been on the receiving end of a couple of tankings but handed a few out ourselves. I thought from the start of the season that Alloa had the strength in depth that would win them the league and so it proved, with the rest fighting for the play-offs.

“We went to Dingwall and won in the Challenge Cup and that’s when I really thought we had a team that could challenge. We have done that and given ourselves a chance but, for now, it is only a chance.”

Still, Jack and Wilson have already proved a useful double act. “I read Ross in the paper saying he is a horrendous loser, I think he was going easy on himself there,” Wilson laughs.

“He is incredibly knowledgeable about his job. He knows the positions of every player in the league; it took me long enough to get to know most of the names.”

If Elgin are to earn promotion, Wilson will play no on-field part from next season. The assistant has announced he will retire from playing at the end of this campaign.

“Funnily enough, I think the Second Division is where a lot of our players would be more comfortable,” he explains.

“The Third Division is hard, very physical and I think the boys would like the chance to play more football. It won’t be strange for me not to be playing any more. I’ve kind of been on a football diet for a while now, playing only when needed so it won’t represent much of a change.”