Dumbarton FC Look To The Future

Season 2012/13 is a significant one for Dumbarton Football Club. Playing in the Irn Bru Scottish Football League First Division for the first time in 16 years, Dumbarton’s first return to the top division of the SFL since season 1995/96, is a testament to the hard work and dedication of all concerned with this historic football club.

Formed in 1872, Dumbarton were Scotland’s first ever national champions, sharing the first ever league title with Rangers in season 1890/91 (though Dumbarton were ahead on goal difference, this wasn’t taken into consideration in those days) and being crowned outright champions of Scotland the following season. It is said that the club’s reluctance to embrace professionalism in those early years of organised football are the reason that they never went on to fully exploit their position as one of Scotland’s big guns in domestic football at that time. Over the years Dumbarton have seen their fair share of ups and downs, with various promotions, relegations, financial crises and cup near misses, in particular the 4-3 extra time defeat against Celtic in the semi-final of the League Cup in October 1970 and the 3-0 replay defeat to Heart of Midlothian in the semi-final of the Scottish Cup in 1976.

Since the dawn of the modern game and the advent of all-seated stadia, Dumbarton have mostly occupied the lower tiers of the Scottish Football League, spending time variously in the Second and Third Divisions for the most part. However, the unlikely play-off success of last season has seen the club rise to Division One for the first time in 16 years and with that comes a new set of challenges.

Dumbarton are a part-time club in that their manager and players have day jobs and train only two evenings per week. This is a common position amongst football clubs in Scotland outwith the top two tiers of the professional game, however, it is somewhat unusual at the level which Dumbarton now find themselves operating at. The Scottish First Division is typically occupied by all or mostly full-time football clubs and this season is no exception as all but two of this season’s Division 1 teams are full-time or, in the cases of Raith Rovers and Cowdenbeath, a mixture of full-time and part-time playing staff. Only Dumbarton and Airdrie United are truly part-time in their operation, Airdrie only having dropped to part-time after being relegated from Division One 2 years ago.

Dumbarton’s play-off success and promotion had given the club, the town and the groundswell support a welcome boost and season ticket sales had increased accordingly, topping 450 prior to the beginning of the season. Matchday hospitality packages were similarly commercially successful, both of which bode well in these times of financial austerity and coming immediately after a summer when many pundits had predicted doom for provincial clubs in Scotland following the demise of Glasgow Rangers.

It is to this backdrop that Dumbarton began their season, having retained the majority of the players who had achieved an unlikely play-off promotion last season and adding a number of new faces to their squad in order to help them compete against their full-time rivals. The season’s league business did not begin with a bang however, as Dumbarton were humbled 0 – 3 at Airdrie United on matchday one, oddly enough an identical scoreline and venue to the first game of the previous season, and a defeat which was felt all the more as it had come at the hands of the league’s only other fully part-time club, a club which Dumbarton had overcome with ease in their play-off final success only 2 months earlier.

From there, results continued to follow a similar pattern and, though the Sons had achieved two draws in their two most recent fixtures prior to the international break (a 3-3 at home to Hamilton Academical and a 2-2 away to Raith Rovers), the club were beaten by 2 goals to nil at home to Falkirk when the league action resumed and the Board took the decision to cancel the manager’s contract.

The decision to replace a manager is one that is taken with increasing frequency in modern football and has become so commonplace that fans can now place bets with major bookmakers on which managers will be first to lose their jobs during the football season. However, it is the decision to replace Dumbarton manager Alan Adamson after only 9 league games which has raised eyebrows.

Dumbarton’s unbeaten run in the early months of 2012 saw the club competing with eventual Second Division title winners Cowdenbeath and big spending title hopefuls Arbroath in the top 3 of the Second Division, when in the first third of season 2011/12 Dumbarton had looked likely candidates for relegation to the bottom tier. It was that run of exceptional form which eventually saw Dumbarton win the Second Division play-offs and take their place amongst the elite clubs of the Scottish Football League. But yet, for all of Adamson’s success as both manager and assistant manager of Dumbarton, his tenure as manager of the club has been brought to an abrupt end after relatively few matches at Division One level.

Adamson was originally brought to the club as assistant manager to Jim Chapman in December 2007, having worked with Chapman previously at Albion Rovers, and the pair were tasked with firstly ensuring Dumbarton avoided finishing last in Scottish Division Three that season (a feat they achieved with an 8^th placed finish) and then taking the club out of the bottom tier, which the pair achieved in season 2008/09 when they won the Third Division title. Ironically, Adamson’s opportunity to become manager of the club came in October 2010 when Chapman was moved upstairs to become director of football and head of community development as the club sat last in Division Two. Adamson kept the team in the Second Division that season and won promotion to Division One via the following season’s play-offs after a third placed finish. Adamson has therefore been involved in keeping Dumbarton off of the foot of Division Three, winning the Third Division title, avoiding relegation from Division Two and achieving an unlikely promotion to Division One, not to mention the two Stirlingshire Cup successes in that time, all within 5 seasons at the club as coach and manager. For a part-time club with home gates regularly under 1,000 it would appear to be nothing short of miraculous that such a glut of achievements have been secured in this short time, and yet for all of his success with the club, the loss of 7 league matches has cost him his job. Adamson’s assistant, former Falkirk, St Mirren and Dunfermline defender Jack Ross, has been given temporary control of first team affairs whilst a permanent replacement is sought, however, the question must now surely be, who can Dumbarton possibly hire to replace Adamson?

Having achieved so much in so little time, it may be that those in charge at Dumbarton have become spoiled by success. Only time will tell if this is a decision which the club, and its fans, will come to regret. 

This is the original draft of this article. The version which was published in Ultimate Scottish Football magazine issue one can be viewed here:   http://issuu.com/ultimatescottishfootball/docs/usfissueone?mode=window&backgroundColor=%23222222
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Dumbarton FC Season 2012/13; A Season Of Mixed Emotions

The following article was written on 20th October 2012, two days before then Dumbarton FC manager Alan Adamson was relieved of his duties, and was due to be published in Ultimate Scottish Football magazine issue 1 on 25th October 2012. The article appears in its original draft format.

Season 2012/13 is a significant one for Dumbarton Football Club. Playing in the Irn Bru Scottish Football League First Division for the first time in 16 years, Dumbarton’s first return to the top division of the SFL since season 1995/96, is a testament to the hard work and dedication of all concerned with this historic football club.

Formed in 1872, Dumbarton were Scotland’s first ever national champions, sharing the first ever league title with Rangers in season 1890/91 (though Dumbarton were ahead on goal difference, this wasn’t taken into consideration in those days) and being crowned outright champions of Scotland the following season. It is said that the club’s reluctance to embrace professionalism in those early years of organised football are the reason that they never went on to fully exploit their position as one of Scotland’s big guns in domestic football at that time. Over the years Dumbarton have seen their fair share of ups and downs, with various promotions, relegations, financial crises and cup near misses, in particular the 4-3 extra time defeat against Celtic in the semi-final of the League Cup in October 1970 and the 3-0 replay defeat to Heart of Midlothian in the semi-final of the Scottish Cup in 1976.

Since the dawn of the modern game and the advent of all-seated stadia, Dumbarton have mostly occupied the lower tiers of the Scottish Football League, spending time variously in the Second and Third Divisions for the most part. However, the unlikely play-off success of last season has seen the club rise to Division One for the first time in 16 years and Dumbarton manager Alan Adamson is relishing the prospect of pitting his wits against his First Division counterparts: “After the way we started last season, we felt we would be lucky just to stay in the Second Division. We had a lot of new players and, as I said all season, it takes time for a team to gel, but fortunately for the team, me and everybody they did gel and we went on that run in January / February of 12 games unbeaten and at that stage we saw ourselves saying ‘can we win this league?’”.

Dumbarton’s unbeaten run in the early months of 2012 saw the club competing with eventual title winners Cowdenbeath and fellow title hopefuls Arbroath in the top 3 of the Second Division, when in the first third of the season Dumbarton had looked likely candidates for relegation to the bottom tier. But throughout that time, Adamson remained realistic and tempered his team’s excellent turn around in fortunes with a cautious optimism: “I always felt that the play-offs were a more realistic target and, having got there, we thought to ourselves ‘why get here and stop?’”.

Of the play-off final success against Airdrie at the Excelsior Stadium, the Dumbarton manager notes that the match was a watershed not just in terms of the confirmation of their promotion from Division Two, but also of their tactics and coaching finally paying dividends. “All season we had been hoping for maybe 20 minutes to go where we could relax and that was the first game all season where we could. We just enjoyed the occasion and even after Airdrie scored we thought it was fine as we would just go and score more”.

With the success of promotion comes the chance for Dumbarton to test themselves against a higher quality of opposition and the manager is under no illusions as to the challenges that they face in what is predominantly a full-time league (only Dumbarton and Airdrie United are completely part-time, whilst Cowdenbeath and Raith Rovers have a mixture of part-time and full-time players. All other clubs in the division are entirely full-time). “We’re up a level and when you do make a mistake in the First Division, you’re going to be punished a lot more than you are in the Second. If you got a couple of chances last season and missed them, you always felt you would get more. This season we’ve had a couple of chances and missed them and further chances haven’t come along, but we’ll keep working hard, the boys train hard and I don’t think fitness will be an issue at all. We had a really good pre-season under our belts and that’s what stands you in good stead. The last year’s signings, the new signings we’ve brought in, it could take time to gel again, but watch this space.”

Asked what his goal is in coaching, Adamson acknowledges that he has come a long way in a short time. From managing the British police football team to managing a First Division club, the coach has had an unorthodox route into professional football management; “I was coaching the first team at Albion Rovers with Jim (Chapman, ex-Dumbarton manager who stepped aside in 2010/11 to become Director of Football and Community Development, Alan Adamson stepping up from assistant to manager at that time) and when Jim was sacked I was offered that job. I felt that as Jim had brought me into Albion Rovers I would go as well. We came here to Dumbarton and we did well, winning the Third Division in 08/09. After we were promoted to Division Two things changed. It’s hard to put your finger on what went wrong, but it wasn’t quite working. Jim made the decision to step aside and the Board approached me and I decided I would have a crack at it this time. We were sitting on 4 points from 11 games when I took over and we turned it around and survived.”

Of his background coaching the police team, Adamson maintains that it was a valuable experience for him to take into his professional coaching career; “The police team were very talented, I had players earning £2,000 per week in the Conference, and there is the Metropolitan Police FC in the Ryman League. I was offered the position of coach there a few years ago with a good salary while I was still in the police, but the idea of moving to London didn’t appeal to me. We played in European championships, so I had worked with good players before. I did my coaching badges whilst I was in the police as you have to have them to coach at that level. The standard of football is really good and, of course, the fitness levels are very high. We played teams like Swindon and various others down south and we always held our own. My left back from the police team actually left the police service and signed for Brighton and I believe he’s still there now.”

When asked what his proudest achievement is in the game, the manager has only one answer; “Airdrie away last season, winning promotion. That’s my proudest achievement by miles. Winning the Third Division title (in 08/09) was great, but I don’t think it compares. Getting us to the First Division is a bigger achievement than that I think. When you consider the fact that it looked like we may go down, back to Division Three, and then the opposite happened”.

It is clear, then, that this is a club who are not taking their new found position amongst the elite teams of the Scottish Football League for granted. There is an air of determined optimism running throughout the club from top to bottom.

One person at Dumbarton who is looking forward to making his bow in the First Division is striker Patrick Walker. The former Albion Rovers forward is currently injured and is determined to get his share of the action as soon as possible. Even if results on the park haven’t been exemplary so far, the teacher-cum-footballer is anxious to help his team earn some pass marks sooner rather than later. “It’s difficult to watch the team struggling, I’d definitely rather be playing in a struggling team than watching from the sidelines. But the mood in the dressing room is good and although we’ve conceded a few soft goals the team have bossed games and if we can take the chances then we’ll compete at this level. All of the lads are upbeat and confident. I can’t wait to be fit again so I can start contributing. I take the boys football team at the school I teach at and they’ve been giving me some stick about the results this season. But they gave me stick at this point last season too and I had the last laugh then, so hopefully I can do so again this season.”

Dumbarton’s success has also seen an increase in season ticket sales, with over 450 sold prior to the season getting underway and the corporate hospitality has been similarly busy, all of which bodes well in these times of austerity and thrifty spending. Clearly the fans will come out in numbers to support a successful team, contrary to the predictions of falling crowds and financial oblivion that were prevalent throughout the summer.

A final word then from Alan Adamson on Dumbarton’s aim for the season; “Our goal is survival. We’re not just here to make up the numbers”. Given the strides which he has made in a relatively short space of time in club management, it is hard to argue with him.

Peter McCormick

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