Day Thirty Nine: Cowdenbeath (Central Park)

Cowdenbeath v Greenock Morton
Tuesday 22nd March
Scottish Division 1

You wait all season for a Cowdenbeath game and then two come along at once.

It's the last of our mid week adventures tonight and the last of the grounds to visit in the First Division. Only three more home teams to see Brechin City, Ayr United and Arbroath.

Instead of my dad driving across Edinburgh to pick me up after work I've decided to bring my car to work so I can drive over to Cramond myself. I need to head home first to check on the state of play at my flat. We've had a minor disaster this week with a boiler leak and slight flooding of the flat below. I'm delighted then when I get home to find the gas man has been round, fixed the leaky pipe and stopped the bleeding so to say.

It's just after 6pm when I get to my folks house and I've got just enough time to say hello to my mum before jumping in my dad's car for the short trip over the bridge to Cowdenbeath. Again it's an early start but after thirty eight games I've got used to the fact that he wants to make sure we get parked near the ground.

We turn off the M90 at Hill of the Beath, head towards Central Park and park up at the ground with ninety minutes to spare. I'm absolutely starving and I'm sure I'm saw a Fish n' Chips place on the way in to town. I ask my dad if he fancies a poke of chips but he tells me he'll wait and get a pie in the ground.

On the way up to buy them a wee voice in my head reminds me that I entered in to an agreement with the missus to make this week 'Healthy Eating Week' and the guilt drives me towards Morrison's for a self-service pasta salad and a carton of milk - Emma would be proud ha ha.

I take it back to the car and settle in for half an hour or so of the football on Radio Scotland before we make our way in to the ground.

We decide to make our move when the coach load of Morton fans turn up, got to make sure we get a seat eh. Pre-match photo taken we pay and head past a burger van on our way to the Club Shop which is located in a portacabin.

As I'm buying a programme my dad is off asking a steward if there is a pie stand open in the ground. A Club official pipes up that 'it depends on the number of folks in through the gate, if we get enough punters we'll open up. In the meantime you can get something from the van'.

Our last pie from a van was way back in September with at Berwick Rangers and if memory serves me right it was pretty minging. Here's hoping we'll do better here.

You can not imagine the horror my dad's face when we read what is available - Cheese Burger or a Bacon Burger. Nae pies. No points and a very disgruntled punter. I'm just glad I've had my pasta salad earlier. After he's calmed down my dad asks for a burger bacon roll. As we make our way to the stand he points out that this is the first burger bacon roll he's had with nae burger in it.

Now I'm not the brightest but surely it makes more business sense to buy in a load of pies, heat them up and sell them on at a profit than it is to take £100 rent off an outside catering company and let them sell products at a profit on your property?

You'd also not have let my old man down. Shame on you Cowdenbeath, (insert sad face here).

Making my way into the stand first thing I notice is that there is a dirt track around the side of the pitch. My dad tells me that if I wanted I could bring my car along here and enter it in a Stock Car race.

It's a strange set up this side of the pitch too with not one but two separate stands to choose from on this side or an open terracing on the far side. We decide on a seat in the more modern looking of the two stands but have to position ourselves in between the many stanchions for the floodlights.

My dad points out a flag hung up at the bottom of the stairs, it reads Dublin Branch of the Cowdenbeath Supporters Club and right on queue five middle aged and looking slightly inebriated men come into view, three of them are carrying those traditional Irish drums. I hope the decide on a seat away from us, I'm not a fan of the drumming at matches.

Out of the tunnel in front of us comes the home mascot Bluebell the Cow and she trots on to the pitch to get a pre-match photo with the mascots. More of the mascot to follow.

The game kicks off.

Three minutes later and we witness the softest penalty award of the season. Iain Brines, tonight's referee awards a penalty after a long Carlo Monti thrown in to the box bounces towards the by line and up on to a Cowdenbeath defender Mark Baxter's hand. Never a penalty. The boy could have done nothing about it and it wasn't as though he had deflected it from a path towards an attacker. A poor decision.

Up stepped Monti himself to fire the ball in to the bottom left corner as the 'beath keeper, David Hay, went the other way.

Cowdenbeath went in search of a equaliser and Mark Ramsay had a shot deflected wide, and then a Craig Winter missed from five yards with a free header from the resulting corner.

Morton responded in similar fashion when Derek Lyle saw his shot saved by the feet of Hay. From their corner Peter Weatherspoon was unlucky not to add a second with a brilliant back header from the edge of the six yard box.

The aforementioned Monti has a throw in style like Stoke player Rory Delap and from another of his huge efforts Brian Graham had a header that flashed just wide.

There are so few people at tonight's game that there is no segregation with home and away fans sat together. I'm sure when the local rivals Dumfermline and Raith Rovers are in town things with be different but tonight it's fairly jovial so far.

The home side are forced into an early substitution when striker Archie Campbell limps off with what looks like a hamstring injury,on comes Mark McKenzie in his place. The substitute should have done better with ten minutes to go until half time but chose to shot when the square ball inside was the better option.

Sat a few rows behind us in the stand are five Morton players in their Club tracksuits. They are just young boys, probably part of the youth set up and they seem to be minding their own business watching the game or playing on their phones. We're all then a little surprised to see a steward walk in to the stand and demand that two off them come down the front for a chat. They're taken off almost out of sight but you can still tell from the gesticulating from the group that there is a disagreement taking place. A Cowdenbeath official then approaches the group to say his piece. With this change in proceedings a Morton official makes his way from the Stand to the group. Further words are exchanged and then the two boys are banished from the ground.

It's all very strange. It has however taken all my attention away from what has been a fairly poor forty five minutes of football.

Half time and I inform my dad I'm off to the van for a cup of tea and I ask if I can pick anything up for him. He asks for a bacon burger and tells me to make sure there is a burger in it this time.

On my way out I ask one of the remaining Morton boys for an update but he informs me he hasn't got a clue, he set they were all sat there just watching the game.

At the van I notice that the Burger Bacon sign has been replaced with a Bacon Roll one. Still I chance my arm and ask the lassie for a Burger n' Bacon roll. She's not sure now, almost as if I've asked for the impossible. In the end she agrees but only if I promise not to let everyone see and she then charges my £4.50 for it.

Back in the stand and Bluebell appears with a box of Cadbury's Celebrations and proceeds to offer one to every person in the stand. Now you don't get that at every game. Doesn't make up for nae pies though.

The second half kicks off.

The level of football continues in to the same vain as the first and both teams struggle to string any real period of possession in the first ten minutes.

Greg Stewart nearly brings Cowdenbeath back to life with a great header from a corner that needs a brilliant Cuthbert save to tip it over the bar.

The second Morton goal on the hour mark sums up this game, sloppy. David Hay came racing out of his goal to clear a back pass and he smashed the ball against the Morton attacker Allan Jenkins and could only watch as it flew back past him and rolled into the empty net.

Fouad Bachirou becomes the first player in to the book when he picks up a yellow card for chopping down a 'beath player as he strode past him in to an attacking position.

Stewart went close again with fifteen minutes left but his shot was blocked by a combination of keeper and centre back.

Jimmy Nicholl throws on Stevie Crawford with ten minutes left to try and pull the home side back into the game.

In the final minutes Jon Robertson went close to a consolation goal with a free kick that curled up and over the wall but the wrong side of the post.

The final whistle goes and brings to an end what my dad and I both describe as the worst game yet.

Making our way back to the car I ask one of the track suited Morton boys for a further update and apparently the two lads were chucked out for shouting abuse at a ball boy. I was sitting much closer to the fella than the steward who came and chucked him out and I'm more than certain you could ask anyone else in the stand and they wouldn't have been able to relay what was supposedly said either.

Still it brought some needed excitement to proceedings.

The Statistics

Ticket: Adult £18, Concession £10
Programme: £2
Attendance: 359
Pie: N/A
Pie Marks: N/A
Mileage: 32 miles
Final Score: Cowdenbeath 0 v Greenock Morton 2
Man of the Match: Dad - Brian Graham (Greenock Morton), Me - Brian Graham (Greenock Morton)
Fascinating Fact of the Day: Central Park is the only ground in the United Kingdom with a Stock Car track running around the edge of the pitch.

Next Game: Glebe Park (Brechin City)