They’re on the pitch, they think it’s all over

Further to my previous post, this is what happened at Tannadice on Saturday.

First, the good news. Dundee United beat Ayr United 1-0 with a late goal scored by a young sub, Chris Mochrie, who was bizarrely given the Man of the Match award despite being on the pitch for less than 20 minutes and the goal he scored was, by most standards, an absolute sitter.

The award nevertheless said a lot about the game, which was terrible, and was arguably decided by the sending off of an Ayr player in the second half.

That said, a win’s a win and the three points meant that United are effectively guaranteed promotion to the Scottish Premiership, one year after they were relegated.

Knowing this, the United fans were keen to celebrate and after the final whistle a substantial number invaded the pitch.

It was all good-natured but after 15 minutes the stadium announcer informed the exuberant but well-behaved supporters:

“The team will not, repeat not, be coming back out. There will be no further celebrations tonight.”

I didn’t go on the pitch but I was one of the last to leave and when I did it was eerily quiet outside the ground, 10,000 supporters having mysteriously vanished into the evening air.

Anyway, it brings me to a conversation I had with Ranald Macdonald, MD of Boisdale Restaurants, on Thursday.

Ranald went to St Andrews University in the early Eighties and as you know I went to school in the same town a decade earlier, so we have some shared experience of both St Andrews and Dundee.

Aside from expressing horror that I liked football and was travelling several hundred miles to watch a match in the city, he told me how he and his university pals would visit Dundee’s casinos, which he described as a rather dangerous environment (in those days) for a “bunch of toffs”.

He also revealed that his wife’s uncle is the Earl of Dundee who owns Birkhill Castle which overlooks the River Tay and is just five miles from where we lived in north east Fife.

Now, I’ve known Ranald for 20 years, and danced with his wife in Havana (we were in a dancing class, to be fair), but this was still news to me.

Then again, he is the son of a Scottish clan chief so why am I surprised?!

Update: I sent Ranald a photo of the pitch invasion and he replied, ‘Wow!!! Looks absolutely ghastly!!!’.