Gimme the Fife: East Fife 2-0 Edinburgh City

The last game I watched in Scotland was very much unbeknownst to me given that it happened before the pandemic, and before I made plans to leave Glasgow for good back in 2020. That game was a 4-1 win for Pollok at Neilston on 29th February in the snow - a leap year and a leap into the unknown once COVID hit. As Futbology ominously tells me: nobody else was there. I mean, others were there, but still...

It seems strange writing about my return well over four years on given my unwavering love for Scotland and Glasgow in particular, but life happens in mysterious ways, and it often passes in the blink of an eye. Now I find myself in the final week of a summer job in Newcastle, which has allowed for at least one trip back over the border. 

The game in question would of course be East Fife v Edinburgh City - from what I've heard, one of the league's favourites against some relegations candidates who could only amass 8 points last season. The plan was to meet up with Tom for the first time since a cracking weekender in Newcastle back in 2022 for a friendly against Bilbao, in which we enjoyed the company of many Bilbao fans in the away end.

As far as Scottish League football goes, my last of the 42 was Dundee United, as I watched them beat Inverness Caledonian Thistle 2-1 in the most incessant rain I can recall en route to a dominant Championship title win which COVID wouldn't scupper. 

It seems funny to look back on all of that now, with a Czech visa now renewed and an incredibly exciting job on the horizon. But what better place to ponder life than East Fife?

The ground, the game, and any other business.

I left Gateshead fairly early in order to catch an 8.40 train from Newcastle to Edinburgh, which would be the first of two trains to Leven. I picked up an overpriced Edinburgh Waverly bagel before meeting Tom and heading toward Platform 17 for our next train,

It was a journey of around an hour from Edinburgh, with some stunning scenery along the Fife coastline meeting us en route. It's fair to say the Kingdom of Fife is a genuinely magnificent part of the world. 

I suppose now you're expecting me to say 'until you get to Methil' - well, no dice. Despite the decline of the shipping and coal industries that has undoubtedly made the town poorer, there was a certain beauty and charm about it. 

After exploring Leven, we walked toward the stadium with plenty of time to kill. We found a couple of pubs along one street before happening to stumble upon the Methil Heritage Centre, which was just opening, We met an incredibly knowledgable historian from Basildon who had lived in Fife since childhood. 

The centre itself was also home to some incredible artefacts from Methil and Leven's storied history, from East Fife's cup successes (more on that later) to the glory days of shipbuilding and coal mining that brought wealth to the area. 

Before leaving the heritage centre, we asked for a pub recommendation, and were told the East Dock Bar had a friendly crowd. It turned out to very much be the case, as we sat watching Oxford beat Norwich in the company of some very kind locals. I enjoyed the first pint of Tennent's in a good few years, coming to the conclusion that it's actually quite nice as far as the generic beers go.

We made our way to the ground, quickly popping into a fairly empty club shop beforehand. Tickets were £18, which for Scottish League Two football is a bit of a joke if we're being brutally honest. And though the second half made up for it, the game was not worth anywhere near that.

The first half was horrific. I'm not even exaggerating when I say that nothing happened. You could argue East Fife edged it, but they genuinely did nothing of note. They came to life in the second half, with goals from Liam Newton and 38-year-old Alan Trouten, who showed no signs of his age throughout.

That was that game-wise. It would be fair to say Edinburgh City aren't exactly enjoying a glittering 2024, with only one win at home to Montrose to their name. On yesterday's evidence, it's easy to see why.

Five things you didn't know about...East Fife

1. In terms of honours won, there are no clubs in the Fife area with a better record than East Fife, with the Fifers having won the Scottish League Cup on three occasions, as well as the Scottish Cup. They were in fact the first side to win the Scottish League Cup thrice, as well as the first of only two second-tier clubs to win the Scottish Cup.

2. The town of Methil, where East Fife are located, had once been the greatest coal port in the entirety of Scotland, with the port exporting as much as 3,000,000 tons per year between the two World Wars. Methil Power Station followed in the sixties, but was recently demolished in 2011.

3. Leven station, which is now East Fife's nearest station, may be the most recent station to open in the United Kingdom, having just re-opened on 2nd June 2024. This only a mere 170 years after it first opened in 1854. This was mainly due to the fact the Levenmouth area was the largest urban area in Scotland that wasn't served by any direct rail link. 

4. Any guesses as to where East Fife's most capped player hails from? He was a TT Pro League Golden Boot winner in 1999 with a whopping 45 goals for Joe Public. He only spent two years at East Fife, which would in fact be his only experience of football in the UK before moving to Al-Ansar in Lebanon in 1997.  His international career was long finished before he could participate in the 2006 World Cup where Peter Crouch could have been pulling his dreadlocks instead of Brent Sancho's. Give up? Well, it is of course Arnold Dariwka, who played 73 times for the Soca Warriors of Trinidad and Tobago.

5.Situated a few miles south of Methil is Wemyss Caves, which boasts the largest collection of Pictish carvings anywhere in the world. The carvings are thought to have been made some 1,500 years ago. Though we didn't get time to see it this time, it certainly seems worthwhile to take a trip.