Some may have noticed that over recent years there has been an
increasing North Lanarkshire influence at Hawks both on the coaching
and playing sides
To some this may be suprising as this area is not noted for it's rugby
heritage but to others who have a sense for the lines of strength in Scottish sport it will come as no surprise

The area loosely encompassed by what is now prescribed as North
Lanarkshire has always produced outstanding sportsmen and sportswomen
A hard industrial region that produced hard and industrious
competitors
Setting aside football they have seen Olympic swimmers like Jack Wardrop Nancy Riach Cathie Gibson and Elinor Gordon all out of the Motherwell Baths--World class boxers like Chic Calderwood from Craigneuk-- and truly outstanding athletes like European 800 metres champion Tom McKean from Bellshilll and Ian Macafferty from Law who trained out of the Brandon St HQ of Motherwell YMCA and reached the Olympic 5000 metres final to face the likes of Lasse Viren in the tragedy that was Munich He was coached by his father Sam who part of the week trained greyhounds and the rest coached his son
Another was John Maclaren of Shotts Miners Welfare who won the English
Junior Cross Country Championship quite an achievement for a Scot let
alone for a runner with one arm the other having withered from polio

Well where does all this take us--it takes us to Gary Strain-Andy
Hill-Tom McGarrity--David Milne--Callum Harvey--Jamie Dempsey--Grant
Talbot and Dean Kelbrick
Gary-Andy-Tom-Jamie-Grant all ex Dalziel-- David-Waysiders where he
was coached by John Shaw a hard competitor who gave West and Glasgow
great service--- and Callum-Strathaven even Dean Kelbrick who comes from Dundee South Africa can trace his family roots back to Motherwell and of course Bellshill's finest Ricky Munday

President Woodrow Wilson stated “Every line of strength in American
history is colored with Scottish blood.”----many of the lines of
strength in Scottish sport were steeled in North Lanarkshire

This article was originally posted on 31-Aug-2010, 13:47 by Hugh Barrow.
Last updated by Hugh Barrow on 1-Sep-2010, 06:54.