Club won’t let relegation spoil jubilee celebrations
Published on 1 Jul 2011

matt vallance

CUMNOCK Rugby Club has long enjoyed a reputation as a place to which no other rugby team go happily.

Even at their lowest ebb, Cumnock packs reserve a warm welcome for visitors. But, no matter the on-field violence meted out during games, the hospitality inside the three-feet thick walls of the Broomfield clubhouse, a listed former farm steading, is never less than warm.

That welcome will be even warmer in the new season, the club’s Golden Jubilee year, marking the night in October, 1961, when the new club, the brainchild of three Cumnock Academicals – who then played for Ayr – Alan Davidson, Ronnie Houston and Bill Morrison, became reality.

There have been highs and lows in the years since, but when Ian McLauchlan, the SRU president and fellow Ayrshireman, rises to toast the first 50 years of Cumnock, at the Golden Jubilee dinner in November, the three pioneers who had the idea and the many who have followed them into membership, can reflect on an what has been a rough ride, during which Cumnock established themselves in an area in which junior football is supposedly the only game in town.

Premiership outfit Glasgow Hawks will take on Cumnock in a special pre-season game on 6 August, while there will be other commemorative events during the jubilee year.

The club had a disappointing campaign last season, finishing second bottom of West Regional Division One and being relegated. The SRU annual meeting stuck the boot in further, after the successful vote in favour of league reorganisation. This meant Cumnock suffered a double relegation and will kick-off their second half century in West Division Three.

But, with a successful youth development programme continuing to produce good young players such as Scotland Under-20 internationalist Mark Bennett, and with a School of Rugby initiative with Cumnock Academy starting to bear fruit, club officials are confident the only way is up.

The new president, Jim Morrison, a former Scotland basketball captain, is bullish about the road ahead. “Of course, a double relegation has not been the ideal preparation for this important year, but, we clearly see better days ahead. We’ve got a good off-field team of former players, working hard for the club, the clubhouse is an important facility in the town and there is bags of enthusiasm around the place.

“We are also heavily involved in a new initiative, aimed at building a community sports hub here at Broomfield which will have great benefits for us at the rugby club, for the other local organisations involved, and for the area as a whole.”

With the Duke of Rothesay’s new Knockroon village going up right on the club’s doorstep, that confidence seems well placed. Ayrshire is reportedly “tribal” and that tribalism knows no greater outlet than in the junior football rivalry between Cumnock and Auchinleck Talbot.

There is, of course, banter in the club bar but, on the field, the two sides combine happily. Cumnockian Morrison has taken over the presidency from Auchinleck man Alex Dunsmuir and both they, and the club committee and members, are determined to make this jubilee year one to remember.

This article was posted on 1-Jul-2011, 06:19 by Hugh Barrow.