WHAT a great village Hill of Beath is for creating football talent.

The latest duo from the village to play for Scotland at under age level are the Smith brothers, Callum and Conner, and the former has also played in the first team at 17 in The Championship with Dunfermline Athletic.

The statue of Jim Baxter, the legendary Scotland, Rangers and Sunderland wing-half, is a reminder of probably the best known of the players who have done superbly on the big stage and the current Scotland captain, Scott Brown, is also Hill of Beath born and bred.

Callum and Conner have shown as teenagers that they could be the next to follow in the wake of Baxter and Brown but there have been many more who have played senior or have been outstanding junior players, including the current Hill of Beath Hawthorn manager Kevin Fotheringham.

Hill of Beath Swifts was the real reason for the production line in the 1980s and 90s but now there is something new.

The mechanism set up by the Haws and the Blue Brazil Boys Club to provide a path for youngsters to proceed from kids’ football to the junior game and beyond is another example of how the Hill of Beath football factory can produce talent and for such a small village to be so successful is simply amazing and credit must go to the people who give so much free time to make the youth set-ups work.