Cowdenbeath: Donald Findlay at 70, his life in his own words

Club historian and director, David Allan, caught up with Mr Findlay, who had celebrated the memorable milestone on Wednesday, March 17.

The now well known QC said: “I originally lived with my mum and dad at 171 Perth Road, Cowdenbeath, beside the ‘Jeely works’.

“I was six, maybe going on 7, when my family left Cowdenbeath. We moved to the new town of Glenrothes, to a wooden house in MacDuff Gardens.

“The new town then was tiny, it was just starting out. My new primary school, Warout, was more or less located in a field! There was nothing round about it. Then we went on our travels before ending up in Dundee.

“My mum was a Muirhead – her cousin was Tommy Muirhead, from Cowdenbeath, who played for Rangers and Scotland. If anyone ever asks me where I come from I always say Cowdenbeath.

“Cowdenbeath was always home - apart from anything else I suppose because my family are all buried in the auld Kirkyaird – my mother, my father, my grandparents”.

What helped guide him to the legal profession: “When I was a boy I was fascinated by the Peter Manuel case. I was drawn to it and knew it was something unique. I read the stories in the newspaper every day.

“Around the same time there was a TV show called Boyd QC. We had a great big TV set with a tiny little screen. One of my earliest memories is of the Coronation in 1953.

“We were all peering through the snow on it to watch – it’s just a flash of memory I have of that. I also recall watching ‘What’s my Line?’ on that TV set in Cowdenbeath.

“I was always interested in football. I recall when I was at Lumphinnans School there was one of those mass football matches that involved everybody in the playground.

“I was picked for the Celtic team and even scored a goal versus the Rangers team. I proudly announced this when I went home and my granny said, ‘Well that will not be happening again!’ Thereafter I followed the fortunes of Rangers.

“My granny was not the sort of woman you disobeyed. At that time they had players such as George Niven, Harold Davis, Billy Stevenson, Eric Caldow, Sammy Baird, Maxie Murray, Alex Scott, Johnny Hubbard and Iain McMillan.”

Taking up the law he recalled: “In my legal career my most memorable case was that of Paul Ferris.

“Young Arthur Thompson was dead, his father was a witness. Ferris was regarded by the police as the heir apparent to Arthur Thompson Sr. We had supergrasses. It just had everything that was going in it. I forget how many charges that there were but of course Ferris walked on each and every one of them. He was in the witness box for a week.

“It went on for three months and at the time it was the longest-running single accused murder trial. It was a terrific case because of all these legendary characters. So many of the witnesses were also people of legend at the time in and around the Glasgow underworld. It could never happen again, the world has changed so much since then”.

He added: “One current legal issue surrounds the Not Proven verdict which is unique to Scotland.

“I saw that Douglas Ross, the referee and Scottish Conservative party leader, had introduced a policy whereby they would do away with the Not Proven verdict. That didn’t please me very much. For some reason people seem to knock it because we have it and no-one else does. Maybe though we are right and the others are wrong. We have 15 on the jury. Everybody else tends to have 12.

“In England you need 12 out of 12 to convict although after a period of time the judge will take a majority of 10-2. Up here 8 out of 15 is enough to convict. The Not Proven verdict allows all the jurors to express the view they take of the evidence.

“I think it is an advantage have the three verdicts and quite honestly if Not Proven was done away with I would boost my success rate. 10 out of 12 jurors would be far harder to achieve for the prosecution”.

Rangers “I was at home one night and my stepson answered the phone and he said, ‘There’s a phone call for you from David Murray’.

“Now I couldn’t think who I knew called David Murray. I was assuming it was a solicitor. I began to have this conversation and it suddenly dawned on me I was talking to the chairman of Rangers. He invited me to meet him for dinner.

“I assumed he was going to ask me to do some legal work for him. We had dinner, it was just after the Aberdeen game where Rangers had clinched the title. We finished and he got up to leave and I was none the wiser.

“I said, ‘It’s been very interesting but what do you want?’ He replied, ‘Oh I want you to join the board at Rangers. Phone Campbell Ogilvie and he’ll sort it out’.

“I phoned home and said, ‘You’re not going to believe this!’ “There were some fantastic years at Ibrox. The real highlight for me was meeting and being with the players who at that time were a terrific bunch. They were mainly old school - largely Rangers men.

“Those others who came in and were successful quickly realised there was something special there. Players like Jorg Albertz and Van Bronckhorst – the clubs they came from didn’t have this bond with the fans that there was at Rangers.

“I think one of the real highlights was the night we went down to Leeds United to be ritually flogged, chastised, humiliated and sent home again.

“Mark Hateley scored in the first few minutes and Leeds didn’t get into it. And then of course yer man got the second goal. As McCoist would invariably do once all the hard work was done. He’d come in and get the glory.

“To be honest we just kept winning – it was unbelievable. The one regret was we didn’t get to a European Cup final. I learned that football is a business like no other.

“Looking at Steven Gerrard this season, I thought it was a big challenge for him as he had to win something. Things were improving but just improving won’t do at Ibrox.

“Especially if the alternative is that Celtic win. It is that which bedevils Scottish football.

“I think both sets of supporters could put up with say Aberdeen or Hearts having a bit of success some of the time, but not the other lot!

“That pressure for success doesn’t give you the time to nurture young talent. It’s taken Gerrard some time to deliver success but he turned it round. Rangers went out and won it – they have been beating everyone all season albeit Celtic have been woeful. However, it seems we are back with just a two horse race albeit that is better than a one horse race.

“We desperately need some other teams to compete for the title. The one disappointment I have with the Rangers team of today is - where are the Scotsmen? Walter Smith believed that for success at Ibrox you needed a core of Rangers men and the foreign players that could be grafted in would mainly come from England or the Northern European countries where there was a similar outlook”.

Cowdenbeath FC Speaking about how he ended up involved with his hometown club, Donald said: “Sandy Ferguson phoned me up and talked about Cowdenbeath. I was thinking, ‘What do you want? If you want a cheque you won’t be getting one!’ “I had always kept an eye on Cowdenbeath and remembered the Andy Matthew days (promotion to the old First Division) with some affection. There were two or three further contacts from Sandy over a period. Largely unbeknown to me it seemed the new owners, the Brewsters, were trying to move the club to Edinburgh.

“Indeed they were going to maybe merge with Spartans and become Cowdenbeath Spartans. Then maybe soon it would become Spartans Cowdenbeath and then just Spartans was the view put to me.

“Local people thus were getti`ng involved to stave this off and needed someone to come along to help them. Two things clicked with me: – 1) that I had an idea of how to run a football club and 2) it was my hometown team.

“I came to meetings in Cowdenbeath and met the folk involved who struck me as decent people. They wanted to do something that was very difficult and had never run a football club. I agreed to be chairman but not just to be a figurehead. I wanted to actually do something not just swan about the place. And we got going and we got Jimmy Nicholl and we went to Raith Rovers and we won our first football match.

“This is a piece of cake I thought. The reality began to sink in and I thought I’ll give this three years. That was 11 years ago.

“I wouldn’t have missed it for the world, it’s been a fantastic journey. Mind you the lows have been just desperate. And bear in mind nobody is a worse loser than I am.

“Being involved in a football club and with the people in a football club and the players and everybody else - that gets into your blood.

“The lows are made up for by two things – the good times of course. One of the great days of life was at East End Park (the 4-1 play-off win on aggregate).

“You wouldn’t swap that. There’s no money in the world would take that away from me. That reminded me of Leeds – we went there to be slaughtered and we did them. Beating big Jim Leishman, that made it even sweeter.

“But just to be involved with people who care that’s actually quite special. Had we been safe in the Championship I might have stepped back and let other folk have a go. It’s probably time I did. Maybe some people want that. Now though it’s unfinished business. Jennie says to me at the end of every season, ‘Is this the last?’ “I reply, ‘Probably not!’ I need to see us get back up out of this Division and re-established in League One. Maybe then we might see people coming in and giving us a nudge and saying you’ve been here long enough give us a shot at it. People with new and better ideas than us, not just taking it over because there’s nobody else”.

But Donald added: “There have been low points. Two matches come to mind – losing at Stranraer in 2016 and the year before at Alloa. Alloa was probably the worst.

“We just needed not to lose (to stay in the Championship). To lose 3-0, to not turn up, to just give in and end up being relegated – a dreadful, dreadful day. When you start to slide in this game it is difficult to arrest it. Cove and East Kilbride (Pyramid play-off finals) were different because we won but I couldn’t celebrate that sort of triumph. Maybe just a wee bit after the Cove one!

“This year we should have been moving forward – we had turned things round under Gary (Bollan) and last season were in the play-off places. But we got off to a poor start to a large extent due to all those injuries. 27 games though would give us a proper chance to move up the table but that has been taken away from us now. Everything has been very fragmented. Next season, if we don’t have to spend all our money on testing, maybe we can have a real push. You need to have the right people. Players of character who you can trust like Mango (Craig Barr). Or someone like Toddy (Jamie Todd) – the man gives 100% every time he steps on the pitch.

“I think to be successful you need to have a team which largely is made up of players who can produce a consistent, at least 7 out of 10, performance every week. A core you can really rely on. Then you have a few guys who can win you games with something special – although they might be off the boil some weeks. Loan players too are important now – they can make a real difference. I remember when we brought in Andy Murdoch – he was keen to prove a point and he was excellent in midfield working alongside Kyle Miller. Getting recruitment right is vital.

“This season, on reflection, I wouldn’t even have started it. I guess my views in a modern world are out of date. I was at a conference a few years ago and told the young students, ‘You are not growing up in my world, I am growing old in yours.’ I’m not going to change now. I happen to think that loyalty and integrity matter – they matter to me. Professional integrity for me is vital – without that you lose everything. It is clichéd but it can take many years to build a reputation and just seconds to destroy it. I don’t like cheating and players throwing themselves about the place and all that carry on.

“This year’s League lacks real integrity because of the circumstances that surround it – the same applies re these Colts proposals (bringing Rangers and Celtic Youth teams into League 2). Season 2020/21 has become a lottery.

“Was that a football match at Annan a few weeks back– teams suddenly back in action with little or no proper preparation time allowed – not really. There’s no people there and we have all these constraints and testing. I question if it is really worth it. It is what it is”.

He added: “It was a very strange experience I have to say on March 17 I looked in the mirror with a razor in my hand and thought I’d better put this down for a second.

“To realise there was a 70 year-old man looking back at me.

“I am now older than my dad was when he died. It was quite a sobering experience. I don’t feel 70. I like to think if I got my hair cut I don’t look 70. And my attitudes I believe aren’t those of a 70 year old man but 70 I am.

“There is a degree of uncertainty Every week someone you know passes away.

“Take Peter Lorimer (the former Scotland star), I met him, a nice man. Death becomes part of your life.

“I’m very angry and very bitter about what has happened over the last year as when you get to my stage in life to have a year taken from you is something you can ill afford. It has been horrendous for all of us.

“But then I genuinely look around and think there’s a lot of things I’d still like to do and there are a lot of things to be thankful for.

“And I am not finished with Cowdenbeath Football Club. That matters to me very much.

“It has been in no sycophantic sense an absolute privilege and a delight to work with everybody who has put so much into the club. Everybody’s a volunteer, everybody’s dug into their pockets and for over a decade we have kept the club going. That’s something to be proud of for everybody.”