1976-The Long Hot Summer

The 1976 season was one which broke a number of records for high temperatures in meteorological terms, but, unfortunately for the Lions, their speedway records proved to be   pretty much of the forgettable kind. There was an air of optimism about the place early on, as the club had secured the signature of Kiwi Colin Farquharson, who had made the comparatively short trip from Berwick up to Paisley to take his place in a heat leader position for his new club and, in doing so, stiffened the top end of the team, having shown a distinct liking for the circuit in the previous year. Further, and bearing in mind the controversy which had surrounded the track when Newcastle had visited the previous year, it seemed to be a sensible move by the promotion to widen the track and remove any suggestions of not meeting width requirements. However, on the downside, for reasons which were never really explained, a Kiwi gain in the form of the incoming Farquharson was balanced by the loss of the popular track record holder, Mike Fullerton, and the Kiwi’s seven and a half point average was sorely missed, particularly at home, where a sequence of poor results began a run of falling gates which was eventually terminal. To make matters worse, early on in the season, with the poor run on the track, and the subsequent drop in revenue at the turnstiles, the promoters were obliged to bring in more cash somehow to save the season, and this was achieved by the sale of skipper Sid Sheldrick to Scunthorpe, who themselves had been looking for a way to strengthen their team and improve attendances, thus at least staunching a financial flow in the short term. However, while the captain’s average was down on the previous year, has absence tended to show that he wielded an influence in the pits amongst his teammates which was lost with his move, probably worth more than a few points to his team over the thirteen heats.

Fortunately, it wasn’t too long before Macfarlane and Thurley were able to bolster the riding order and bring about an improvement in results, at least at home. Mike Fishwick, a Birmingham loanee, came into the seven and achieved a seven point average with a series of barnstorming performances, while Mike Fullerton, the track record holder kicking his heels in Auckland for the first half of the summer, was brought back into the fold with the help of the very active supporters putting up a substantial percentage of the air fare to get him back in the red and yellow of the Lions. While his scoring didn’t replicate the seven points plus per meeting that he had gathered the year before, that was perhaps understandable in that he’d basically given every opponent a three month start in terms of fitness and sharpness.  He nevertheless stiffened the spine of the team and the second half of the season saw an improvement in home form, if the dream of an away success was a phenomenon the club would never manage to experience. The loss of both Tom Davie and Burnett Foot to serious injury didn’t help, but at least the Lions were able to bring in up and coming riders at the bottom of the team in the shape of Kiwi Malcom Chambers and local lad Colin Caffrey, the latter going on to give sterling service to Berwick, and then Glasgow, over the next ten years. Davie tragically lost his life in a road bike accident just a few years later.

There were no surprises second time around in the Championship of Strathclyde, as Newcastle’s Tom Owen picked up the title in the late summer, and near the end of the season there was an inaugural and, as it turned out, only Scottish Youth Championship staged at Paisley, purely for younger riders who hadn’t as yet broken through into a regular team spot, and the event, run by the Lions Supporters Club on a night where the “big team” was away on league business in far off Canterbury. There was relief for Lions supporters as they watched a Paisley one two, indeed a family one two, as junior Colin Caffrey raced to a 15 point maximum, brother Fred scoring one point less through his sole defeat to his wee brother to take the runner up spot.

Tom Owen ensured his name would be on the Championship of Strathclyde trophy, with his name following Mick Sheldrick’s onto the award, while in August it became official that the Lions were struggling to make a third season a possibility, as the news came out that due to the dwindling crowds which had resulted from the earlier season home defeats, the club was significantly in debt, to the extent that if they could not clear what they owed to various creditors they would be unable to make it to the start line for 1977. While this obviously came as a humungous blow to the Lions’ faithful, it nevertheless prompted a wave of fundraising of the serious kind, coinciding with the short life of the “Tartan Team”, a group of supporters who didn’t just follow the team all over the UK for the rest of the season, but who formed themselves into a fundraising machine which very nearly pulled off a miracle by organising very quickly a serious number of fundraising events which with a bit more time might just have saved the day.

As irony would have it, the on track Lions saved one of their best performances for their very last match, when they steamrollered Boston 52-25 to record on of their biggest wins of the season, but in front of a diminished crowd at Love St.

So Near, and yet…….

The end of the 1976 season on the track might have signalled the end of on track hostilities of the friendly kind, but, off the track, the critical task of raising the necessary funds to allow a 1977 season was well under way. Fundraisers such as dances, Bingo Nights, and other revenue raisers became a regular feature of the close season, with money coming into the coffers at regular intervals, while the club was converted into a share issuing organisation which allowed supporters to become shareholders, while continuing to raise significant funds for the cause of saving their club.

In December the help of arguably the greatest rider ever to grace the sport created a night to remember for not just the Paisley fans, but supporters from all over Scotland. Ivan Mauger had indicated that he would be happy to attend a special fundraising dance to help the club. Due to availability issues the organisers had agreed to run the event locally on Monday 20 December, hardly the best night in the week to hold a major event (no pun intended), and only five days before Christmas, with other matters perhaps a little more to the forefront in people’s minds. However, the opportunity to have the then four times World Champion in their midst was a chance not to be passed up, and the organisers were rewarded over and over again as the demand for tickets exceeded even their wildest dreams. The capacity of the venue was ….ahem…..slightly over subscribed, and the Galloping Mauger played his part all night and gave of his time to an extent which demonstrated he was a world champion not only on the track, but off it as well. With Bert Harkins acting as auctioneer for the evening, the money flowed into the Lions bank account, while the eventual six times world champion was happy to have his photo taken with anyone prepared to donate to the cause, while he and his wife Raye also found time to perform more than passable attempts at Scottish country dancing with hordes of fans scarcely believing they had speedway royalty in their midst, and taking a leading role in the festivities! The evening was an outstanding success, but while there was a short break for the festive season, the momentum was halted. Eventually, and heartbreakingly for the Lions’ faithful, Father Time overtook them on the last bend after a valiant effort, and they had to admit defeat not long before they would have come to the tapes for the 1977 season.

However, the story didn’t quite end there. In these parts, the regular off season activity tended to be ice hockey, and one Sunday evening in the ice rink car park, the Scottish Junior League was formed during one such off season get together. It looked as if the mooted teams for a modest, three heats and three riders per team league were going to fall short by one team to form a competitive 4 team league, but the still enthusiastic Paisley Lions Supporters Club was perfectly happy to form and pay for a team, thanks in part at least to Coatbridge promoter Jimmy Beaton happily ensuring that Cliftonhill Stadium, the then home of the Tigers, would provide track time, and in the same stroke ensure that the Tigers home support, supplemented by more than a few Lions’ fans, would see some extra racing in the second half, as some of it was, on occasion, at least as exciting as the main fare in the 13 heat senior matches. Kenny Jarvie, Mick McCoy, and the late Bill Logan formed the regular trio of Lion cubs in these SJL meetings, while on one occasion a last minute fill in for a late absentee was none other than Gary Guglielmi, at that time a young junior trying to break into British speedway, who went on to bigger things with Coventry Bees and Australia, but who perhaps illustrated the worth of the first organised junior programme by getting his break with the Lion cubs. Of course, junior league racing in the UK has taken massive steps forward since those formative steps in the late 70’s, but I venture to suggest that the Paisley Lions played their part in the first tentative steps taken in this regard some 45 years ago now.

While the Paisley Lions might only have had the two years of competitive League racing, followed by the couple of seasons they had in the Scottish Junior League all of getting on for 50 years ago now, they simply refuse to wither and die altogether. There are still, too, a sizeable number of fans now following the Glasgow Tigers at Ashfield during the summer, and perhaps the promotion there are happy to welcome the income generated by these diehards who first cut their speedway teeth at Paisley in the mid 70’s. While the Love St speedway track and stadium have sadly gone the way of so many others, in that a new housing estate has been built where so many entertaining Saturdays were spent, as recently as 2011 and 2015, two very successful reunions were held in the town, not just for the supporters of the club, most of whom are perhaps nearing the stage of placing their zimmers in the car park, but also for member of the management team and former riders, who thought nothing of flying in from various parts of the world to share their memories of a very special time in their lives, and resurrect bonds created so many years before. Auld acquaintances were certainly NOT forgot, and with an active Paisley Lions Facebook page on the internet, with former Love St Lovers continuing to get their weekly speedway fix at Ashfield, who’s to say the Lions will not continue to remind speedway people all over the world that they, too, played their part in the history of our great sport?