Football Without Fans – Haddington Merry Plough Bhoys CSC

Haddington CSC

Merry Plough Bhoys CSC was founded in 1997 with one of the founders being Colin Young. There were between 10 and 15 people from Haddington travelling on the Brother Walfrid CSC, and they found that travelling through the centre of Edinburgh was adding about an hour to their journey, so they decided to start their own club.

They leave from The Plough Tavern in Haddington. Traditionally, in the 70s and 80s, people from Haddington went on the Tranent and District CSC bus, which covered Haddington, Tranent, and Musselburgh. However, this bus stopped going in the early 1990s, with the few remaining members going through on the train.

Through a couple of lads Colin went to school with, they drove to Musselburgh a couple of times to go on the Brother Walfrid CSC bus. Four of them then went by car for a season or two, but then another couple of guys wanted to come with them, so he contacted the Brother Walfrid secretary to ask if they would pick them up in Haddington, and he agreed to do this.

After a while, the number of people going from Haddington increased, and they started their own CSC to commence the following season. In their first season, 1997/98, they had 31 members. At their peak in the 2000/01 season, they had 49 members. The club took a bus to every game at Celtic Park and Hampden, but unfortunately it was only one car, or not very often two cars, for away matches.

Sometimes they had enough tickets to take a minibus to Ibrox. In 1998, four of them drove to Dunfermline to get tickets each for the game Celtic thought was going to win the league, so they had members in both the home and away ends that day.

For European trips, some of them like to get away at least once a year. On occasion, they have travelled with Carfin CSC and Edinburgh No.1 CSCs to Cardiff and Blackburn, respectively. They would take the bus down south to the testimonials. The best away trip was to Newcastle for Peter Beardsley’s testimonial. They literally drank the place dry.

27th January 1999, Celtic beat Newcastle 3:1 in Peter Beardsleys testimonial.

Peacock O.G, Lubo and Burchill. @Burchyboy27 pic.twitter.com/JptQQE3tdH

— Li’l Ze (@LilZe_7) January 27, 2021

They had a good social gathering, and several of them used to go out when the bus returned to Haddington. They used to have an annual Celtic Night and invite The Foggy Dew through to play in the Haddington Labour Club, which closed many years ago.

When Celtic won the league in 1998, the bus went to Colin’s house first, where he had two bottles of champagne in the fridge. They got into the pub, and the bottles sprayed everyone, including the locals who were already in. However, they made up for this as they bought everyone in the pub a drink.

Colin once received a phone call from Celtic asking him to explain the name of the club. He replied that they left from The Plough and were a happy bunch. This was accepted. The club has changed its name to Haddington CSC and runs an 8-seater, with half of them getting picked up from outside the town.

David McIntyre – CelticBars.com

An extract from Football Without Fans – The History of Celtic Supporters Clubs by David McIntyre ( Celtic Bars).

Football Without Fans – The History of Celtic Supporters Clubs is out now and available in print and kindle versions HERE. Watch the video in the Celtic World tweet below for some amazing facts on the Celtic support around the world.

Just before Christmas, David McIntyre from Celtic Bars was interviewed by Celtic TV about his Football Without Fans book. Here’s the video on Celtic TV’s You Tube channel . You can order a copy in print or kindle from Amazon regardless of where you are in the world. Order your copy HERE.