Showing 3 of 3

It was a great Celtic performance. “Man In The Know”, so down in the dumps a week ago, cannot contain his enthusiasm. Celtic “simply staggered their opponents and the spectators by the spemdour of their form, which recalled that of Aston Villa or the old North End”, – the two teams who in England the previous century had won the League and Cup double. It was a “brilliantly successful close to the season”, and the support now had something to look forward to over the summer.

There was however a down side to this game, and it lay in the behaviour of some of the crowd. Whether they were day-trippers from Paisley or Glasgow youths who simply did not like Celtic, their activities involved “the necessity of deploying the constabulary” on one occasion in particular when Maley, acting as linesman (there were no neutral linesmen appointed for the Charity Cup) gave a throw-in to Celtic “contrary to the opinions of the mob” and was pelted with missiles for so doing.

But they were a minority. Young was taken aback at the sheer enthusiasm of the Celtic crowd, some of whom invaded the field at the end. He was an instant hero of the fans, and was presented with a lovely gold medal at the end to add to the Gloucestershire Cup one that he had won less than a month ago. Maley the manager congratulated his players, who, he felt (correctly) could now go on to better things, and said that he was looking forward to seeing them for the start of the season.

Young smiled and was happy with the way that his footballing career had gone. He had clearly done the right thing in coming back to Scotland, but there was something that needed attending to in Bristol.

There was the girl he had left behind him, Florence Coombs. As both of them suspected when he left Bristol to come to Scotland, she was indeed pregnant. There was a mild scandal and embarrassment about this but “mild” was the word. It was hardly unusual to be caught “firing before the twelfth” (a metaphor from the Scottish grouse season which always started on 12 August) in Edwardian Britain, but the couple were in love and Jimmy would certainly do the decent thing and marry her which he duly did in Bristol in June 1903.

Mr and Mrs Young then moved to take up residence at no 14 Barbadoes Road, Kilmarnock, and Jimmy took up a job as an Iron Turner (he had now served his apprenticeship) while keeping up his training and playing for Celtic on a part-time basis when the season started again in August. He did of course hope to get a full-time contract, and would do so in due course. The Scottish League winners in 1903 were Hibs, and the Scottish Cup winners were Rangers. Young was determined to play his part in changing that.

To be continued…

David Potter