Andy Todd’s Jukebox Durie on the Wasps’ wee Willie

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Many clubs are known as perennial runners-up but Alloa Athletic have made a career out of it. They hold the record for finishing runners-up of the third tier of Scottish football a record eight times, most recently in 2012/2013 when they clinched promotion to the First Division via a play-off.

Many clubs hate playing Alloa Athletic, not because of a fearsome reputation, but rather because their pitch is made of artificial turf. This had one benefit – in 2010, Alloa was the only club in the country to play football after a cold snap meant every other SPL and SFL game was postponed due to freezing weather conditions.

One of their greatest players was Willie Crilley, affectionately known as “wee Willie Crilley”, “Electric Spark” and also “The Mighty Atom”, a free scoring striker who played for Alloa in the 1920s and was considered to be one of the best strikers in the league. He still holds the record for the greatest number of goals scored by an Alloa player in a single season.

Willie’s nickname was not ironic. At best he measured 5 foot 3 inches but some records say he was smaller. So small was he that even the club’s official history recounts a story that during one game he ran with the ball between an opponent’s legs before scoring. He subsequently joined Celtic but his heart was with Alloa, and he only lasted a few months before returning. Injury meant his career was (ironically) cut short and he emigrated to the United States to start a new life. He played for a number of US clubs but, after marrying a U.S. girl and taking American citizenship, a dream return to Alloa was foiled by immigration. In 1929, Willie had returned to Scotland with the intention of re-joining Alloa but, as a U.S. citizen, he was deported back to America before he was able to play for the club.

In 1934 he returned to Scotland for a final time to try to re-join his beloved Alloa but time and injuries meant he was not the player he once was and the club’s directors turned down his offer to play.

If Willie had played today every time he scored he would have heard Live is Life the 1985 hit by Austrian pop group Opus. Live Is Life has been adopted by a number of sports as an anthem, particularly in Europe, and in 1994 they released a new version for the World Cup that year, which was held in Willie’s adopted homeland, the United States.

Sadly, just like Willie, Alloa’s greatest musical achievement is also in the past. For a number of years, but no longer, Alloa would walk out to the theme tune to The A-Team, which wasn’t called the The AA-Team, though it really should have been.

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About the Author
After too many years as season ticket holder at Parkhead, Andy Todd renounced the SPL three years ago to support Queens Park. One team is a rank bunch of amateurs who play in a state of the art stadium and the other is…(I think we can all see where this is going).

Andy has been performing comedy for 18 months but is currently ‘between gigs’ while he writes a book on Scottish property law to be published in Summer 2012. Its potential audience will be less than 300 but his mum will be very proud.

Follow Andy on Twitter: @toddandy

Check out Andy’s website: www.toddandy.com

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