Bellshill Athletic F.C.
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Bellshill Athletic Football Club is a
Scottish Scottish usually refers to something of, from, or related to Scotland, including: *Scottish Gaelic, a Celtic Goidelic language of the Indo-European language family native to Scotland *Scottish English *Scottish national identity, the Scottish ide ...
football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...
club based in the town of
Bellshill Bellshill (pronounced "Bells hill") is a town in North Lanarkshire in Scotland, southeast of Glasgow city centre and west of Edinburgh. Other nearby localities are Motherwell to the south, Hamilton, South Lanarkshire, Hamilton to the south ...
,
North Lanarkshire North Lanarkshire (; ) is one of the 32 council areas of Scotland. It borders the north-east of the Glasgow City council area and contains many of Glasgow's suburbs, commuter towns, and villages. It also borders East Dunbartonshire, Falkirk (co ...
. It plays in the .


History

The history of the club can be traced back as far as 1897 when Bellshill Athletic were founded as a Juvenile club who played at Hawthorn Park. After two successful years as a Juvenile club, Athletic transferred to Junior level. The area had three other clubs at this time - Bellshill Thistle, Mossend Celtic and Mossend Brigade. On 6 August 1902 Bellshill merged with another local club, Clydesdale Wanderers, to form Bellshill & Clydesdale United. This new club only lasted for two seasons before folding, meanwhile a new Bellshill Athletic had been set-up in 1903 and this is the club that still exists today. In 1975, Andrew Goodwin secured a four figure deal with The Derby Inn (a pub in Mossend), making Bellshill Athletic the first football club in Britain to wear sponsors on their shirts. The club's early years had it based at many homes. These included Orbiston Park, Douglas Park and Brigade park. The club's previous ground, Brandon Park, was officially opened in 1903 in a friendly against
Blantyre Victoria Blantyre Victoria Football Club, also known as Blantyre Vics, are a Scottish association football club based in the town of Blantyre, South Lanarkshire. Formed in 1889, they play at KG Stadium (traditionally known as Castle Park). They currently ...
in the month of August that year. On the club's centenary year, they were then based at a new location, New Brandon Park, in the Hattonrigg area of the town. However, due to legal matters with the owner, the club were forced to abandon the ground and, after a brief stint in Blantyre, were permitted to move temporarily to the local Sir Matt Busby Sports Complex. After this agreement expired, the club entered a groundsharing arrangement with Vale of Clyde at their Fullarton Park ground in Tollcross, Glasgow for the 2011–12 season. In 2015, the club moved back to Bellshill at Rockburn Park, while planning to move to a new community facility at Bellshill Academy. Professional footballer
Hughie Gallacher Hugh Kilpatrick Gallacher (2 February 1903 – 11 June 1957) was a Scottish people, Scottish association football, football player in the 1920s and 1930s. In 597 senior club games, Gallacher scored 419 goals, playing league football for Airdri ...
also started his playing career at Bellshill Athletic, before becoming the last person to captain Newcastle United to a top division title. Billy Moffatt was another who started his playing career at Bellshill Athletic. Bellshill have played at Junior level since 1899, with an exception of a short spell (1927–1931) during which they played in the Intermediate League. As Juniors they have played in four different leagues: the Lanarkshire League, the
Scottish League The Scottish Football League (SFL) is a defunct league featuring professional and semi-professional football clubs mostly from Scotland.One club, Berwick Rangers, is based in the town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, which is located approximately 4 k ...
, the
Central League The or , also known as the for sponsorship reasons, is one of the two professional baseball leagues that constitute Nippon Professional Baseball in Japan. The winner of the league championship plays against the winner of the Pacific League i ...
and the present
West Region Western Region or West Region may refer to: Places *Al Gharbia, Abu Dhabi, the Western Region *Western Region, Bahrain * Western Region, Eastern Cape, South Africa *Western Region, Ghana *Western Region (Iceland) *Western Region, Nepal *Western Reg ...
. The club were relegated from the Stagecoach Super League Premier Division in season 2009–10. Bellshill Athletic achieved promotion with managers Dean Muir and Neely Rowatt from the West of Scotland Football League Division 3 in 2024. The joint management team reached back-to-back Scottish Junior Cup quarter-finals losing out at home to Glenafton and Arthurlie, before stepping down at the end of December 2024. On the 9 January 2025, Johnny Fallon is appointed the club's manager.


Current squad


Honours

Lanarkshire League Cup *Winners: 1916-17, 1918-19, 1950-51, 1951-52, 1961-62, 1962-63 Lanarkshire Junior Cup *Winners: 1912-13, 1918-19, 1951-52 Lanarkshire Junior Consolation Cup *Winners: 1904-05, 1925-26 Cambuslang & District Junior League *Winners: 1907-08 Lanarkshire Junior League Division 1 *Winners: 1904-05 Glasgow Junior League *Winners: 1925-26 Scottish Central Junior League Cup *Winners: 1949-50 Central Region League Division B *Winners: 1973-74 Central Region League Division C *Winners: 1986-87 Central Region League Division 2 *Winners: 2000-01 Central League Cup *Winners: 2000-01, 2001-02 Central Sectional Junior League Cup *Winners: 2001-02 Super League Division 1 *Winners: 2003-04


References


External links


Official club website

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{{SJFA West Region Football clubs in Scotland Football in North Lanarkshire Scottish Junior Football Association clubs Association football clubs established in 1897 1897 establishments in Scotland Bellshill West of Scotland Football League teams