Stonelaw Football Club was a Scottish football team located in the town of
Rutherglen
Rutherglen (, sco, Ruglen, gd, An Ruadh-Ghleann) is a town in South Lanarkshire, Scotland, immediately south-east of the city of Glasgow, from its centre and directly south of the River Clyde. Having existed as a Lanarkshire burgh in its own ...
,
Lanarkshire
Lanarkshire, also called the County of Lanark ( gd, Siorrachd Lannraig; sco, Lanrikshire), is a historic county, lieutenancy area and registration county in the central Lowlands of Scotland.
Lanarkshire is the most populous county in Scot ...
,
Scotland
Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to th ...
.
History
The club was founded in 1875 and may have taken its name from Stonelaw Tower in Rutherglen, or from one of the coal mining pits of that name in the local area (one located below the tower). Stonelaw's first known matches come from the 1875–76 season and it entered the
Scottish Cup
The Scottish Football Association Challenge Cup,1876–77. The club easily beat
Shotts
Shotts is a town in North Lanarkshire, Scotland. It is located almost halfway between Glasgow () and Edinburgh (). The village has a population of about 8,840. A local story has Shotts being named after the legendary giant highwayman Bertram de ...
at home in the first round, but lost 4–0 at home to
Arthurlie
Arthurlie is an area of the town of Barrhead, East Renfrewshire, Scotland.
History of Arthurlie
The lands of Arthurlie were held in medieval times by the Stewart family, a branch of the noble Stewarts of Darnley. Later the lands became the prop ...
in the second; the club being so little-known that the
Glasgow Herald
''The Herald'' is a Scottish broadsheet newspaper founded in 1783. ''The Herald'' is the longest running national newspaper in the world and is the eighth oldest daily paper in the world. The title was simplified from ''The Glasgow Herald'' in ...
referred to the team as "Stonehouse".
Stonelaw's best Scottish Cup run came in 1878–79, being one of the final ten clubs left in the competition. The club beat the original East Kilbride club 4–0 at home in the first round, the Stonelaw goalkeeper not having a save to make. The club was still so low-key that the national newspapers did not refer to its second or third round wins over
Hamilton Academical
Hamilton Academical Football Club, often known as Hamilton Accies, or The Accies, is a Scottish football club from Hamilton, South Lanarkshire who currently compete in the Scottish Championship, having been relegated from the 2020–21 Scottis ...
and Clarkston respectively. The club's run looked as if it had ended with a 2–0 defeat at
Thistle
Thistle is the common name of a group of flowering plants characterised by leaves with sharp prickles on the margins, mostly in the family Asteraceae. Prickles can also occur all over the planton the stem and on the flat parts of the leaves ...
of south
Glasgow
Glasgow ( ; sco, Glesca or ; gd, Glaschu ) is the most populous city in Scotland and the fourth-most populous city in the United Kingdom, as well as being the 27th largest city by population in Europe. In 2020, it had an estimated pop ...
. However,
Partick
Partick ( sco, Pairtick, Scottish Gaelic: ''Partaig'') is an area of Glasgow on the north bank of the River Clyde, just across from Govan. To the west lies Whiteinch, to the east Yorkhill and Kelvingrove Park (across the River Kelvin), and to t ...
, whom Thistle had beaten in the third round, had put in a protest about Thistle, for using three players who had already played for another side in the
Glasgow Cup
The Glasgow Cup is a football tournament open to teams from Glasgow, Scotland. Operated by the Glasgow Football Association, it was competed for annually by senior Glasgow clubs from 1887 until 1989. It is now (since the 2019–20 amended rul ...
, which made them cup-tied for all competitions; the
Scottish Football Association
The Scottish Football Association (also known as the SFA and the Scottish FA; sco, Scots Fitba Association; Scottish Gaelic: ''Comann Ball-coise na h-Alba'') is the governing body of football in Scotland and has the ultimate responsibility fo ...
upheld the protest when drawing the fifth round ties. In the fifth round, the club lost 9–1 at home to
Dumbarton
Dumbarton (; also sco, Dumbairton; ) is a town in West Dunbartonshire, Scotland, on the north bank of the River Clyde where the River Leven flows into the Clyde estuary. In 2006, it had an estimated population of 19,990.
Dumbarton was the ca ...
, a result so expected that none of the newspapers remarked on it.
Clarkston gained revenge over Stonelaw in the first round of the 1879–80 with a 2–1 win, the first goal scored after the goalkeeper dropped the ball when charged by Forsyth, and Sturton poking the loose ball home. A month later, the club was one of the 16 founder members of the Lanarkshire Football Association, finishing third in the balloting for membership on the executive committee.
The association set up the first
Lanarkshire Cup
The Lanarkshire Cup was an annual competition open to football teams in the Lanarkshire area. The competition is now defunct.
List of winners
1879–80 - Stonelaw
1880–81 - Thistle
1881–82 - Hamilton Academical
1882–83 - West Benhar
1883� ...
that season, and Stonelaw became the first Lanarkshire champions. Unusually, Stonelaw played Hamilton Academical in two rounds of the competition, as the rules of the competition followed those of the Scottish Cup, in that, if clubs drew twice, they both advanced to the next drawing, and the clubs played out two draws in the second round. The clubs met again three rounds later, in the semi-final, the original attempt at playing out the tie being abandoned just before half-time (with Stonelaw 1–0 up) because of a broken leg to the Acas' Alexander Brown, and with Stonelaw already down to ten men because of an injury to Gilchrist. Stonelaw returned to Hamilton for a replay and won 3–0.
The final was also played at the Acas' ground, against Shotts, and Stonelaw took the lead through an own goal, Menzies securing the game with a second before half-time. There was however some dark whispering that Stonelaw had relied on seven guest players for the final, and, perhaps backing up those rumours, the club never seems to have played a competitive match again; it scratched from its defence of the trophy and from its final two Scottish Cup entries. The name was revived in 1887 briefly by a new club which included Stonelaw's goalkeeper Gilzean in its new incarnation.
Colours
The club wore blue jerseys, white knickers, and blue hose, with a
Victoria cross
The Victoria Cross (VC) is the highest and most prestigious award of the British honours system. It is awarded for valour "in the presence of the enemy" to members of the British Armed Forces and may be awarded posthumously. It was previously ...