Founded in 1867 in Glasgow, Queen's Park F.C. had a pivotal role in the development and expansion of the game of association football in the 19th century. Among other achievements, 76 of the club's players were selected for the Scotland national football team, with 252 appearances in total, between 1872 and 1946 (the majority coming before 1900).
Queen's Park won the first three Scottish Cup competitions in the 1870s, reached the final of the English FA Cup twice in the 1880s and introduced several innovations in playing tactics and stadium procedures. [1] [2] Their contribution to the Scotland national football team was fundamental: all 11 players who appeared for the home side in the 1872 Scotland v England football match were officially representatives of the club (although some are known to have had strong links to other teams). [3] The Spiders provided the majority of the Scotland team for the next two decades, particularly in the most important annual fixture against England. [4] [5] [6] [7] Scotland played without Queen's Park representation for the first time in 1885, but this was an anomaly: the club needed their players for an FA Cup semi-final against Nottingham Forest, and their absence was not felt – the 'weaker' Scotland team defeated Ireland 8–2. [8] [9]
As football increased in popularity across Britain, talented Scottish players were regularly enticed to English clubs with unofficial financial inducements, which the Scottish Football Association and its members in general, and the Queen's Park club in particular, railed against, insisting that the sport was to be enjoyed by gentlemen for recreation on an amateur basis. This stance meant that when professionalism was legalised in England in the mid-1880s, Scottish teams withdraw from the FA Cup and the SFA ignored the 'mercenary' Scotch professors employed over the border, selecting only home-based players, a practice which continued even after the introduction of the Scottish Football League in 1890 (two years after England's Football League began); as standard-bearers of the amateur ethos, Queen's Park refused to join the league as they felt it would lead to professionalism among the larger clubs pursuing success which would lead to the demise of smaller provincial teams [12] (also, it has been reported, weakening their own commercial appeal in playing occasional lucrative exhibition matches around the country). [13] In this period the club had its only active international player from outwith Scotland: Humphrey Jones was already captain of the Wales team when he moved to Scotland in 1887 to work as a teacher, and gained his last two caps while registered as a Queen's Park player [14] (he also turned out for East Stirlingshire and for other teams in England and Wales when circumstances allowed, with his amateur status meaning he was not tied to any one club). [15]
While the effects of wider professionalism in England were not immediate – Scotland continued to post strong results throughout the first decade of the British Home Championship which began in 1883–84 [7] – gradually the economic and physical benefits of the more organised English system became clear, and with 'shamateurism' already rife in Scotland, professionalism was legalised in the SFL in 1893 and the better-supported clubs, including Queen's Park's city rivals Celtic and Rangers, could now compete with English clubs in recruiting and retaining the best talent. English-based players were admitted to the Scotland team in 1896 to arrest their larger rival's increasing dominance of the Home Championship, and Spiders representatives became increasingly rare. [16] [17]
By the end of the 19th century Queen's Park had been displaced as the country's leading club; the divide in quality with the bigger professional clubs was initially not so wide that they could not still compete to some extent, but they never challenged for the Scottish League championship after belatedly joining the competition in 1900. The 1901–02 season was the first in which no Queen's Park player was involved in any of the three international fixtures, and tellingly the first time that none played in the prestige England match. [8] the Spiders were relegated from the top division in 1922, though quickly regained their place in the top division and held it until 1948, after which they were largely a lower-tier club. With an unremarkable status as a league member, they provided only 14 different players to the Scottish League XI (ranking 16th in this respect), [19] and only 12 of the club's players with over 100 appearances also gained a Scotland cap while at the club, [20] with the vast majority of internationals being from the earlier era when only a small number of official cup fixtures were played each season. Instead, as they battled to compete at a high level with limited resources, the club became the main provider to the Scotland national amateur football team which was active from the 1920s to the 1970s – several of those players also represented Great Britain in Olympic football. [21] In the 1930s, Mustafa Mansour, an Egyptian international goalkeeper, played for Queen's Park after moving to Glasgow to study, but it appears he was not capped during his time at the club.
Of the club's 76 different internationals (still the fourth-highest ranking club in this regard, [23] while 89 goals were scored – 3rd overall [24] – and 252 total appearances made – 10th overall), [25] only 18 of those men made their debut in the 20th century [26] (eight after the end of the First World War), [27] itself a notable achievement for an amateur to be selected in an environment dominated by professionals. The final cap gained by a Queen's Park player was for Bobby Brown in 1946, [28] but this itself was an outlier – more regular representation had ended when Bob Gillespie and James Crawford both won their last cap in a win over England in 1933. [29] [30] The final goal was scored by Alan Morton in 1920. [31] [22]
Despite their diminished status in the game as a result of the commitment to amateurism (a status which was ended in 2019 following a vote by club members), [32] [33] the club has continued to act as a stepping stone to several players who reached international status later in their career, [20] including Sammy Cox, George Herd, Ronnie Simpson, John Little, Bobby Clark, David Holt, Alex Ferguson and Jamie Paton (for Australia) in the late 20th century, and Malky Mackay, Paul Paton (for Northern Ireland), Barry Douglas, Lawrence Shankland, Andy Robertson and Paul McGinn in the early 21st century – the last three played together at Hampden in the fourth tier during the 2012–13 season, [34] [35] with Robertson going on to become the national team captain, as well as gaining the most caps of any former Spiders player (55 as of the end of 2021) and the first club graduate to win the English league championship. [36] Modern-era internationals who played for Queen's Park at youth level include Derek Parlane, Simon Donnelly, Aiden McGeady (93 caps for Ireland) and Steven Saunders.
In Women's football which became more organised in the 1990s, Queen's Park F.C. (women) has never been among the major Scottish clubs although they were a SWPL member. Detailed records are not widely available before the 2010s, although Megan Sneddon, Amy McDonald and Jen Beattie are known to have played for the club and the national team shortly prior to the section was disbanded in 2008, relaunching two years later at a lower level. Since then, Ho Wan Tung has featured for Hong Kong.
Scotland except where stated.
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Belgium 3–7 Scotland 4–2 Wales 0–0 Wales 3–0 Ireland 1–0 Scotland 0–2 Wales 1–1 Wales 5–2 Wales 2–2 Scotland The International Roll of Honour is a list established by the Scottish Football Association recognising players who have gained 50 or more international caps for Scotland. The roll of honour was launched in February 1988, when 11 players had already achieved the distinction. Each player inducted receives a commemorative gold medal, an invitation to every Scotland home match and has their portrait hung in the Scottish Football Museum.
Gordon Smith was a Scottish footballer. He is the only player to have won a Scottish league championship with three clubs: Hibernian, Heart of Midlothian, and Dundee. Smith also represented Scotland and the Scottish League XI.
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Robert Lennox, MBE is a Scottish former professional footballer who played for Celtic and was a member of their 1967 European Cup-winning team, known as the Lisbon Lions. He earned ten international caps for Scotland. In 2002, Celtic supporters voted him a member of the club's all-time greatest team.
George Lewis Young was a Scottish footballer who played as a defender. He is best remembered for his 16-year association with Rangers and for being the first player to receive more than 50 caps for the Scotland national team.
John Tait Robertson was a Scottish football player and manager who played mainly as a left half. He won 16 caps for his country, scoring three goals.
John Miller "Ian" McColl was a Scottish football player and manager. McColl played as a defender for Queen's Park and Rangers, while he also represented both the Scotland national team and the Scottish League. After retiring as a player, he managed the Scotland national team and English club Sunderland.
The 1901–02 British Home Championship was an international football tournament between the British Home Nations which was meant to herald the arrival of the full professional game of football as both England and Scotland fielded fully professional teams for the first time. The championship was however dominated and overshadowed by a disaster during the final deciding match between England and Scotland at Ibrox Park, which claimed 25 lives. Six minutes into the game, a section of the wooden West Tribune Stand suddenly collapsed due to heavy rainfall the night before. Over 500 people were injured as the stadium was packed to its 68,000 capacity for the match. Although play was stopped in the immediate aftermath of the disaster as players, police and stewards rushed to aid the injured, it was later continued. The continued match finished 1–1 despite the players' reluctance and repeated pauses to allow police and injured spectators to cross the pitch. After the match the Scottish and English Football Associations decided to void the result, and the match was replayed at Villa Park. All proceeds from the replay were contributed to the Disaster Fund set up to aid victims of the accident.
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The Scotland national football team represents Scotland in international association football and is controlled by the Scottish Football Association. It is the joint-oldest national football team in the world, alongside England, Scotland's opponents in what is now recognised as the world's first international football match, which took place at Hamilton Crescent in Glasgow in November 1872. Prior to this, a series of matches had been played between teams representing the two countries, but the Scottish team was drawn almost entirely from players based in and around London and these games are now not regarded as full international matches. The lack of involvement by players from Scottish clubs in these matches led to some controversy, which was resolved when The Football Association arranged to send a team to play in Glasgow, where the English players took on a Scotland team composed entirely of players from the Queen's Park club.
This article lists the results for the Scotland national football team between 2000 and 2019.
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This article lists the results for the Scotland national football team between 1960 and 1979.
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