2001/02 A Championship Season Reviewed

A serialised account of our championship winning season by our man who has been at almost every match home and away - Ewan Lithgow

Part Four - October

It was the 13th October before we played our next game due to an international weekend the previous week. With Alloa having brought their game forward due to the Challenge Cup Final, we knew when we took the field to play Hamilton at home that a win may well see the side go top. This would however depend on how Stranraer and Clydebank, behind us only on goal difference fared. In the week preceding the game, Connolly brought Peter Weatherson's former strike partner at Blue Star, Paul Hollier, in on trial. The youngster would make his debut as a substitute in the Accies game but failed to impress in his time and left two months later having managed only three sub appearances and no starts. The game itself, played in front of the biggest home league crowd for a good many years (1,552), was extremely poor fare. Too many players had poor games and Hamilton, without particularly impressing, went back up the M74 with all three points. The only goal of the match came when Jim Thomson trod on the ball and fell over, letting Michael Moore to run clear on goal and finish with ease.

Over the course of the previous few weeks, Queens had been in talks with striker Craig Feroz, who had been reasonably successful in his two month loan, with a view to making the deal permanent. However, following the Hamilton match, John Connolly admitted defeat in his quest and Livingston recalled Feroz. He would later clinch a move to Berwick. In the same week, Des McKeown, frustrated at a lack of first team football, was allowed to join Stenhousemuir on a free transfer and Stuart Connolly, another who never quite picked up the pace of the Scottish game, returned to the North East to sign for Esh Winning.

This did however leave us a little short up front for the visit to Forfar that followed and meant Warren Hawke returned to the side in a forward role. The home side had been in decent form and a tough match was expected, but in the event, it couldn't have been more different from the previous game. Within the first minute Peter Weatherson turned in a Graham Connell cross to give his side the lead and the double act repeated the trick in the second half to double the lead. A further goal from John O'Neill finished the home side off.

As luck would have it, the way other results had gone left Queens in second spot in the table, just one point behind leaders Stranraer with the head to head at Palmerston to follow. Barring an unlikely big win for Alloa, in third place on goal difference, this meant the winners at Palmerston would be top. Peter Weatherson was suspended again but Connolly pulled off a surprise on the eve of the game, bringing former Cowdenbeath forward Murray

McDowall in on loan from Partick Thistle. Out of the blue Palmerston was besieged with fans and the biggest league crowd in over a decade (3,083) turned up. John O'Neill missed his first ever penalty for the club in the first half but made amends with a superb strike from the edge of the penalty box in the second to send the club top of the table for the first time since 1993. Jamie Campbell had returned in goal after Colin Scott dislocated his thumb in the pre-match warm up.

Ewan Lithgow

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