Queen of The South Player
In 1963 Allan Ball signed for Queen of the South for £100. Ball was signed in the early hours of the morning as he came off his shift. Ball joined Queens playing staff that featured all time goals king of Queens, Jim Patterson, right winger Ernie Hannigan and fellow long servants Iain McChesney and Jim Kerr.
Goalkeeper & manager George Farm dropped himself from the team to give Allan Ball his Queens debut in a 6-3 defeat to Falkirk. Retained for the following midweek match at Celtic, he again played well despite losing.
Allan Ball made 819 Queen of the South appearances, including 507 consecutively, and was only once cautioned. That was by Tiny Wharton, on December 25. "I'd said something about Jesus Christ," he recalls. "I was booked for blaspheming on Christmas Day."
Ball's performance in the 1975/76 Scottish League Cup quarter-final against Rangers at Ibrox Park helped keep Rangers to a 1-0 defeat. A 2-1 victory for Queens in the second leg at Palmerston meant extra time after an aggregate 2-2 score. Jocky Dempster was one of the Queens scorers. An extra time goal for Rangers saw them through.
In the 1975/76 Scottish Cup Ball made a penalty save with a broken ankle in the away 2-2 fourth round draw with Ayr United. He did not play in the 5-4 replay victory.
In 1980-81 with Allan Ball as goalkeeper Queens were promoted from Division Two. Also in the side were fellow long servant Iain McChesney, Crawford Boyd and Jimmy Robertson and future manager Rowan Alexander.
Allan Ball's long service as Queens last line of defence was rewarded with two testimonials, the first versus Carlisle United in 1971 and the other in 1984 against Manchester City. Danny McGrain, Davie Cooper, Gary Mackay and Rowan Alexander guested for Queens in the game against City.
Read more about this topic: Allan Ball
Famous quotes containing the words queen of, queen, south and/or player:
“In the game of “Whist for two,” usually called “Correspondence,” the lady plays what card she likes: the gentleman simply follows suit. If she leads with “Queen of Diamonds,” however, he may, if he likes, offer the “Ace of Hearts”: and, if she plays “Queen of Hearts,” and he happens to have no Heart left, he usually plays “Knave of Clubs.””
—Lewis Carroll [Charles Lutwidge Dodgson] (1832–1898)
“They’re here, though; not a creature failed,
No blossom stayed away
In gentle deference to me,
The Queen of Calvary.
Each one salutes me as he goes,”
—Emily Dickinson (1830–1886)
“Biography is a very definite region bounded on the north by history, on the south by fiction, on the east by obituary, and on the west by tedium.”
—Philip Guedalla (1889–1944)
“There has been in our time a lack of reliance on language and a lack of experimentation which are frightening to anyone who sees them as symptoms. We know the phenomenon of stage-fright: it holds the player shivering, incapable of speech or action. Perhaps there is an audience-fright which the play can feel, which leaves him with these incapacities.”
—Muriel Rukeyser (1913–1980)