Ah, them were the days
Yet again the performance of Scottish teams in Europe has been very poor. We are currently ranked seventeenth in UEFA's ratings and are falling. Unless we improve soon then our places in the UEFA cup will be cut to one. This is almost a reason to hope that the old firm do well in Europe! 'Well fans might not be best placed to criticise as we've never made it past the first round of European competition but the ties that we have played hold (some) special memories.
Our first taste of continental football was in 1991. As we had won the cup earlier in the year, we qualified for the Cup Winners Cup. We didn't have to play a preliminary round and we drew the seeded GKS Katowice in the first. We probably couldn't have got a worse draw with the exception of Russia or Albania. Having played well in the away leg we were unfortunate to lose 2-0 with a late deflected goal. We were reasonably optimistic before the home leg and Steve Kirk scored our first European goal before having another shot cleared off the line. When they scored the crucial away goal we looked dead and buried but we came back late in the game and were unlucky to go out on the away goals rule. Another disappointment about this game was the absence of Polish fans. Sadly, they couldn't afford the journey.
We had to wait a few years before our next European adventure. A season of good football rewarded us with third place in the league which gave us a place in the UEFA cup. The opponents this time were the amateurs, Havnar Boltfaleg of the Faroe Islands. 3-0 and 4-1 score lines gave us a convincing aggregate win. The draw for the first round proper was eagerly anticipated, with Motherwell fans hoping for an accessible away leg. The man from UEFA paired us with German giants Borussia Dortmund. A couple of thousand 'Well fans made the journey to Germany. The atmosphere outside the ground was very friendly, with fans freely mixing together. During the game TC missed a sitter to put us one up. A second half goal from Andy Moller gave us a respectable 1-0 defeat but perhaps we could (should?) have done better. The home game was a huge anti-climax, 0-0 at half time but with Dougie sent off we never looked like getting anything back. A three goal aggregate defeat was the final outcome but I bet Tommy Coyne still has nightmares about that first leg chance.
Another successful league campaign put us in the UEFA cup for the second season in a row. MyPa 47 was the competition in the preliminary round this time. We had fun looking for the non existent 'MyPa' on the map. We didn't know much about this lot except that they would be harder than Havnar. In the first leg we were one up after ten minutes and cruising. Three daft goals later and we were out of the UEFA cup. The first two could be blamed on the goalie although he couldn't do much about the third. In the away leg we showed our class and comfortably won 2-0. Andy Roddie missed a sitter and had a supposedly good goal disallowed. Lee McCulloch shaved the post in injury time but we had blown it by then.
I'm sure you all agree that the sooner we get back into Europe the better. Considering our current form this season it might not be this season. Still there's always the Cup (Winners Cup).#
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