St Johnstone’s season resumes against Airdrie this weekend, with a place in the last 16 of the Scottish Cup on the line.
Ahead of the first meeting between the teams in a decade-and-a-half, Courier Sport picks out some notable landmarks, players and games from their shared history.
The first and the worst
It was a Scottish Cup draw that paired the two clubs together to meet for the first time.
Saints were a Northern League side at the turn of the 20th century, while Airdrie were established in Scotland’s top professional division.
And it showed.
The 1905 clash ended 7-0 in Airdrie’s favour.
Given Saints had lost 10-1 to Third Lanark at recreation Park a couple of years earlier – their heaviest ever defeat in the Scottish Cup – there was no great affection for the competition taking hold in the Fair City in those days.
As far as Saints v Airdrie is concerned, this was as numerically bad as it would ever get (for either team) in the fixture.
The biggest
Considering Saints were losing to Airdrie by scorelines of 4-0 and 6-0 in the early 1920s, it was a sign of the club’s progress that by 1927 they were beating them 6-1.
Laurie McBain scored a Muirton Park hat-trick and had a hand in two other goals.
1927 | Laurie McBain scores a hat-trick in a 6-1 win for St Johnstone against Airdrie at Muirton Park. pic.twitter.com/XF6NLwVwoL
— Saints On This Day (@SaintsOTD) December 17, 2021
That the teams were 11th and 12th in the First Division respectively, made the result even more impressive.
It was a record top-flight margin of victory for Saints at the time.
The road to third
It was bordering on the incomprehensible that Willie Ormond’s great side of 1970/71 would lose 5-0 to Airdrie in the November of that season.
The return fixture at Muirton balanced the scales, though.
And with it being the fifth last game of the campaign, the 4-1 win (Jim Pearson and John Connolly both scored doubles) was crucial in helping Saints secure a highest-ever third place finish in Division One and European football for the first time.
The best
For any Saints fan over the age of 40 the mention of the word ‘Airdrie’ will take them back to a glorious, sunny, spring afternoon in 1990.
McDiarmid Park is nearly 35-years-old now and the day Alex Totten’s promotion-chasing aside came from behind to effectively seize the title in a never-to-be-forgotten second versus first shoot-out stands above all other matches played there.
In fact, if Saints are still calling McDiarmid home in another 35 years, the sell-out contest in their first season there is unlikely to be topped for drama.
The debuts
Any ‘greatest Saint’ debate will always include Sandy McLaren.
He was the club’s first Scotland player and remains the youngest ever Scottish international goalkeeper, making his debut at the age of just 18 years and 152 days.
McLaren was only 16 when he first played for Saints, his local team, in a 1-1 draw with Airdrie on April 30, 1927.
Fast forward 82 years and against the side now known as Airdrie United, Stevie May got himself into the youngest debutant top three and, by finding the net after coming off the bench, became the second youngest goalscorer behind Vic Robertson.
2009 | In the rearranged last game of the season, Stevie May scores on his debut in a 4-0 win over Airdrie Utd. St Johnstone finish the season 10 points clear at the top of Division One. pic.twitter.com/gPR0wS2g7i
— Saints On This Day (@SaintsOTD) May 11, 2021
In between times, another couple of players who deservedly found their way into the recent ‘Great Saints’ book also made their debuts against Airdrie – Willie Steele and Alan Main.
The transfers
Willie McLaren won’t be mentioned in the same breath as Sandy McLaren, that’s for sure.
He’s one of the players who has made the switch from Airdrie to Saints.
McLaren made next to no impact in Perth.
It was a different story for Gordon Whitelaw and Martin Hardie, though.
Whitelaw scored in the famous 1971, Muirton Park, Uefa Cup clash with Hamburg and an almost as famous Bernabeu friendly against Real Madrid the previous summer.
Hardie was a central midfield force of nature in Owen Coyle’s ‘nearly’ team before eventually helping Saints back into the top-flight under Derek McInnes.
Coyle was, of course, a founding father of the St Johnstone golden era and he too arrived at McDiarmid from Airdrie, having played for the Diamonds in that 1990 ‘greatest game’ all those years ago.
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