The world’s second oldest major football rivalry resumes in the Capital tonight
The derby match that has seen everything - even an extra-terrestrial goal celebration
It’s seen sporting triumph and failure; record-breaking crowds and public disorder; bitter rivalry and moments of shared city support. It has even seen one club’s captain chased through city streets by a mob of rival fans.
There’s been a game-that-never-was fixture turned into a BBC Radio drama and an alien Hollywood superstar at the centre of a supporters’ row.
It is, of course, the Edinburgh derby. And when it kicks off at Tynecastle this evening, it will see the world’s second-oldest top-flight football derby resume its latest round of hostilities.
The Capital’s two big football clubs are amongst the oldest in the world. Hibernian celebrate their 150th anniversary this year, Hearts last year, and their fixtures are behind only the Nottingham derby (played far less frequently) in terms of venerability.
The first was played without goalposts as we know them today, in the cold of winter and with a crowd of at best a few hundred, on the Meadows, on Christmas Day 1875. The players wore everyday clothes, and the ball had been borrowed from a local school. Other than that we know little about the game, as records were not kept, other than Hearts ran out winners by one goal to nil.
Chased through the streets
We also know that playing that day were two characters who would play pivotal roles in the development of the two clubs – Tom Purdie who would captain Hearts, and Michael Whelahan who skippered Hibs. In those early years, there were reports of fighting between rival fans. After one game in 1877, Purdie was chased through the streets by Hibs fans after refusing to shake hands after the match.
What is less well-known is that a supportive Heart of Midlothian FC, founded a year earlier than Hibernian, had defied the guidance of football authorities in both Edinburgh and Scotland to play the original derby game. Hibernian had been founded by the poor Irish immigrant community in the city’s Cowgate to raise funds for a community fighting both poverty and prejudice, and the authorities were determined that their competitions were “catering for Scotsmen, not Irishmen.”
The early fixtures with Hearts went some considerable way to easing Hibernian into Scottish football competition, although the route was still far from easy.
The dominance of the two clubs in Edinburgh – there were a number of others - and the importance of the fixture in the Scottish football calendar would be established in in season 1877-78 when Hearts won the Edinburgh Football Association Cup in a fifth match after the previous four had been drawn.
The clash has certainly grown since then. Today’s match in Gorgie is inevitably a sell-out, with a crowd of more than 19,000 expected. The record attendance for a derby came in the New Year derby of 1950, when Hearts ran out 2-1 winners against their rivals before almost 66,000 crammed into the enormous terracing and stand of the old Easter Road Stadium.
Derby means authenticity
In his book Auld Foes, author James Stephen, points out that the two clubs remain deeply rooted in their communities in Gorgie and Leith, and says: “Edinburgh is a melting pot of immigrant; from elsewhere in Scotland, from England, from around the world. Football, because of the unique place it occupies in societies, is a great way to get under the skin of a city. To understand its subcultures, its politics, even its nasty side.
“In Edinburgh it is where you can go and hear the authentic Edinburgh accent, mixed in with local Scots dialect. In a city known for its success, its beauty and its affluence, it’s where you can find the traditional working classes and a predominantly Edinburgher native crowd.
“Nothing matters more to a football fan then their own city rivalry.” And with fast approaching 700 fixtures between the two sides to look back on, there is plenty to feed that rivalry.
Irvine Welsh has spoken of the fierceness of the rivalry, but also said this about the Edinburgh Derby. “Though the Edinburgh footballing rivalry is fiercer than ever … a discernible empathy, engendered by a shared animosity to the Glasgow power centre, now often runs alongside it. Hibs and Hearts, with their tight, atmospheric stadiums, lodged in the heart of two of the last thriving, vibrant inner-city working-class communities replete with pubs, shops, restaurants and cafes full of genuine football supporters, now seem like the best possible places to watch a game of football.”
It’s important to understand the positions both clubs occupy in the broadest context of the city’s landscape. Hearts is undoubtedly the establishment club, playing in the city’s maroon colour, and often followed by the great and the good of the city. Hibs are very much the Capital’s bohemian club, almost anti-establishment, more likely to be followed by writers, actors and singers.
Even compete for celebrity fans
A generalisation, of course, but a quick look at the celebrity fans following both clubs does provide some supporting evidence. Sporting stars including Sir Chris Hoy and athlete Eilidh Doyle, former snooker champion Stephen Hendry, and political figures like George Foulkes and Ian Murray MP will be backing Hearts this evening, and also actor Ken Stott, ironically renowned for playing the part of Hibs-loving city detective John Rebus.
Hibs will be cheered on by music stars The Proclaimers and Derek Dick, otherwise known as singer Fish, movie star Dougray Scott, writer Irvine Welsh, boxing world champions Alex Arthur and Josh Taylor, and the tennis legends that are Andy and Jamie Murray. And, of course, their own Stott, the unrelated BBC presenter and actor Grant Stott.
The derby that never was – in a manner of speaking – took place during the 1940 New Year’s Day wartime match, when a blanket of thick fog covered Easter Road. While the conditions would normally have seen the game abandoned, the fact that it was being broadcast widely by the BBC for the entertainment of the troops meant the War Office ordered it to go ahead to avoid alerting the Luftwaffe to the weather conditions.
Match commentator Bob Kingsley could not see the pitch, and had to improvise using a series of runners to tell him if either side had scored. Otherwise, he created his own version of the action, later described by The Scotsman as “Fawlty Towers ahead of itself” and adapted into a BBC Radio Four play.
Rows over the Edinburgh Derby are not confined to earth. In 1999 the diminutive and friendly alien ET featured in BT adverts, urging people to “stay in touch.” One advert created for BT in Scotland featured ET in a Hibs strip sitting with a family wearing maroon strips watching an Edinburgh Derby on telly as Hibs’ Russell Latapy scored, sparking ET’s traditionally energetic celebrations.
Some Hearts’ supporters club were furious and bizarrely claimed, the ad showing ET’s love of Hibs implied that Hearts fans were an inferior species, and called for a boycott of BT services. There were reports, including in The Herald, that the complaint made it as far as the UK’s Race Relations Board in London. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the complaint was speedily dismissed.
Highlights and noise
But what of the sporting action itself? Hearts hold the upper hand in derby wins, but both clubs have held periods of dominance, and both sets of fans have their own particular triumphs that are still crowed about to this day and in recent seasons the fixture has become much more even.
In terms of highlights, for supporters in maroon, there is one undeniably biggest day – their triumph over their rivals by five goals to one in the Scottish Cup final in May 2012 the only Scottish Cup final between the two in the modern era.
For those who prefer green, the New Year derby of 1973 came in a period of dominance, and in that game Turnbull’s Tornadoes blew the challenge of Hearts aside by winning 7-0 at the home of their great rivals by a score which remains a record between the two.
As ever, this evening’s game is difficult to predict, even though Hearts enjoy a rich vein of form and top the Scottish league. Hibs, while lower down the table, are as yet unbeaten in the league and have won the last two derbies.
But one thing is certain. At 5.45pm if you happen to pass by Tynecastle Stadium you may hear a roar that tips the scales at 102 decibels - equivalent to the noise of standing next to a large jet as it lands. These neighbours will be as noisy as ever.
💚