Christmas Cup

Sunday 1st December saw the fifth running of Raith Rovers Walking Football’s Christmas Cup. On a mild day, compared to the last two years, ten teams took to the pitches to contest this popular end of year tournament. The teams were split into two groups of five with each team playing the others once and the top two in the group going forward into the semi finals.

Group A
Group A consisted of: Stenhousemuir, Tayport, Linlithgow Rose, Hibernian WF and Fairfield. Round one saw Linlithgow Rose beat Tayport 2-0 while Fairfield were beating Stenhousemuir by the same score. With Fairfield sitting out round two Linlithgow could take the initiative in the group. A 1-1 draw with Stenny saw them narrowly lead the group while Tayport added their name to the contenders with a 1-0 win over Hibs. A 3-2 win for Tayport over Stenny in round three saw them share the league lead with Fairfield with the later beating Hibs 2-1. The final round before the break saw Fairfield beat Tayport 1-0 and Rose beat Hibs 2-1 to book their places in the semi. After the break Fairfield beat Rose 2-0 to take the league while Hibs beat Stenny 2-1 to take fourth place.

Group B
In Group B we had: Hearts, Arbroath, Raith Rovers, Crieff and Falkirk. Round one started with Raith beating Arbroath 1-0 and Falkirk beating Hearts 2-0. In round two Hearts beat Raith 3-2 while Arbroath beat Crieff 2-1 to leave four teams sitting on 3 points at the top of the group. Into round three and, with Raith sitting this one out, Hearts take the initiative to lead the group beating Arbroath 2-0 while Crieff and Falkirk fought out a 1-1 draw. In round four Raith beat Crieff 4-3 in the highest scoring game of the day while Arbroath made things interesting beating Falkirk 3-1. Into the last round of matches and four teams could make it into the top two positions depending on how the results worked out. However with both Hearts and Raith winning by 2-1 score lines against Crieff and Falkirk respectively they topped the group on nine points each. With both teams also having a goal difference of +2 Raith were declared group winners on account of having scored more goals.

And so to the Semi Finals. Fairfield V Hearts and Raith V Linlithgow. Both were tight games with Hearts edging Fairfield out 2-1 and Raith beating Linlithgow 2-0.
Would the final see Raith retain the cup or Hearts put their name on the trophy for the first time? The game was as tight as the group game between the sides with only one goal scored in the 15 minutes and so a new name was added to the trophy and congratulations to Hearts!

Reflections:
After a little bit of rain during the introductions the weather turned out perfect for football. All teams played in the right spirit we’ve come to expect in this tournament which was great to see once more. This year’s competition was the most competitive we’ve had with no team losing a game by more than 2 goals and the results in all games never being certain. For the above we have to thank all of the teams for their attitude. And also the referee crew, who once again did a great job, despite the often helpful(?) advice from players and officials. And finally thanks to Raith’s Callum Hannah for coming along and presenting the trophy.