walking-football

Team lineup

Raith Rovers’ Competitive Start in 2026 Walking Football League

The 2026 Walking Football Scotland East Region league started on 1st February. Last year we ended the first day with just one point from the four games. This year, against three of the same teams and one of the league’s newly promoted teams, we were hoping for slightly more. The games would be against Arbroath, Hibernian, Luncarty and Dundee East.

Team lineup
Back row: Willie Carroll, Scott Chalmers, Ally Grant, Ryan Ramsay, Fraser Terris, Davey Ramsay, Darren Scoon, Charles Doherty
Front row: John Wylie, Mikey Curtis, Kev Henderson, Graham Allen

Game 1 today was, as last year, against Arbroath – Maroon. Raith started on the front foot with shots from John and Mikey in the first few minutes. Play was then stopped for a couple of minutes while the ref reflated the ball. In 7 minutes the ref adjudged a third running foul against Raith and awarded Arbroath a penalty, which they scored (1-0). Raith continued to press, desperate to tie the game up, with shots coming from Ryan and Darren failing to beat the Arbroath keeper. In 11 minutes the pressure pays off when Arbroath commit their third running foul and Raith have the penalty. Darren steps up and calmly slots past the keeper for his first goal in Rover’s colours (1-1). A minute later however Arbroath restore their lead (2-1). It’s a frantic end to the game though as Raith press some more and pressure Arbroath into a mistake as an Arbroath player infringes the keeper’s area. Penalty Raith! Darren again steps up but this time the keeper saves. However Darren is quick on the rebound and scores at the second attempt (2-2). With time running out Arbroath are again penalised for a third run and it’s another Raith penalty. With regular penalty taker Ally Grant on the pitch penalty taking switches to him and he slots it past the keeper to finish the scoring (2-3).

Arbroath – Maroon 2-3 Raith Rovers
Dundee East CSC 1-1 Oriam
Forfar Athletic 1-0 Luncarty
Hibernian CF 2-3 Linlithgow Rose

And so on to Game 2 against newly promoted Hibernian. A tight game with both teams playing well but cancelling each other out in midfield and no team really coming out on top. Until in 7 minutes Mikey Curtis unleashes a shot from about 15 metres out which flies straight into the keeper’s top right hand corner. Unstoppable!! (1-0) Both teams continue to cancel each other out and the game finishes without much incident and only 1 running foul committed (by Hibs BTW).

St James WF 2-0 Oriam
Arbroath -Maroon 1-2 Luncarty
Dundee East CSC 2-0 Linlithgow Rose
Raith Rovers 1-0 Hibernian CF

Game 3 against Luncarty started well when a perfect pass from Ryan to Mikey left Mikey with only the keeper to beat and he did(1-0). Luncarty press for an equaliser but some heroic defending and goalkeeping thwart them. Midway through the match a Luncarty player challenges Mikey from behind and knocks him 6 feet forward onto his face. The ref has a word. Luncarty finally get the ball in the net in the 14th minute but the player is penalised for running onto the ball.

Raith Rovers 1-0 Luncarty
St James WF 2-2 Linlithgow Rose
Arbroath – Maroon 0-2 Hibernian CF
Dundee East CSC 0-1 Forfar Athletic

And finally to Game 4. Last year our solitary point from the opening day came against Dundee East. We were hoping for a better result today. The game opened well with a shot from Ally in the first minute. However Dundee East poured on the pressure and only some fine saves from Scott in goals kept the game level. Until the 6th minute when a Dundee breakaway led to a goal (0-1). Raith seemed to be rocked by this and two minutes later Dundee doubled their lead. A speculative shot from the edge of the keepers area was initially saved by Scott however it squirmed up over his head and despite grabbing for it as he fell backwards the ball crossed the line (0-2). With nothing to lose Raith pressed for a foothold back into the game. The pressure paid off as a Dundee player entered the keeper’s area and the ref awarded a penalty. Ally Grant stepped up and scored (1-2). Dundee hit back and only multiple saves by Scott kept the score as it was as Raith appeared to be spluttering. In an effort to try and see out the game Dundee tried to keep the ball in the Raith corner however Davey stepped round and managed to play the ball out. Ally picked up the ball and pressed forward. With options to play in either Mikey or John he decided to grab the glory himself to shoot past the despairing right hand of the keeper to tie the game(2-2).

Oriam 1-2 Linlithgow Rose
St James WF 1-3 Forfar Athletic
Luncarty 1-2 Hibernian CSC
Raith Rovers 2-2 Dundee East

The final two games of the weekend were:
Oriam 1-5 Forfar Athletic
St James WF 1-1 Arbroath – Maroon

League Table Feb 2026

Reflections: A big improvement on last year. Disappointing to only draw in the last game but if we had been offered 10 pts at the start of the day we would happily have taken that. We can build on this and move onto the Glasgow Trophy in April closely followed by the next round of league fixtures.

Raith Rovers Waling Football Squad

Raith Rovers’ Penalty Struggles in Opening Matches

The 2025 league season started on Sunday 2nd March. despite a tough opening group of fixtures the squad was looking forward to a, hopefully, successful afternoon. We were starting with a tough fixture against constant premiership team Arbroath, followed by last year’s unbeaten championship winners Forfar, then top four premiership team Luncarty and finally current premiership champions Dundee East.

Raith Rovers Waling Football Squad
Back row: Willie Carroll, Ritchie Malcolm, Harry Gilfillan, Ally Grant, Davey Ramsay
Front row: Scott McIntosh, Kev Henderson, John Wylie, Neil Galloway

We started with a tie against Arbroath – Maroon. The game started well for Raith with a foul on Davey Ramsay in the penalty area leading to a penalty. John Wylie stepped up and beat Dave Beattie in the Arbroath goal however the ref adjudged him to have lifted his foot and disallowed the goal. Two minutes later Arbroath were pinged for a third running offense and it was time for another penalty to Raith. This time Kev Henderson stepped up. He hit the ball without raising his foot but “Beats” guessed right and saved the penalty. It wasn’t long until there was another penalty. This time it was for Arbroath for three running fouls against Raith. The Arbroath player struck it high into the top right corner to beat Harry. 0-1 Raith continued to press but found it hard to pass the ball through a dense Arbroath defense. However in the 12th minute Arbroath gave away another running penalty. This time Davey Ramsay stepped up and beat the keeper low to his left. With time running out, and against the run of play, a great save from Harry gave Arbroath a corner. From the corner they secured a kick in from the left wing. With all of the Raith players concentrating on the ball no one noticed the Arbroath player on his own at the right hand side of the box and when the ball got to him he beat Harry to give Arbroath a 1-2 win.
Raith Rovers 1-2 Arbroath – Maroon
Dundee East 1-2 Oriam
Fairfield CSH 2-2 Luncarty
Forfar WF 3-0 Hearts

Next up were Forfar with a few familiar faces in their squad. A quick start for Raith saw Kev score from distance after some good build up work in the first minute. In the second minute a John Wylie shot was saved and, from the resultant corner Scott hit the post. A minute later and John hits the bar. It’s constant pressure from Raith. However in five minutes Gordon “Gogs” Smith takes the ball down Forfar’s left wing and fires in a spectacular shot to level the score. In the ninth minute the referee awards a penalty to Forfar after a tackle in the penalty area. Gogs steps up to get his second goal of the game for a 1=2 Forfar lead. two minutes later a shot from Kev leads to a corner from which Neil hits the post. There’s more raith pressure until Gogs once again gets a good shot in which brings out a good save from Harry. However a minute later Forfar get a third from a contested ball at the edge of the box. With time running out, and almost the last touch of the game, Kev Henderson gets a shot off and scores to cut the deficit to one.
St James 1-1 Oriam
Arbroath – Maroon 2-2 Luncarty
Dundee East 2-1 Hearts
Raith Rovers 2-3 Forfar WF

Then it was on to game three and Luncarty. Another quick start from Raith saw Davey Ramsay shoot just wide in the second minute. Raith continued to press until, against the run of play, Luncarty scored in the eighth minute. A minute later it was three runs by Luncarty and a Raith penalty. Davey Ramsay beat the keeper but the ref disallowed it for another raised foot. Two minutes later and it was a penalty to Luncarty for three running offenses. This time the shooter missed to the keeper’s right but was also pinged for a raised foot. Raith continued to push for the remainder of the game but to no avail and Luncarty ran out winners 0-1.
Raith Rovers 0-1 Luncarty
St James 2-1 Hearts
Arbroath Maroon 0-0 Forfar WF
Dundee East 2-2 Fairfield CSH

Our final game of the day was against Dundee East and started badly with Dundee East scoring through Andy Elwood in the second minute. From then the game developed into a bit of a slugfest with Raith dominating the possession but unable to break a stubborn Dundee defence. A rare Dundee East shot in the tenth minute brought out a great save from Harry and although Dundee did beat Harry the scorer was rightly pulled up for running. Then in the thirteenth minute Raith restored parity with a fine strike from the right by Ally Grant. Raith continued to press but were unable to breach the Dundee defence for a second time and the game finished 1-1.
Oriam 1-1 Hearts
St James 3-1 Fairfield CSH
Luncarty 0-1 Forfar
Raith Rovers 1-1 Dundee East

The final two games of the afternoon were:
Oriam 3-0 Fairfield CSH
St James 0-0 Arbroath – Maroon

The final league table of the day.

Reflections: Not a great day at the office, results wise. However the general play and possession was very good. Putting away some of our penalties and being a bit more disciplined could have turned results our way. Penalty taking practice will be taking priority over the next couple of weeks.