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| Full name | Ayr United Football Club | ||
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| Nickname(s) | The Honest Men | ||
| Founded | 1910 | ||
| Ground | Somerset Park (capacity: 10,243 (1,597 seated)) |
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| Chairman | Lachlan Cameron | ||
| Manager | Mark Roberts | ||
| League | Scottish Second Division | ||
| 2011–12 | Scottish First Division, 9th (Relegated via play-offs) | ||
| Website | Club home page | ||
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Ayr United Football Club are a Scottish association football team based in Ayr, South Ayrshire, that plays in the Second Division of the Scottish Football League. Formed in 1910 after the merger of former clubs Ayr Parkhouse F.C. and Ayr F.C. (the latter being a prior merger of Ayr Thistle F.C. and Ayr Academicals F.C. in 1879), their nickname is "The Honest Men", taken from a line in the poem "Tam o' Shanter" by Scotland's national poet, Robert Burns. They play at Somerset Park.
The club have spent 34 seasons in Scotland's top division altogether, though the last was in the 1977–78 season. The club have been the champions of the second tier of Scottish football on six occasions and of the third tier twice, but have not won any national cup competitions. The club's most famous and most successful manager is Ally MacLeod, who went on to manage the Scottish national football team. On 15 May 2012, it was announced that Mark Roberts would succeed Brian Reid as manager of the club, following relegation to the Second Division at the end of the 2011–12 season
Ayr United were founded in 1910 after the merger of Ayr Parkhouse and Ayr. Although Inverness Caledonian Thistle are also the product of a merger between two clubs, Ayr United are the only Scottish Football League club to have been formed from a merger of two existing league clubs.
The club's honours include winning six Second Division titles (as the second tier championship) and a further two such titles (as the third tier championship), most recently in 1996–97. They have not won any national cup competitions, although they were runners-up in the 2001–02 Scottish League Cup, and in the Scottish Challenge Cup in the first two seasons in which the competition was held: 1990–91 and 1991–92. They have won the local competition the Ayrshire Cup on 26 occasions, most commonly facing fierce local rivals Kilmarnock F.C. in the final. The Ayrshire Cup was last played for in season 1996–97, since when the competition has been suspended.
The club's record scorer in a single season is Jimmy Smith, who scored 66 goals for Ayr in only 38 league matches in 1927–28, which remains the British goalscoring record for a single season. The club's overall record scorer is Peter Price, who scored 213 times in competitive matches for the club between 1955 and 1962.
Former Scottish national team manager Ally MacLeod is regarded as the club's most famous and most successful manager. He led the club on three separate occasions spanning fifteen years, during which his teams recorded a record 214 wins, won two league titles and finished one point short of qualifying for European competition in 1973, when Macleod was also voted as Ayr's Citizen of the Year. More recent managers have also included the recent Scottish national team manager, George Burley, and former Scottish League Cup winner with Raith Rovers, Gordon Dalziel. Their current manager is Mark Roberts.
Although the club has spent 34 seasons in Scotland's top division, they have played in the second and third tiers of Scottish senior football since the 1977–78 season. During the late 1990s and early 2000s, the club established a record of defeating teams which played in higher leagues in cup competitions, including Hibernian, Dundee, Dundee United, Motherwell, Dunfermline Athletic and four consecutive wins in cup competitions against their fiercest rivals Kilmarnock.
In 1988, Ayr United fan and businessman Sir David Murray offered to buy the club but the club's shareholders rejected the bid by a vote of 60 to 56. The manager at that time, Ally MacLeod, had threatened to leave if Murray's bid had succeeded: Murray went on to become Chairman of Rangers, which coincided with a period of financial growth and league success for that club. During much of the 1990s and 2000s, a period of relative success both in league and cup competitions, the Ayr United chairman was local construction magnate Bill Barr. After Barr stood down, there were occasional boardroom struggles: the club suffered significant cashflow problems in 2004 although it survived with a combination of efforts. Prestwick-based Roy Kennedy failed to takeover the club in 2005, and his company Kennedy Construction went bankrupt in 2006.
On 24 May 2009, Ayr won the Scottish First Division Play-off against Airdrie United 3–2 on aggregate to win promotion to the First Division. For season 2009–10, to celebrate the club's centenary, Ayr United played in black and white hoops, the club's original black and white kit. The away kit was crimson and gold with blue shorts to reflect the original club colours. Ayr were relegated on the last day of the season after losing 2–1 to Morton. At the end of the 2010–11 season, Ayr United defeated Forfar Athletic 7–4 on aggregate in the First Division play-off semi final, to set up a final with Brechin City. In the first game at Somerset Park the match ended 1–1, however Ayr United won the second leg at Glebe Park 2–1, which promoted Ayr United to the First Division for the 2011–2012 season. Also, in the 2010–11 season, they knocked out Hibernian in the Scottish Cup, winning 1–0 at Somerset Park in a replay.
Early in the 2011–2012 season, Ayr have enjoyed success in the 2011–12 Scottish League Cup, beating SPL sides Inverness, Hearts and St. Mirren on their way to the semi-finals. Ayr United are now playing against Ayrshire derby rivals Kilmarnock in the semi-finals, the first time the two clubs have met at this stage, Kilmarnock won one-nil. At the end of the 2011–12 season, Ayr United were relegated to the Second Division following play-off defeat to Airdrie United, Ayr drew the first leg at the Excelsior Stadium, 0–0, before losing the home leg, 3–1.
On 15 May 2012, Ayr United announced that Brian Reid's contract will not be renewed, with the club appointing, the clubs top-scorer in the last three seasons, Mark Roberts as the manager, with head of youth development, Davie White as his assistant.
The first Ayr United kit of Red and Gold was inherited from Ayr FC, one of the clubs in the merger (the other Ayr Parkhouse), was used from 1910 until 1914. Then it was replaced with Black and White which used until 1938, when navy blue now supported white as the colour on the playing kit. After only two years, War broke out, when it finished black was once again on the kits of Ayr United and blue wasn't to feature again until 1958. Black & White hoops featured again in the 1960s, and the home colours remained white with black trimmings throughout the twentieth century. The Centenary Season saw the re-introduction of the traditional hooped shirt.
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| Somerset Park | |
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 Somerset Park, looking onto the Somerset Road end |
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| Location | Tryfield Place, Ayr, Scotland |
| Opened | 1888 |
| Owner | Ayr United F.C. |
| Surface | Grass |
| Architect | Archibald Leitch |
| Capacity | 10,185 (1,597 seated) |
| Field dimensions |
Ayr F.C. (1888–1910) |
Ayr play their football at Somerset Park in Ayr's New Town. One of the few surviving traditional stadium designs, it consists of one stand, two covered terraces, and one open terrace. It has a capacity of 10,128. The first match to take place at Somerset Park was between the former Ayr F.C. and Aston Villa in a 3–0 victory for Ayr.
During the 1990s the club's chairman was Bill Barr, who owned and managed the company which built modern-style stadiums and stands for several other clubs around the UK. United also sought - and obtained - planning permission from South Ayrshire Council for a new 10,200 all-seated stadium at Heathfield in Ayr with an associated retail development. The Scottish Executive then "called in" the application and reversed the decision in respect of the retail development. Since the club considered this aspect of the proposal necessary to fund the construction, the development did not proceed.
In November 2006, United signed a contract with Barratt Homes for the sale of Somerset Park, having secured a 20-acre (81,000 m) site in the Heathfield area of Ayr. The site would house a new GB£18 million stadium seating 7,650 as part of a "sports and business campus".
| Period | Sportswear | Home sponsor | Away sponsor |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1977–78 | Umbro | None | |
| 1979–80 | |||
| 1980–81 | |||
| 1981–83 | Barr Construction | ||
| 1983–84 | |||
| 1984–87 | |||
| 1987–88 | Ayr Advertiser | ||
| 1988–90 | Bukta | Centrum | |
| 1990–91 | Riberio | ||
| 1991–92 | Arrow | ||
| 1992–93 | |||
| 1993–94 | Sports Limited | ||
| 1994–95 | Core | What everyone Wants | |
| 1995–96 | The Ayr United Collection | ||
| 1996–97 | Ayrshire Post | ||
| 1997–98 | Premier Marketing UK | ||
| 1998–99 | Barr Construction | ||
| 1999-00 | TFG Sports | Strachans Motors | Barr Construction |
| 2000–01 | Leader Newspaper | Barr Steel | |
| 2001–02 | Aurigin | ||
| 2002–03 | Kerr & Smith | Iveco Daily | |
| 2003–04 | |||
| 2004–05 | Kennedy Construction | Simply Purchasing | |
| 2005–06 | The Home Bakery | Honest Men Trust | |
| 2006–07 | The Events Company | Greig Lucas | |
| 2007–08 | Lotto Sports | Rodie | Carrick Bathrooms |
| 2008–09 | Surridge Sports | Paligap | |
| 2009–10 | |||
| 2010–11 | Nike | ||
| 2011–12 | Bodog | ||
| 2012–13 | |||
Squad correct as of 24 August 2012.
| Position | Player |
|---|---|
| Goalkeeper | Ally Brown |
| Goalkeeper | Darren Martin |
| Goalkeeper | Bobby McLatchie |
| Defender | Adam Hunter |
| Defender | Darren Brownlie |
| Defender | Marc Twaddle |
| Defender | Martyn Campbell |
| Defender | Jackson Longridge |
| Defender | Kyle McAusland (on loan from Rangers) |
| Defender | Austin McCann |
| Defender | John Robertson |
| Defender | Alan Murdoch |
| Midfielder | Robbie Crawford |
| Midfielder | Anthony Marenghi |
| Midfielder | Darren McGill |
| Midfielder | Michael McGowan |
| Midfielder | Ryan McStay |
| Midfielder | David Sinclair |
| Midfielder | Mark Shankland |
| Midfielder | Aaron Wyllie |
| Forward | Darian MacKinnon (on loan from Hamilton Academical) |
| Forward | Michael Moffat |
| Forward | Roddy Patterson |
| Forward | Mark Roberts |
| Forward | Ross Robertson |
| Forward | David Winters |
| Dates | Name | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| 1910–14 | Committee | |
| 1914–15 |  Herbert Dainty |
Ayr United's first manager |
| 1915–18 | Lawrence Gemson |
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| 1918–19 |  John Cameron |
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| 1919–23 | James McDonald |
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| 1923–24 | Jimmy Richardson |
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| 1924–26 | Jimmy Hay |
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| 1926–31 | Archie Buchanan |
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| 1931–35 | Alex Gibson |
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| 1935–40 |  Frank Thompson |
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| 1945–48 | Bob Ferrier |
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| 1949–53 | Archie Anderson |
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| 1953–55 | Reuben Bennett |
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| 1955–56 | Neil McBain |
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| 1956–61 | Jackie Cox |
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| 1961 | Bobby Flavell |
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| 1961–62 | Gerry Mays |
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| 1962–63 | Neil McBain |
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| 1963–64 | Bobby Flavell |
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| 1964–66 | Tom McCreath |
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| 1966–75 | Ally MacLeod |
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| 1975–78 | Alex Stuart |
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| 1978 | Ally MacLeod |
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| 1979–83 | Willie McLean |
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| 1983–85 | George Caldwell |
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| 1985–90 | Ally MacLeod |
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| 1991–93 | George Burley |
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| 1993–95 | Simon Stainrod |
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| 1995-02 | Gordon Dalziel |
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| 2002–04 | Campbell Money |
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| 2004–05 | Mark Shanks |
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| 2005–07 | Bobby Connor |
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| 2007 |  Neil Watt |
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| 2007–12 | Brian Reid |
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| 2012–present | Mark Roberts |
Current manager |
25,225 vs Rangers, 13 September 1969 in Scottish League Division One
51,158 vs Rangers, 4 April 1973, Scottish Cup semi-final, at Hampden Park
106 vs Girvan, 1 May 1991 in the Ayrshire Cup
192 vs Deveronvale, 28 November 2009, in the Scottish Cup
11–1 vs Dumbarton, 13 August 1952
0–9 vs Rangers, 16 November 1929 |
John Murphy (597 apps), between 1963–1978
Peter Price, (213 goals in 251 apps) between 1955–1962
Jimmy Smith, (66 goals in 38 apps) in the 1927–28 Season
James Nisbet for Scotland (3) vs Norway, Germany and The Netherlands in 1929.
Mark Shankland, aged 15 years and 300 days.
Mark Shankland, aged 17 years and 17 days. |
All players are from Scotland unless otherwise stated.
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| Year Inducted | Name | Years at Ayr Utd. | Role(s) at Ayr Utd. |
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Ally MacLeod | 1964–65, 1966–75*, 1978*, 1986–89* | Player and Manager |
| Ian McAllister | 1977–92 | Player | |
| Peter Price | 1955–62 | Player | |
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Sam McMillan | 1952–68 | Player |
| John 'Spud' Murphy | 1963–78 | Player | |
| Henry Templeton | 1987–91 | Player | |
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Alex 'Dixie' Ingram | 1966–70, 1970–77, 2008–** | Player and vice-chairman |
| Alex 'Sanny' McAnespie | 1964–78 | Player | |
| Davie Stewart | 1967–74 | Player | |
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Rikki Flemming | 1968–78 | Player |
| Dick Malone | 1964–71 | Player |
* years involved as a manager
** years involved as vice-chairman
| Year Inducted | Player | Years at Ayr United |
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Sir Alex Ferguson CBE |
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| year Inducted | Player | Years at Ayr United |
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Sir Alex Ferguson CBE |
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Only includes caps won while playing for Ayr United
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