After meeting for a few beers at Haymarket, we jumped onto a train to make the short (but frustratingly slow) journey across the Firth of Forth to Fife (try saying that when you’re pissed). Having eventually arrived at Cowdenbeath we departed the commuter cattle truck and walked down the main street in the direction of Central Park, passing a few pubs which all appeared to be closed.
Cowdenbeath’s home could be found set back off the main street and without being disrespectful to the club, their ground isn’t exactly going to be winning any awards for it’s state of the art facilities any time soon. The venue is used mainly for motorsport/stock car racing which meant that pitch was a fair distance from the stands/crumbling uncovered terracing. You also have to watch through a grill type safety fence and ignore the novel monster truck tyres at each end. I’d been to Central Park before but I’d forgotten how out dated a venue it was, in fact, I over heard several well travelled Hearts supporters saying it was possible the worst ground they’d ever visited. Harsh but quite possibly true.
The game itself was typical pre-season fare. Hearts’ side included a number of first teamers but it was an experimental team positionally speaking and was padded out by a few u19 and fringe players.
We managed to watch the game until just after half-time (by which point Hearts were 1-0 down) before we headed to the only decent looking open pub, I think it was called Partners.
Later on came reports of Hearts equalising through a Stephen Elliott penalty, before Cowdenbeath went on to snatch a late winner. Pretty embarrassing but ultimately training ground stuff.
The open terracing along one side.
At pitch level, looking across the track.
The Hearts support (mostly).
The esteemed players and match officials entrance. Just squeeze between the out of order coke machine and the empty crates.
Amen.
Players leave the pitch at half-time.
Pete's attempts to buy a souvenir are thwarted.
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