Some things never change !!

With the passing of the legendary Alfie Conn, an interesting article appeared in the Scotland on Sunday newspaper which focused on an amazing bias against the Edinburgh forwards of the Terrible Trio and the Famous Five when it came to selection for Scotland in the 1950s, at a time when Hearts and Hibs were consistently dominating the domestic scoring charts.

Out of these 8 players, only Lawrie Reilly gained an appropriate haul of caps (38), although injury was probably a factor too – especially in Willie Bauld`s case.

Here is some of the article –

“Reading the Scotland team lists from 1948-49 to the World Cup finals in 1954 is illuminating. This was the period when the Edinburgh Eight were in devastating form. Each of them would score more than 100 goals in their career, and the bulk were notched in those six seasons when Hearts and Hibs were scoring for fun.

“Despite the fact that the Five and the Trio were the dominant attacking forces in Scottish football, the selectors tended to go for a range of players from a host of other clubs. The allegations against the selectors – never proved, of course, in those days of SFA omerta – were that each of them fought his corner and ignored the national interest, demanding that a player be picked from his area or often his own club.

“The SFA selectors had neither the courage nor the imagination to see that playing the Trio or the Five together as a unit would produce far greater dividends than their own short-sighted attempts to get their personal favourites a game.

“The Hearts players suffered worst. The SFA’s treatment of the Trio was, to coin a phrase, simply terrible. Willie Bauld was capped three times, all in 1950. He hit the bar against England and that was deemed enough for him to be dropped.

“More scandalously, Wardhaugh was selected just twice, against Hungary in 1954 and Northern Ireland in 1956. It is to the utter disgrace of Scottish football that such a great player as Conn was given just one outing in the dark blue, against Austria in 1956.”


On a similar subject, this week saw Hearts continue to show why Hibs are referred to as “the wee team” in this part of the world. Back in the 1950s, the relative accomplishments of the Terrible Trio and Famous Five in Edinburgh derbies is worth noting.

Our Trio played together against Hibs on 23 occasions, winning 16 and losing only 5.

The Famous Five played together against Hearts on 12 occasions, winning only 2 and losing 9 !!

As I said, some things never change ….