First and foremost: Second things first

Celebrating landmark achievements and curious quirks in the history of Ireland’s Oldest Football Club, cliftonvillefc.net today commences a new mini series reflecting on some of the trailblazing enterprises where Cliftonville have led the way.

Every week throughout the summer break, ‘First and Foremost’ will shine a spotlight on startling statistics, tall tales and magical milestones that saw the Reds play a pioneering role in the story – starting with the peculiar campaign in which Cliftonville finished both first AND second in the League!

To do so, we must wind the clock back some 117 years to the eve of the 1909/10 term which, as the Red Army’s most learned history buffs will attest, was the first season that Cliftonville won the Irish League title outright.

What’s more, the team that claimed the crown performed the very same turnaround achieved by the Club’s next Champions some 88 years later – namely coming out on top just 12 months after finishing second-bottom.

Similar to Marty Quinn’s 1998 heroes, who clinched the Gibson Cup less than a year after being involved in a Relegation Play-Off, Hugh McAteer’s kingpins (above) took the title having previously come seventh in the eight-team Irish League; level with fellow strugglers Belfast Celtic and just two points ahead of Derry City.

More remarkable, however, was that the Reds’ 1909/10 schedule started with a fixture to determine the runners-up from 1907/08 – where victory saw Cliftonville formally seal second spot in one season before going on to win the Championship in another.

On August 20, 1909, the Reds faced Glentoran at Solitude in a Test Match – effectively a Play-Off – to decide which of the teams would officially be declared runners-up for the 1907/08 season.

Note the year. The game had no bearing on the previous campaign (in which Cliftonville finished second-from-bottom) but had instead been carried over from a further season earlier, when McAteer’s side were level on 17 points with the Glens, five behind Champions Linfield.

Goals from Tweedie, Thompson and Robertson earned a 3-2 win for the Reds, settling an unresolved issue from two years earlier as Cliftonville secured second place in the standings simultaneously five months and two seasons before being crowned Champions.