A 100-year-old gold medal won by an Inverness player who went on to FA Cup glory has been presented to a football memories project.
The 1922 Inverness Cup medal and chain was one of the last won by Clachnacuddin player Roddie Mackenzie before he joined Newcastle United.
Clach’s successful team also won the Highland League on four consecutive seasons from 1920-21 and the North of Scotland Cup in 1920-21 and 1922-23.
Winning the FA Cup
Roddie went on to play 238 games for Newcastle, nicknamed The Magpies, scoring six goals in a career capped by United lifting the FA Cup in April 1932.
He was in the Newcastle party that travelled north in March 1933 to play Inverness Thistle in a friendly match which ended 5-3 to the English side.
This match was played only four days before the famous first floodlight match played in Scotland – at Telford Street, Inverness, when Caley beat Clach 2-1.
Roddie’s Inverness Cup medal was initially given to Clach by the executors of Roddie’s sister, Mrs Violet Fairchild of Fairfield Road, Inverness, on her death in 1993.
It was held by former Clach director Calum Grant until his death in December 2020 when his wife Phyllis passed it to his friend and former team-mate, Peter Corbett.
Mr Corbett, a former Highland councillor, also managed Clach and played for Caley and Ross County.
With Clach’s blessing, he has now donated the medal to the Inverness Football Memories Project to feature in a future permanent display of memorabilia.
The donation of the medal continues a footballing connection between Inverness and Newcastle.
United also won the FA Cup in 1924, when former Caledonian and Inverness Thistle inside forward Tommy MacDonald was in the team that defeated Aston Villa 2-0.
Former Inverness Thistle player Peter McWilliam, who went on to become manager of Tottenham Hotspur and steer them to the English Cup in 1921, played for Newcastle when they won the trophy in 1910.
Inverness-Newcastle connection
Many of the 1910 cup-winning Newcastle side – including Peter McWilliam and his Inverness friend and fellow Thistle teammate, Andy McCombie – travelled to Inverness in 1912 to play a Thistle and Caley Select.
The game, which ended 3-3, was such a big attraction that The Highland Railway put on special trains from all over the Highlands.
At half-time, local Boy Scouts took up a collection on behalf of the Titanic Disaster Fund.
In addition to Peter McWilliam and Andy McCombie, Newcastle United also signed Alexander “Ackie” Fraser and George “Dod” Urquhart in December 1903, both from Thistle.
More recently Inverness Caledonian Thistle’s sporting director, John Robertson, played 14 games for Newcastle United in 1988.
The Inverness Football Memories Project is being promoted by Inverness Caledonian Thistle (ICT) Community Trust in partnership with Clachnacuddin FC and High Life Highland.
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