New Douglas Park

10^th November 2001

Hamilton Accies 2-3 Stenhousemuir

I suppose in an ideal world I would have included a visit to Accies’ former ground Douglas Park in this blog somewhere, but that particular arena’s candle burnt out long before I started this collection.  

Which is a bit of a pity really, as I had attended matches at Douglas Park on many occasions, having adopted Accies as my wee team during my Celtic supporting days.  It was a trim little ground full of character, sporting what seemed like a thousand advertising hoardings covering every spare surface.  I watched the Accies lose a Scottish Cup tie 2-1 to Celtic there, after leading 1-0 for what seemed like most of the match.  I also witnessed them giving local rivals Motherwell a pasting one New Years Day.

The new ground, officially known as The Ballast Stadium when opened, was actually sited just a few hundred metres from the old one, and was particularly unusual in that whilst it only had two stands, these two were at right angles to each other.  A third smaller temporary stand has since been added.

The approach to New Douglas Park in 2001.
The subsequent erection of a Morrison's supermarket means this view is no longer possible.



The main entrance in 2001.

New Douglas Park is presently The Superseal Stadium

I took up a place in the North Stand (the one allocated to the away fans), along with a smattering of other souls.  And I was actually told to move my seat by a steward, as I was apparently sitting in some sort of area of segregation, somehow designed to keep the 100 or so Stenhousemuir supporters in two batches – very strange.   


The North stand at New Douglas Park in 2001 - note the empty central

seating section - used to keep warring Warriors' fans apart?

Again, commercial development of the surrounding area prevented a repeat pic in 2017. 



Another inept Accies attack comes to naught (2001)

For an hour or so us folks in the away stand were treated to the Willie IRVINE show, as the veteran Stenhousemuir striker ran the home defence ragged plundering a hat-trick with unseemly ease.  His colleagues, however, the took their collective foot off the pedal, and almost contrived to present Hamilton with a share of the points, but Mark NICHOL’s double in the closing five minutes came just a bit too late to seriously affect proceedings. 

Panorama of New Douglas Park (2001)

Panorama of New Douglas Park in 2017.
Little appears to have changed, but what my pics do not show here
is the small temporary stand opposite the main one.

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20th June 2017

Hamilton 4-0 Dundee
Bingham (23)
Skondras (25)
Imrie (pen 56)
Crawford (76)

Panorama of New Douglas Park/Superseal Stadium (2017)

The facade to the Main Stand 

The dinky little (do we call it the) East Stand.

Panorama of New Douglas Park/Superseal Stadium (2017)

Panorama of New Douglas Park/Superseal Stadium (2017)

Panorama of New Douglas Park/Superseal Stadium (2017)

Hamilton Accies v Dundee (May 2017)

Hamilton's opening goal on 23rd minutes.
Mikey Devlin's (No 4) header is bundled over the line by Rakish Bingham.

Dundee's Kevin holt bashed this free-kick high into the stand.

Asking anyone to squat on their hunkers for five minutes,
does appear to be a particularly
nasty form of torture. Would a wee stool, like the ballboys have,
really be too much to ask. 

Hamilton Captain Mikey Devlin collapsed following an innocuous-looking first-half challenge.
One hopes it is not a recurrence of the knee injury which cost him most of last season.
 

Hamilton Accies v Dundee (May 2017)

Panorama of New Douglas Park/Superseal Stadium (2017)

The Main Stand at New Douglas Park/Superseal Stadium.

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November 2021