Spain Park
Saturday 29th November 2025
The first of my trips to see a team outside the SPFL. Banks o’ Dee are the third club in Aberdeen and the only one I’ve not yet seen. I have seen their ground though as it’s probably the most visible ground in the city. It sits at one end of a bridge over the River Dee and within touching distance of the railway line to the south of the city so every journey heading down towards the central belt (or back up) offers a glimpse into Spain Park.
The ground is so close to the river in fact that balls are occasionally lost when they end up in the Dee after being kicked out of the ground. One of these balls famously ended up making the 1,000 mile journey across the North Sea to Tromsø in Norway before being found by a local who was searching for driftwood. He got in touch with the club to let them know and the story made the BBC news.
I’m not going out of my way to see grounds outside the SPFL but when an opportunity arises I’ll take it and, with my aim of trying to see games that matter when I can, this seemed like a good chance to finally see Spain Park from inside the ground rather than from the train.
Banks o’ Dee entered this year’s Scottish Cup in Round One (following two preliminary rounds) with an away game at Bo’ness United who are based between Edinburgh and Falkirk. A comfortable 0 – 3 win saw them progress on to Round Two where they were drawn against their Highland League rivals Fraserburgh. Despite sitting four points and two places behind Fraserburgh, Banks o’ Dee thoroughly turned them over with a 4 – 0 win with all the goals coming in the first half.
This result took them through to Round 3 where the Scottish Championship teams enter the draw and earned them a home fixture against one of the two teams that were relegated from the Premiership last season, Ross County. This is as big a fixture as you could hope for at this stage of the competition and probably ranks as one of the biggest games in their history. Normally their games are ‘pay at the gate’ but for this ficture it would be fully ticketed in advance.
Whilst Banks o’ Dee are having one of their best ever seasons the same cannot be said of Ross County. Following relegation last year most of their fans hoped for (and expected) to be challenging at the top of the Championship and to be pushing for promotion back to the Premiership at the first time of asking. Things have not gone to plan.
Having sacked their manager just before I first saw them when they lost to Arbroath in September their form hasn’t really improved. They currently sit in ninth place in the Championship (the relegation playoff position) and have just 12 points from 15 games. Any chance of winning the Championship has already gone and whilst the promotion playoff positions are just eight points away they have shown no indications that they are likely to turn their form around and begin moving up the league.
All that being said this game shouldn’t really be a competition. Ross County’s team is estimated to be worth around £5.5M and they have a striker in Ronan Hale who made his international debut for Northern Ireland earlier this year. By comparison Banks o’ Dee have only a handful of players who have ever played league football and not a single one who is considered to have any transfer value at all. Sounds like the perfect set up for a Scottish Cup giant killing to me….
A few days before the game Will (who you may remember from the trip to Arbroath) messaged to say he was thinking of going to the game. I let him know that I already had a ticket and he promptly bought his. We had agreed to meet shortly after 2pm and due to a brief but dramatic illness last night I decided to drive rather than my original plan of walking to the ground.
I arrived shortly after Will and had no trouble in working out where to pick up my ticket and make my way into the ground. For the first time on this journey I actually had a paper ticket rather than the endless electronic versions which are really handy but nowhere near as nostalgic. Will had found a spot to stand close to the halfway line and already had a coffee and a pie. My body still wasn’t ready for a pie but a cup of tea helped to keep the cold off but wouldn’t achieve this for long.
It was already very cold by the time the game got underway but fortunately the forecast rain had held off so we avoided the most miserable possible conditions. From the very start it was clear that there was a gulf in class between the two teams. Ross County were confident playing the ball around whereas Banks o’ Dee were relying on long balls and hopeful chases.
Despite the difference in stature and experience of the two teams the early stages of the game were close and tightly contested. Ross County had a good chance early when neat work between Ronan Hale and Jordan White saw Hale clean through on goal. Only an alert run and last gasp challenge prevented Hale from giving County the lead.
Banks o’ Dee managed to succesfully chase down some of their long balls and crafted a couple of half chances but Ross County seemed content to manage this threat and use the opportunities created by Dee’s attacks to exploit the space they had left behind them.
They got their breakthrough on 19′ exactly this way. Gaps on Banks o’ Dee’s left flank allowed County to pour forward almost completely unchallenged. A few quick passes took out the two remaining Dee defenders and Hale found himself unmarked in the middle of the penalty box. He was picked out easily and had no trouble slotting the ball past Dee’s stranded keeper.
Ross County had brought a decent number of fans down with them and they were in good voice following Hale’s goal. They had a version of Doo Wah Diddy Diddy that was amended to celebrate Hale and also repeatedly sang a faithful rendition of Last Christmas for no obvious reason.
County had almost all of the possession for the rest of the half and it seemed like only a matter of time before they got their seocnd goal. Dee defended well though and managed to limit their opportunities to half chances. It was still 0 – 1 as the teams went in for halftime and Banks o’ Dee will have felt they were still in the match if they could keep up with Ross County in the second half.
Night fell during the break and if we thought it was cold in the first half then it was freezing in the second half. The difference in fitness and conditioning between the two teams became more apparant after the break. County were winning almost every first and second ball and the Banks o’ Dee players were chasing their tales trying to get a touch. Despite this Ross County couldn’t seem to buy a second goal and with only one goal in it there were still chances for Dee.
These chances mainly came from free kicks won on the occasional forays into County’s half. The first of these saw the ball placed with precision and a lengthy wait for the Banks o’ Dee forward to line things up before he hit a shot that looked more like a rugby conversion than a shot on goal. The second was a foul wide on the left that offered a chance to bring the defenders up and get a dangerous ball into the box. The deep free kick was met at the back post by a Dee head but rather than out the ball back across goal he only managed to find the keepers arms.
On 81′ Ross County finally put the game beyond reach and it came in the simplest way possible. A corner from the left hand side picked out Jordan White completely unmarked in the six yard box and he nodded home without any issues. The last ten minutes of the game were a procession for County and the fight had clearly gone from Banks o’ Dee. They might never have looked like threatening Ross County but they also held their own against a team three divisions above them. Their Scottish Cup adventure is over for this year though whilst Ross County will be looking ahead to tomorrow’s fourth round draw.
The Facts
- Ground
- Spain Park
- Home
- Banks o’ Dee
- Away
- Ross County
- Competition
- The Scottish Cup
- Result
- 0 – 2
- Scorers
- Ronan Hale, Jordan White
- Attendance
- 550
- Cost
- £20
- Total distance travelled
- 5 miles
- Transport
- Car
- My MotM
- No-one really stood out for Banks o’ Dee but the stadium announcer gave it to Mark Reynolds who did manage to keep County’s strikers relatively quiet so I’ll happily go with the decision and give it to him.
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