“Are there as many as three?” Jamie Darroch laughs when he’s asked to pick his top three individual moments in Clydebank colours.
The defender is standing on the BankiesTV gantry, overlooking the pitch he’s called home for the past eight years and reflecting on making his 200th appearance for the club, becoming just the fourth player in the modern era to do so.
He’s been presented with a quaich to mark the milestone and says: “It doesn’t feel like eight years, it’s kind of flown by but it’s a nice number to get to. Hopefully I have a few more in me, even if I doubt it will be another 200. Since I’ve come here, the club has constantly gone in an upwards direction. It might not be as fast as people want it to go, but everyone’s vying for the same spots in non-league football so we just need to be patient but it’s going the right way with the right people in charge.
“In terms of highlights, number three would probably be the season we got promoted. Getting promoted with that team of boys is up there. We had guys like Robbie Halliday, Alan Vezza, Bubba and Phil Barclay who were a cracking group.
“I then got to lift a trophy as captain. Vezza was club captain at that point but unfortunately was injured that day so I got to be captain and lift the only trophy in my time here, so that was a big thing.
“Sometimes we get stuck with that Scottish Cup run, we talk about the Clyde game and how brilliant it was or the Elgin game being on the tv, but the Elgin away game stands out. At full time, you were seeing grown men crying and it was maybe the first proper realisation as to what it meant to people. We were in the Scottish Cup again and for some of the guys who have followed the club since the senior days, they felt as if their club was back that day. It was an unreal day, going into the changing room just seeing what it meant to people.
“That’s probably my biggest achievement, seeing how you made people feel.
“I was on a nightshift the night before, and the boys had gone up to stay over on the Friday night. I was sad not to be part of that, but I got the bus from here at 6am and tried to get an hour’s sleep, but I was sitting next to Archy who didn’t stop talking! I was playing with an hour’s sleep and the gaffer was trying to usher me up to the halfway line with two minutes to go!”
A firm fan’s favourite at the club, Jamie last year won acclaim across the Scottish game when he opened up on losing his dad to suicide in a video that was seen more than 800,000 times. It sparked a partnership with ManOn Inverclyde, a mental health and wellbeing charity based in Greenock, that sees him become an ambassador for their postvention services.
Jamie added: “After the incident with my dad last year, I’ve started to look at wee changes that we can all make, not just for myself but teammates and people you come into contact with. Nicky Low is also doing some great work with them, getting young ones into football. The video wasn’t something I took lightly, but there was no one I was going to trust more than Davy. It’s coming up to the year anniversary now and it’s been a long and tough year, but everyone associated with the club has been a great help.”
Now 34 and with one eye on his future in the game, he continued: “Hopefully I’ll still have a future in the game. Things do get harder as you get older with family and work commitments, but hopefully I’ll stay in football in some capacity. I’d like to think there is still a couple of years left in the playing side of things, but I’m starting to dip my toe in the coaching side of things as well.
“It’s where I naturally see myself. I’m not sure if that’s as a manager, coach or as an assistant, but it’s something I want to look at more. I’ve got some coaching courses towards the back end of the season with hopefully some more at the end of the year so hopefully I can do it with the club.”
