00:00Ever heard the one about the record-breaking team who went from non-league to the top flight and
00:07played European football in five years and then fell into oblivion just two years later? No,
00:13didn't think so. This is a story that makes what's happened at Wrexham in recent years look pretty
00:18normal when you dig into it. It's got everything. A chain-smoking insurance magnate, one of Sir
00:23Bobby Robson's most trusted lieutenants, a free-scoring doctor and much, much more. This
00:29is Gretna, a marriage that went wrong. Welcome to Gretna, historically beloved for aficionados
00:36of matrimony owing to Scotland's more relaxed attitudes to marriage which existed up to 1847.
00:41This small town in the borders has a few other claims to fame. It's got the Loch Marban stone,
00:47it was an important customs post in the 17th century and the factory there made a load of
00:52cordite in World War One to help British firearms. But for a few years it was also the place where
00:57one of the most rapid rises ever in European football history took place that brought Gretna
01:02FC from the English Northern Premier League to the Scottish Premier League via a Scottish Cup final
01:08and an extremely brief sojourn in the UEFA Cup. And it all starts with a man born in a completely
01:14different country from where the club is based, England. This is Brooks John Joseph Myleson,
01:20born as one of five in the Pennywell estate in Sunderland, notable prior to his investment in Gretna,
01:24which we'll get to later, for breaking his back aged 11 after falling into a quarry and
01:29being told he'd never walk again, then winning the bronze medal at the 1967 English Cross Country
01:34Junior Championships and making somewhere between £50 and £75 million through insurance companies.
01:40Mind you, he had a few goes at business before he got it right. He was director of 14 companies in
01:44his career. To some, Brooks was a dreamer and a philanthropist whose generosity knew no bounds.
01:50For some, Reid Gretna players, who were afforded extravagant lifestyles throughout his tenure at
01:55the club. To others, he was an egomaniac who left a trail of devastation in his wake.
02:00Anyway, while he was making his millions in Carlisle, across the border Gretna FC were tolling in the
02:06Northern Premier League where they'd been for 10 straight years, having failed previously to gain
02:10election to the Scottish pyramid. They'd had a couple of FA Cup runs in their time, but had pretty much
02:14failed to bother historians for the most part. In 2002, one club's demise was another's moment to rise.
02:21Airdrie owners folded, despite finishing runners-up in Scotland's second tier that year,
02:25and Gretna won election to play in Scotland at the expense of the newly formed Airdrie United.
02:30The club would enter the league in the Scottish third division. Expectations weren't exactly high,
02:35but at least they wouldn't need to go to England for every away game from now on. At the time,
02:40Gretna averaged crowds of just over 400 at Raydale Park, which isn't actually that bad,
02:45considering only 3,000 people live there. Brooks saw the potential at the club. He'd been pouring
02:51money into supporters' trusts at Stockport, Berwick, Ayr, Dundee and Dundee United, and having failed to
02:57take over Carlisle United, a £20,000 donation to Gretna's youth development scheme gave him skin
03:03in the Scottish game. Brooks came to the club with deep pockets and a defined vision,
03:09telling the club's manager at the time, Rowan Alexander,
03:11I want to be in the Scottish Premier League in five years.
03:14Conservatively, he'd have called him misguided, but history tells us he was anything but.
03:20Their debut campaign ended with a third-placed finish in the bottom tier in 2004.
03:25That was the springboard, and Brooks began to splash the cash. Practising doctor and prolific striker
03:30Kenny Duker joined from East Fife, and that campaign brought them the league by 20 points,
03:35a plus 101 goal difference, and 38 goals in just 36 games for the good doctor.
03:41There were more high-profile arrivals from big Scottish clubs, and Gretna made it back-to-back
03:45promotions in 2006, and won the league by March of that year. What really caught the public's
03:50attention though, was their run in the Scottish Cup. They beat four First Division sides on their way to
03:56the Hampden Park showpiece to face Hearts, and became the first club ever to do so from the third tier.
04:01They lost the game on penalties after a 1-1 draw, despite the manager going full kilt and sporran
04:06for the occasion. But they did gain entry to the UEFA Cup for the next campaign.
04:11Now you might be thinking that the wider football world was willing them on as the plucky underdog.
04:15Everyone loves a football Cinderella story, right? Well, Gretna proved that this isn't always the case.
04:21Envious glances from elsewhere, and cries of annoyance over the wages they were paying while playing in
04:26front of crowds in the hundreds, meant that the footballing fraternity were waiting for it all to fail.
04:30You might have guessed though, that the Gretna house was in fact built on sand, but we aren't quite
04:35there yet. As the next season rolled around, Gretna were in the second tier and heading into Europe.
04:40They didn't get the glamour tie they'd hoped for though, and got roundly thrashed 7-3 on aggregate
04:45by Derry City in the second qualifying round of the UEFA Cup. If they'd won, they'd have faced Paris Saint-Germain.
04:51Brooks had continued to bankroll the club's endeavours though, and the spending was unrelenting. In came Sir Bobby
04:57Robson's former assistant Mick Wadsworth to run things, and he later said,
05:01I saw more Jeeps in the club's car park than in the Normandy landing. Everything was coming out of
05:06the chairman's pocket though, and while results on the pitch continued to get Gretna nearer to the
05:10top flight, the line of credit was beginning to run out. Things started going wrong when the architect of
05:15their rise, manager Rowan Alexander, was put on gardening leave when their form hit a wobble.
05:20They were top at the time, but Brooks felt it was the end of the road for him. Without Alexander,
05:25Gretna did their best to blow an 11-point lead, and questions were being asked as to whether or not
05:30the club really wanted to make the jump to the SPL. It all came down to a dramatic final day when it
05:35looked like St Johnston under Owen Coyle would pip them to automatic promotion. James Grady scored for
05:40Gretna though, and the helicopter that was en route to present the trophy to Coyle at Hamilton
05:44had to divert to Ross County. The dream was realised for Gretna, but the nightmare was just about to
05:49begin. They'd become the first club to go from bottom to top with three consecutive promotions
05:54in Scotland or England, but they definitely weren't ready for the big leagues. Cries of derision went up
06:00from other clubs over the state of their stadium. It couldn't hold the 6,000 fans required for the SPL.
06:05A deal was reached to share Motherwell's fur park for home games while Raydale was renovated,
06:10but inside the club the realisation was hitting that their benefactor was living beyond his means.
06:15He'd paid for everything for staff and players at the club, but his wealth didn't resemble that of
06:20an oligarch's bottomless pit, or come from a nation state. With an unsustainable business model and no
06:26wholesale recruitment in the summer of 2007, the Gretna bubble very quickly burst. Try as they might,
06:32the team just couldn't compete at the highest level, and they lost 25 of their 38 SPL games,
06:38and the club's infrastructure creaked under the expectations of playing at the top level.
06:42But forgetting all the players' boots for a game against Rangers brought some gallows humour at the
06:47time. Rumours of missed payments for wages became commonplace, and the owner's health was beginning to
06:52suffer. Aged just 60, he was admitted to hospital with a brain infection following successive stomach
06:58operations and suffering chronic fatigue syndrome. And that was the beginning of the end for Gretna.
07:03Without their benefactor, they were staring into financial abyss. They were quickly placed into
07:08administration, given a 10-point deduction, and liquidation looked inevitable. Wadsworth even
07:13sold his car to pay the players. Their only SPL campaign ended in April 2008 in front of 431 fans,
07:20and saw them amass just 13 league points. Gretna's financial issues meant they'd go back to where they
07:26started in the fourth tier, because they couldn't guarantee they could play all their games the next
07:30season. August 2008 brought liquidation, and in November that year, Brooks Myleson died after
07:36suffering a heart attack at home and falling into a pond. His fortune gone, and the club he loved,
07:42now, in oblivion.
07:43So, that's the story of the meteoric rise and stratospheric fall of Gretna FC. Less a failed
07:49marriage in keeping with the town's history, more a spectacular love affair that burned bright,
07:54but brought destruction to all involved.
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