By Chris Macmillan
July 31 2002

INTERNAZIOSWALLY AIRDRIE

Now entering their 4th year, Internazioswally are Airdrie’s very own Internet Fans Football team who regularly play games in the IFA League against similarly minded teams, more often than not in the morning before the ‘big teams’ meet in the afternoon. The IFA (Internet football Association) has been on the go for around 5 years now, and has grown from the initial concept into an organisation encompassing fans’ teams from over 80 teams in the UK (18 in Scotland). The league is split into Regions, but also tallies up into one big huge league, although the emphasis of the whole thing is really just to have fun and for opposition fans to meet each other and build bridges - even with Motherwell ;-)

The ‘Swally team formed after a challenge from the Ayr team (Kaisayr) on the Airdrie message board, and the main Internet faces at the time - Rab from the Stomp and Club site, Dougy and Baz from Johnny Martins Willy, and a few other regular posters met up in the Scarborough Social Club a few weeks later and the team was formed. What undoubtedly helped was the fact that we actually won the game 6-2, found a carry out friendly minibus driver, and generally had a riot of a day out.

4 years on and the team is predominantly still the same faces from the 1st game down at Ayr, although many new faces have come along as some have disappeared (the carry out friendly minibus driver is also still on the scene which keeps interest up immensely). Midway through last season saw our numbers jump to an all time high of 18, and while the emphasis stayed firmly on the team playing purely for fun, we actually became quite good, winning the Scottish Cup in Edinburgh, finishing runners up in The Albert Morton Summer 7’s, and getting through the group stages of the Worldnet tournament.

Away from the tournaments, the team were going great guns in the league, and looked likely to finish at the very worst 2nd in the league. However a spate of severe injuries, coupled with a general apathy of all things football related after the demise of the big team saw us fail to play anymore league games finishing the league in 4th spot. This year should hopefully see the team improve on last years league position, although may be hampered by lack of opposition amongst the 2nd division teams.

So that’s a brief history of the team and where things are up to now. Its important to point out that the team isn’t a closed shop, and that if you are an Airdrie fan and on the web then you are more than welcome to drop us a mail and we can try and get you a game in upcoming fixtures, while at the same time trying to avoid the situation of 40 guys turning up for a game. One other important feature of the team and one which probably highlights the wonders of the internet is that despite being an Airdrie team, very few of the players actually stay in the town, with players coming from Armadale, Livingston, Kirkintilloch and Glasgow. Christ there’s even a few in Coatbridge.

So that’s the Swally team then. Beer, Singing, and playing football with an Airdrie strip on. What more could you ask for ?

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