but is still known locally as the Cricky. This venue was the site of the first Irish cup final but Solitude reached even greater heights as it not only hosted finals regularly until 1970 but also played host to Irish Internationals against England, Scotland and Wales up until 1910. Ths Scots in particular loved the ground and recorded two double figure victories there in the 1890s. The IFA by contrast regarded Solitude as it's lucky ground when playing Wales and in five meetings the men from the valleys recorded just one victory, on their final visit in 1908. The last International played there was the most memorable when as many as 20,000 crammed into the ground in 1910 to see the English held 1-1. Cliftonville's decision to remain amateur saw them lose ground on their rival Belfast clubs however and the ground also lost it's stature to newer larger stadiums. The 1970s saw major changes for the club when they finally adopted professionalism and also lost their tag of being something of an afterthought in Irish football. For decades they were regarded as the poorest supported club in the league but the outbreak of violence between Belfast Protestants and Catholics split the community in two. Cliftonville had for decades been a cross community club who drew support from all sections but they and their near neighbours Crusaders now both found themselves designated as representatives of a specific section of the community. For Cliftonville it seemed that they now represented Catholic North and West Belfast, the latter devoid of a club when Distillery were made homeless, and while this did generate a much greater support for the club than before the troubles there was a downside that many lifelong fans, whose fathers had watched the team eighty years before, were lost. The fact that most of Cliftonvile's rivals became Protestant in outlook made life more difficult and Solitude saw more than it's fair share of crowd violence in the hooligan era. The stadium's last great fling was hosting the 1961 cup final in front of a record 22,000 crowd but violence at the 1970 final brought the curtain down on on the old ground and it degenerated into a very sorry state. Cliftonville's fortunes on the field improved by contrast as they finally lifted their first major honour for 69 years when Portadown were defeated in the Irish cup final of 1979 but the highlight for the present fans was clinching their first league title for over ninety years in 1998, their third to date. The club have big plans for Solitude and a new dawn is already happening for the old ground with one new stand already built and another planned. Should future readers decide to ground hop, they could find a very different ground to the one that stood in 2004.
On a personal note, this was the eighth ground hop and so far not one of the eight home teams has won the game. This dour cup tie was heading for a goalless draw after Coleraine had missed two glorious chances while Cliftonville had hit the post and had a shout for a penalty waved away when Rory Hamill scored the best goal of my ground hops so far. A cracking overhead kick deep into injury time to give Coleraine a 1-0 vitory in their continued defence of the Irish cup.
FAN BASE
The club draws the majority of it's support from Nationalist areas of North and West Belfast but can still claim to have a cross community support base. Support for eight of the ten Belfast clubs is still determined to a great extent by religion and Cliftonville have no top flight rivals for the City's Catholic supporters but a new generation of Protestant fans to replace the current ageing crop is unlikely.
CLUB ISSUES
redevelopment of the old cage end of the ground is due to commence At Christmas 2004 but the club now feel this is optimistic. The club also have a no flags, except in club colours, order but this is impossible to enforce and both sets of fans at this game flouted it with British and Irish National flags.