Alloa Athletic Football Club is a Scottish association football semi-professional club based in the town of Alloa, Clackmannanshire.
History
Founded in 1878 and known by the fans as 'The Wasps', due to their club colours of black and gold hoops, they currently play at Recreation Park, Alloa, also known as the Indodrill Stadium, where they have played since 1895. The facility has a capacity for 3100 supporters.
Founded as Clackmannan County in 1878, the club changed its name to Alloa AFC a year later and to Alloa Athletic in 1883. Upon joining the Scottish Football League in 1921 they returned to being called Alloa AFC, before reverting to Alloa Athletic again in 1997.
Alloa Athletic first entered in the Scottish Cup in 1883, its best result reaching the quarter finals on three occasions, the last in 1988. The club's best result in a national cup competition was reaching the final of the Scottish Challenge Cup, winning in 1999 and finishing runners-up in 2001 and 2015.
In 1906 - 1907, the club were Scottish Football Union champions and won the Central Football League six years later, with two runners-up finishes in-between.
Alloa won the Scottish Football League Division Two title in their first season but were immediately relegated from the top flight the following season. Promotion was achieved again in 1938 - 1939 but the onset of the Second World War saw the new season curtailed after just five games. When the leagues were re-organised after the war, Alloa were placed back in Division Two.
Following further league reconstruction, Alloa found themselves as founder members of the new Third Division in 1995. Under Tom Hendrie, Alloa won this league in 1997–98, the club's first championship win since 1921–22. The following season saw the team consolidate in the Second Division and also enjoy a 7–0 derby win over local rivals Stirling Albion. Terry Christie took over at Alloa and led the club to the Scottish Challenge Cup in 1999 followed by promotion to the First Division a few months later.
Alloa's home colours have been black hoops with either orange or gold stripes for the majority of its existence. The club's first strip featured black and orange hoops in 1878 and rarely changed up until 1947 when gold was more commonly used with the black. Occasionally the club has adopted an all-gold or all-orange strip to replace the hoops and only once have these colours not been used; in 1897–98 the home strip was blue and white vertical stripes for a solitary season which was reverted to the traditional style the following year.
In the same year the home shirts were first sponsored in 1985, the club displayed a crest for the first time. The crest reflected the club's nickname "The Wasps", featuring a black wasp on a basic gold shield with the club's initials below. The design of the crest was edited slightly in 1994 with an almost identical wasp on a similar gold shield and the club's full name was displayed below on a gold scroll banner. The crest colour varied along with the shade of colour on the strip and featured until 2010 when it was again redesigned. The new design features a large cartoon Wasp.
Alloa Athletic has played its home games at several grounds over its history. When the club was founded in 1878 it was based at West End Park, Alloa. The club moved to Gaberston Park in 1883 and to Bellevue Park in 1890. After five years at Bellevue Park, Alloa moved to Recreation Park in 1895, where the club has played its home games since. The pitch at the stadium was replaced with artificial turf in 2007.
Recreation Park
Recreation Park, also known as Recreation Grounds, The Recs and The Indodrill Stadium for sponsorship reasons, is a football stadium in Alloa, Clackmannanshire. It is the home ground of Scottish Professional Football League team Alloa Athletic, who have played there since 1895. Additionally, Broomhill (formerly BSC Glasgow) of the Scottish Lowland Football League have been ground sharing at Recreation Park since 2016. Central Girls Football Academy have used the stadium for home matches from 2017. Since 2007 the stadium has had an artificial playing surface.
Recreation Park in 1928
A wooden main stand was built during the 1920s. Around 1950, a terracing cover was built on the Hilton Road side. A record attendance of 15,467 was set by a 1954–55 Scottish Cup match against Celtic. Floodlights were installed in 1979. Following the closure of the main stand for safety reasons, it was demolished, and a new main stand was opened in 1991. The new main stand cost £350,000, most of which was provided by the Football Trust. By the mid-1990s, when the ground was being used for Rangers reserve team matches, capacity had been restricted to just over 4,000. A seated stand was constructed on the Hilton Road side in 2008.
Total seating capacity of the two seated stands is 919 seats. The main stand, which has just over 400 seats, runs approximately half the length of the pitch and is raised above ground level. The other stand, on the Hilton Road side, is used by away team supporters. The rest of the ground is open terracing, apart from a small cover at the Clackmannan Road End. Total crowd capacity is now 3100.