Biggest Palmerston crowd

[QOS_MAD_ADMIN]

You youngsters must find it a touch frustrating when we oldies go on about what in was like "in my day". Do forgive me if I find posts about crowds of 7000/8000 rather amusing. In my early days at Palmerston (there I go again) we could average crowds in excess of 10,000 and on occasion we could exceed 20,000. I was there in February 1952 when we went down 1-3 to Hearts in a Scottish Cup game when the attendance was in excess of 26,000. Another notable Scottish Cup game was in 1958 when we went down narrowly 3-4 to Rangers in front of a crowd of 23,000. There was no segregation in those days and I recall a Rangers' fan beside me offering to swap Max Murray for Jim Patterson. There was a similar crowd (ie 23,000) at another Scottish Cup tie, again against Hearts, some two years after the record breaking tie of 1952 when we again lost narrowly, this time 1-2. Nowadays we can barely reach a "crowd" of 2000. In 1953 Queens actually took more than 2,000 to a Scottish Cup tie at Berwick who were then in C Division and had Billy Houliston at centre forward. Thankfully we won on that occasion by 3-2. I remember that it snowed heavily on the way home and that the bus I was in got lost.

We used to get more for a reserve match in those days than what we get nowadays for a first team fixture

[Cresswell]

The crowd figures given now are a lot more accurate than they used to be . For years there was skullduggery aplenty at the turnstiles and the new system of paying for your tickets beforehand has largely wiped this out. I recall, many years ago, a boy boasting that he had made a few hundred quid at the turnstile after a big cup tie and I knew he wasn't joking .

You may be right about skullduggery, JRS, but you are certainly not right about crowd figures being a lot more accurate, certainly not in respect of Premiership clubs. In days gone by some clubs operated what were euphemistically called "directors' turnstiles" (or skullduggery as you so nicely put it although I infer from your post that you think the turnstile operators were the main culprits of skullduggery). This inevitably led to under-declaring the attendances at games. I cannot be definitive about the lower league clubs (and any over-declaring by these lower league clubs will be relatively insubstantial) but the Premiership clubs take the number of season tickets sold and add to that figure the number of tickets sold on the day. As a consequence, the official attendance does not reflect the number of bums on seats and for some games, particularly those relating to Rangers and Celtic, there can be an over-declaration of many thousands especially when games are played at odd times to suit TV. You may argue that such over-declaration of the actual attendance at a game doesn't matter and you may well be right: but you are wrong to think that the officially declared attendance accurately states the number of fans at any particular Premiership game.

[JRSLEFTPEG]

I was only on about our crowd figures not any other teams or leagues. Plenty of ' very big ' under 16's used to get in the concessions gate for a fiver and others used to jump the turnstile and pay couple of quid to those behind the mesh. I want to make it clear that I haven't seen these practises for years now incase I get misquoted or misunderstood. This definitely used to happen and p###d me off entirely at the time knowing Queens were getting ripped off.

[MUSKY]

The largest crowd I have been in was back on 6th March 1976 v Rangers in the Scottish Cup QF. I was with my Father in the Portland Road terracing and if I remember correctly I had been unwell and off school for a few days before the game and I was just glad that I got to go. Remember it being packed and noisy with a crowd of around 18700. Unfortunately Queens were well beat and went down 5-0.
I was also at the League Cup QF earlier in that same season (24th Sept 1975) on a pouring wet night. The crowd was around 7500 for that one. We had lost the first leg at Ibrox narrowly 1-0 and we led 2-1 after 90 minutes in this one only for Rangers to level and go through to the SF on a 3-2 aggregate score.

[ALBERTZ_11]

The Dundee Scottish Cup Quarter Final match in March 2008 would be my one, with the 84 yards goal from Ryan McCann.

[Spikefaethesouth]

The largest crowd I have been in was back on 6th March 1976 v Rangers in the Scottish Cup QF. I was with my Father in the Portland Road terracing and if I remember correctly I had been unwell and off school for a few days before the game and I was just glad that I got to go. Remember it being packed and noisy with a crowd of around 18700. Unfortunately Queens were well beat and went down 5-0.
I was also at the League Cup QF earlier in that same season (24th Sept 1975) on a pouring wet night. The crowd was around 7500 for that one. We had lost the first leg at Ibrox narrowly 1-0 and we led 2-1 after 90 minutes in this one only for Rangers to level and go through to the SF on a 3-2 aggregate score.

I remember the first of these games as I had a Saturday job working in Kelly's the Ironmongers and we were inundated with Rangers supporters that Saturday but I am not sure what they were doing in an Ironmongers on the day of a game!!
Regarding the League cup Q/F-Rangers won the treble that season under Jock Wallace but we were the first team to beat them over 90 minutes that year which was a tremendous achievement then. If I recall we scored in the 90th minute only for Derek McParlane to score the equaliser in extra time to knock Queen's out. I think that it was one of our fullbacks who scored the last minute goal but cannot recall who it was-O'Hara???

[Ftivano1]

Jocky Dempster (pen.) and Tommy Bryce scored for Queens with McDonald's goal in extra time for Rangers knocking us out of the LC 3 - 2 on aggregate - attendance 5,645

[Spikefaethesouth]

Jocky Dempster (pen.) and Tommy Bryce scored for Queens with McDonald's goal in extra time for Rangers knocking us out of the LC 3 - 2 on aggregate - attendance 5,645

Thanks for the correction from the official statistics and it only goes to show just how the memory can play tricks even if it was 40 years ago. Must be more senile than I thought😱.

[Ftivano1]

Glad to help Spike and forgot to say it was Tommy Bryce (Mark One) who netted the 89th minute equaliser not the more well - known Tommy of Guiness Book of Records fame

[ALBERTZ_11]

The Dundee Scottish Cup Quarter Final match in March 2008 would be my one, with the 84 yards goal from Ryan McCann.

Trying to recall the attendance at this unforgettable match?