FORMER Grade One referee John Bannerman was the guest speaker at the Irvine Meadow Wednesday Club/Medda Memories event last week, writes Gordon McCreath.

Now in his early 80s John, who is originally from Kilmaurs and now lives in Kilmarnock, entertained the group with tales of his days refereeing in both junior and senior football.

He started his refereeing career because injury stopped him playing the game.

“I loved football so much,” John explained, "and I burst my ankle playing in an amateur game one day. They had no referees and somebody had a whistle, so I had to be the referee and I enjoyed it that much that I decided to go for lessons held in the Conservative Club in the High Street in Irvine. 12 weeks it lasted for.”

At times during his career, John, who is also a former Royal Marine, refereed three games a day - schoolboys at 9am, Craigie College at 11am and a senior game in the afternoon.

The highlight of his career came when he was invited to take charge of the 1967 Scottish Junior Cup final at Hampden. Kilsyth Rangers and Rutherglen Glencairn fought out a 1-1 draw and John got to control the replay.

“The newspapers said I had two good games. I allowed the game to flow and Kilsyth were worthy winners in the end. I was satisfied with my performance, but I had to change my normal black shirt to a horrible khaki one," he said.

John was a great believer in playing the advantage rule and added: “I tried to get through the game without blowing my whistle, but that’s not possible. There are 17 Laws in the game of football. But there’s actually 18. Number 18 is the Law of Common Sense. Keep the game going and let the fans enjoy themselves.”

He also had a sound piece of advice for budding referees; “Don’t blaw yer whistle too much!”