Retro Player + Staff Directory 2005-2006
A new addition to the “Distillery Collectables” series has been released.
Last season we produced a set of player picture cards for the 2004-2005 season – a look back to our first team squad twenty years ago.
They were very well received, so this season David Hunter decided to produce another, slightly different, format for a look back at the 2005-2006 squad.
“Whilst preparing for the Northern Ireland Football Programme and Memorabilia Fair back in June, I came across the last “Player Directory” we produced in the mid-nineties. At that stage we had a huge turnover in players as manager Paul Kirk set about rebuilding the club following his arrival at New Grosvenor and the then programme team decided to produce the booklet to help supporters get to know all the new arrivals.
The booklet format enables a lot more content to be added, so given last year’s interest I have added this new booklet to the “Distillery Collectables” series.
I thank Willie Jack from the Duke of York in Belfast for kindly sponsoring the booklet – in recent seasons the Duke of York has also sponsored the picture player cards and season tickets as we look back at a little of the club’s great past and in so doing help support it today.
This booklet is A5 (16 pages – full colour) and goes well beyond what we can include on a picture card. It contains photographs of all the first team players that season along with their individual statistics over the season, and additionally club historian Dawson Simpson has also provided a complete player breakdown in terms of competition appearances and goals.
In addition to looking back at the team management at that time, we have a page on the club’s “Seconds” that season, a two page spread on a selected “Game of the Season” and a few other “interesting things” as well.
The “Distillery Collectables” series continues to grow and later this month the club website will carry a full update on what’s available. I am pleased that since it started back in 2022 the series has recently broken through the four-figure mark in terms of donations into the club so “THANK YOU” to everyone who has made that possible.
And I am currently planning something in relation to this year’s squad that will be available later in the season.”
As usual the print run is limited; a booklet costs £5 and will be available from David on match-days at the club or you can contact him on ldnetweb@hotmail.co.uk for further information.
The first team players in the booklet from that season are – Aaron Johnston, Stuart Thompson, Simon West, Andrew Dickson, James Willis, Gary Spence, John Martin, Chris McGaharan, Chris Coffey, Kyle McQuillan, Michael Ferguson, Ryan Catney, Damien McLaughlin, Philip Matthews, Francis Murphy, Wayne Buchanan, Darren Armour, Andrew Kilmartin, Paul Muir, Ryan McCann, Gareth McKeown, Robert Casey, Andrew Barron, Conor Hagan, Sean Armstrong and Michael Dougherty.
All these players played in at least one competitive match over the season.
