In case you’ve be living under a rock, you’re more than likely aware that the fairytale of Gretna Football Club has well and truly come crashing to earth.

Everyone involved in this disaster will no doubt be point fingers at each other, but in reality they all have to share some of the blame. The Scottish Football League for allowing a village club into it’s ranks in the first place, the Gretna management (including the ailing Brooks Mileson) for allowing Gretna to ascend too quickly causing the club to contract the football equivalent of vertigo, and the Scottish Premier League for forcing GFC to decamp it’s Raydale Park home due to ridiculous ground standards (To meet SPL standards a stadium must have 6,000 seats. Despite that, outwith the Old Firm, the SPL averages around 7,000 fans per match.)

To those who followed the club closely Gretna’s “Icarus moment” was the 2006 Scottish Cup final against Heart of Midlothian. Hearts defeated Gretna on penalties thanks in no small part to the heroics of Scottish number 1 Craig Gordon. However, as a result of Hearts qualifying for the UEFA Champions League, Gretna were awarded a spot in the 2006/2007 UEFA Cup where they would meet the Irish club Derry City, and lose, badly. The Candystripes crushed the Anvils 5-1 at Motherwell’s Fir Park. Later in the season it would be revealed that Gretna’s wage bill was comparable to that of Aberdeen. The Dons, a traditional club from a city of 200,000, were themselves having trouble making ends meet, even flirting with selling their storied Pittodrie Stadium to clear debts. Gretna did manage to win promotion that season, James Grady’s last gasp effort to beat Ross County made sure of that, but it was obvious something was amiss when during the summer the club halved it’s wage bill.

Gretna’s SPL campaign kicked off to much publicity, a club from a town of 2,700 battling the big boys was a story that anyone would read. But behind the scenes the problems kept piling up. Forced from Raydale Park the club had to set up shop at Fir Park in Motherwell, a 150-mile round trip. Renting Fir Park costs Gretna £20,000 per use ($40,100 as of Mar 19) this, combinded with the Monochromes’ astronomical wage bill and benefactor Brooks Mileson’s failing health turned Gretna from a fairytale into a time bomb. An SPL record low crowd of 501 turned up to see what was likely Gretna’s final match at Fir Park, a drab 3-0 defeat to a strong Dundee United side, has left Gretna on the ropes and to add injury to injury they’ve been hit by news that Fir Park is now out of use due to drainage problems. So on Sunday Gretna will take the pitch against Celtic at Livington’s Almondvale Stadium, their third “home” in under a calender year. A visit from the Hoops could be a much needed shot in the arm for Gretna as the Glasgow side always attract a decent gate, but whether or not Gretna survive, and there may well be a light at the end of the tunnel in the form of a Roddy Collins-led Irish consortium, everyone involved needs to take a long, hard look at themselves.