�Make some noise for Gretna!� the match announcer implored. The response wasn�t deafening. It was mid-winter, and Raydale Park had attracted 246 people for a game against East Stirlingshire.

DAVID BENNETT

Make some noise for Gretna!" the match announcer implored. The response wasn't deafening. It was mid-winter, and Raydale Park had attracted 246 people for a game against East Stirlingshire.

That was in the early days, soon after the Borderers had moved into the Scottish League. It had been an ambition for years; their acceptance - after the collapse of Airdrie - came at the third time of asking in a decade.

I was working as a reporter in Dumfries at the time, and there was excitement over the move. Rowan Alexander, the club's manager had been optimistic it was time for a change. The club had been playing in the Unibond League, travelling around the north of England every other weekend, a dedicated band of fans following them. The clubs accepted Gretna's bid and in August 2002, the fairytale began.

My first assignment covering Scottish football's newest side was at their third league match, an important one, as the team recorded their first home win, beating Montrose 4-1.

It was accepted that Gretna were never going to the biggest club in the country. That match attracted 373 people and attendances rarely passed 1000.

Yet the side coped well. Alexander doubled as an occasional player and groundskeeper and though their wealth was never enormous, Gretna had enough, their coffers boosted by car-boot sales in the official car-park.

After one season, things changed dramatically. Charismatic millionaire Brooks Mileson arrived, ponytail and cigarettes in tow. There were rumours that the insurance tycoon had tried, and failed, to take over Carlisle United. No matter. He was offering Gretna and their followers the opportunity to turn a little club into something huge.

There were sceptics even at that early stage. The local MP called for a meeting between Mileson and the fans, concerned about how the club would be run. But at first everything looked rosy.

Two seasons later, their rise through the Scottish League began, the team scoring 130 goals to ease their way out of the third division.

The following year, a second division championship all but paled into insignificance after 12,500 went to Hampden for a Scottish Cup final against Hearts. They lost, but the dream had come true. This club was going somewhere.

But doubts remained. Mileson was effectively carrying the club financially. The wage bill was huge; players turned down SPL contracts because the money was better at Gretna.

And the fans still weren't there. Many went to Hampden, myself among them, but home attendances were barely higher than in that first season. And with competition from Carlisle just across the border and Queen of the South half an hour up the road, there was little room to grow.

The next season started well, with the side soon at the top of division one, heading for the SPL, but then things started to turn. The mystery illness' which led to the unexplained absence of Alexander left many confused. The side began to struggle in the league, ending the season by only just securing promotion with an injury-time winner over Ross County.

The SPL was going to be tough. The club's problems were easy to see. The fans were facing a round trip to Motherwell for home games. Alexander was turned away from Fir Park on the club's SPL debut and later sacked.

The niggling fears had been there, probably since Mileson first arrived: would he eventually get bored backing a team which wasn't earning him anything? Or would the money one day run out?

Sadly, it seems we now know the answer.