Dundee take on Hamilton Academical at Dens this weekend and so we take a look at a player who played for both clubs Derek Lyle. Lyle was a player who courted controversy during his time at Dens but finished as top goal scorer in his debut season but it is away from the pitch that the Dark Blue support will probably remember him most.
Born in Glasgow on February 13th 1981, Lyle started his footballing career in 1999 with Partick Thistle but his time at Firhill saw him struggle to hold down a first team place. He went out on loan firstly to East Stirlingshire and then to Queen of the South and six goals in thirteen games at Palmerston was enough to earn him a permanent move to Dumfries as Queens went on to win the Second Division title.
The following season, Lyle was part of the Doonhamers side which won the Scottish League Challenge Cup and he earned himself hero status in the market town when he scored the second in the final, in a 2-0 win over Brechin at Broadwood.
When Ian McCall joined Queens as manager in 2005 however, Lyle became a bit part player in the side and went out on loan to Stirling Albion and Dunfermline. He was told by McCall that he wouldnât be first choice at Palmerston and so decided to leave and in August 2006, the 5ft 6in forward moved to Dens Park to sign for new Dundee manager Alex Rae.
Immediately Lyle made an impact with his new club, scoring a penalty on his debut in a 3-0 home win over Clyde and a fortnight later was on target again when he opened the scoring in an impressive 4-0 win over promotion favourites Gretna at Raydale.
Dundee had established their promotion credentials with that victory in the Borders and the following week, Derek netted the winner, this time against Gretnaâs neighbours Queen of the South in a 2-1 home win which sent Dundee joint top of the division.Â
Six goals in Lyleâs first ten games was an excellent start to his Dundee career but it was marred by a sending off against St Johnstone at the end of September which was the first of three red cards he would receive in his two years at Dens.
In January, the diminutive striker would score another four goals in three games against Queen of the South when Dundee played a consecutive trio of matches against his old club but the second of those saw Dundee crash out of the Scottish Cup on penalties in Dumfries after a 3-3 draw in a third round replay. A 1-0 home win over Queens four days later kept Dundee in touch at the top of the league but disappointing defeats to Clyde and Hamilton in February effectively put paid to any title ambitions.
At the end of the season, Dundee would finish third, thirteen points behind champions Gretna and for Derek, his season ended disappointingly when he was sent off in the last game, away at Clyde. He did however finish as top goal scorer with twelve strikes in the League and three in the Scottish Cup and hopes were high that he could spearhead Dundeeâs promotion push the following year.
Suspension however meant that Lyle sat out the start of the 2007/08 season and he didnât make his first league appearance until September and didnât score his first goal until October. He started to show his worth again with four goals in the next seven games but on Boxing Day was sent off again, this time during a 2-1 defeat at Palmerston.
While it was disappointing for Dundee fans to see Lyle get his marching orders again, the news which came next in the New Year was a devastating blow, when it emerged that he had signed a pre contract agreement with promotion rivals Hamilton Academical and would join them in the summer. Hamilton were currently sitting top of the First Division with Dundee hot on their heels in second and it was hugely disappointing to see Lyle sign an agreement to join The Accies in the summer.
Immediately his commitment to the cause was questioned by some of the Dundee support as helping The Dee win the First Division would consign his new club to second tier football and was clearly an impossible conflict on interests. Dundee wanted a fee so that he could move to New Douglas Park straight away but Hamilton were happy to wait until the summer to get their man for free. His place in the Dundee side therefore was no longer assured and he would spend most of the second half of the 2007/08 season on the bench, scoring just two more goals as Dundee finished as runners-up to The Accies.
In his first home match since the deal became public, Lyle came off the bench to replace the injured Antoine-Curier against Morton on February 16th and when he took to the pitch, he was booed by a section of the Dundee support.
It wasnât always the choice of manager Alex Rae to put him on the bench however as in March he was out of the squad through injury after a bizarre incident at home when he fell through a glass coffee table and required sixteen stitches in his stomach. It meant that Lyle missed the big Scottish Cup quarter-final away to Queen of the South and he told the press that âI was messing about with one of my pals when we tripped on a rug and I went through the coffee table. Thankfully there was no internal damage as it couldâve been a lot worse. The pain is going away and hopefully Iâll get the stitches out on Monday.â
His pain may have been going away and presumably the pane too but there was pain for the Dundee support as they crashed out 2-0 to the Doonhamers and could have done with Lyle for the match with fellow strikers McMemamin and Antoine-Curier also missing the match through injury.
In the last game of the season, Dundee hosted SPL bound Hamilton, who had already won the League the week before and Derek was once again on the bench against the side he was due to join in a few weeks. In the 71st minute Alex Rae sent on his third and final sub meaning Lyle wouldnât be getting on the make his final Dark Blue appearance but instead of sitting and watching the remainder of the game from the bench, he walked down the stand side track to go back into the dressing room and applauded the Hamilton fans as he walked past them in the main stand. It was an unnecessary and sour end to his Dundee career which brought the wrath of both the Dundee fans and management on a disappointing day.
Lyle joined Hamilton on July 1st 2008 under freedom of contract but the following year on September 19th, he suffered a serious knee ligament injury in the first minute of the Accies 0-0 draw with Falkirk and he wouldnât play again until the 2009/10 season, where he would only make six appearances.
In January 2011, Lyle would sign a short term deal with Morton until the end of the season but controversy followed him to Greenock when he was arrested on âsuspicion of possession of controlled substancesâ at his home in Bishopbriggs in April by Strathclyde Police as part of Operation Neptune. This later was confirmed to be âpossession with intent to supplyâ, a much more serious charge for which he and partner Nicola Mullen were released on bail pending full committal but prosecutors decided to drop the charge more than two years after initially appearing in court.
In July, he returned to Hamilton on a short term deal, scoring his first goal for The Accies in three years in a 2-2 draw at home to Raith in September but in January ex-Dee Colin Cameron took him on loan to Cowdenbeath until the end of the season.
Lyle signed on at Queens for a second spell in August 2012, along with former Dee Derek Young. He was part of the Division Two and Challenge Cup double-winning team and is the only player in the club’s history to obtain four winners’ medals winning two Second Division titles and has also won two Challenge Cups. On August 27th 2016, Lyle scored his 100th goal for Queen of the South in a 1-0 win at East End Park over Dunfermline Athletic and is currently the third highest goalscorer in the club’s history with 115 goals. Queens awarded Lyle with a testimonial and he enjoyed a 5-3 win against a Rangers Legends XI last June.
His time at Dens was a frustrating one for the Dundee support as his first year had shown him as a popular poacher of goals but his second brought with it resentment and disappointment that he didnât commit himself to try and shoot Dundee towards the SPL, something he had already shown that he was capable of doing.
Appearances, Goals:
League: 39 +14 subs, 18 goals
Scottish Cup: 3, 3 goals
League Cup: 2 subs
SFL Challenge Cup: 1
