This weekend Dundee travel to Dingwall to start their Ladbrokes Premiership campaign against Ross County and so we take a look at midfielder Roy McBain who played for both clubs. McBain spent just one season with Dundee in the mid-Nineties so it is fair to say he made more of an impact with The Staggies with whom he won promotion twice and the Third Division title.
Roy Adam McBain was born in Aberdeen on November 7th 1974 and began his career with Dundee United where he came through the United youth ranks. He was selected for Scotland Schools and Scotland Under-17 squads but never really made the breakthrough at Tannadice where he made one substitute appearance against St Johnstone in the Premier Division at McDiarmid Park on August 21st 1993.
McBain was transfer listed by Ivan Golac in August in 1994 and was released 12 months later after Dundee United were relegated to the First Division when he crossed the road to Dens Park to join Jim Duffy’s Dark Blues.
An attacking midfielder or winger, McBain found it to tough to break into Jim Duffy’s talented side as he was up against the likes of Neil McCann, Morten Weighorst, Paul Tosh and Iain Anderson and he had to wait until September for his debut in the 3-0 League Challenge Cup win over Cowdenbeath at Dens made his league debut as a substitute in a 1-1 home draw with Hamilton five days later.
Roy started the next round against Stenhousemuir at Dens where only four first teamers were selected as the next match in a couple of days was a derby with United at Dens and he had to wait until December for his first Dark Blue start in the league.
By then Dundee played had Aberdeen in the League Cup Final and with Morten Weighorst sold within days of the 2-0 defeat and Neil McCann out injured having been substituted at Hampden, McBain was given his chance at home to St Johnstone on December 16th.
On January 9th Roy would line up against his former employers at Dens and away at Morton four days later but after three defeats in his three games, McBain was consigned to the bench for the rest of the season where he made just three more appearances.
Failure to get promotion for the second season in a row meant financial cuts and big changes to Jim Duffy’s squad and McBain was one of eight players who were given a free transfer in the summer.
Roy headed up north and signed for Third Division Ross County who had joined the Scottish League two years before and in his four seasons in Dingwall he won promotion twice, winning the Third Division title in 1998/99 and promotion to the First Division the following year when three clubs were elevated after the SPL expanded to 12 teams.
However in the summer McBain crossed the Kessock Bridge to join fellow First Division side Inverness Caledonian Thistle and he would spend 11 years in the Highland capital. In his debut season McBain would turn out 38 times as Thistle finished fourth, two places above his old club Ross County.
In 2003 Roy faced his former club Dundee in the Scottish Cup semi-final at Hampden and while there was heartbreak for the Highlanders as Dundee progressed to the Final 1-0, they didn’t have long to wait for glory.
In November Roy was part of the Caley side which defeated Airdrie United 2-0 at McDiarmid Park to win the Scottish League Challenge Cup and six months later celebrated a league and cup double when they won the First Division title on the last day of the season to win promotion to the SPL for the first time.
Inverness would stay in the top flight for five seasons until relegated in 2008/09 but bounced straight back to the SPL at the first attempt at the expense of runners-up Dundee to give McBain his second First Division winners’ medal.
Roy was rewarded for his ten years at the Caledonian Stadium with a testimonial match in August 2010 which saw an Inverness Select side face an Inverness Legends side (which included former Dee Bobby Mann) but as he became a peripheral figure in Caley’s SPL exploits, he was loaned out to Brechin the following March.
In the summer of 2011 McBain left Inverness after 323 appearances and 19 goals to join Peterhead. He stayed with the Blue Toon for just a season before moving to Highland League Cove Rangers and was part of the Cove side to be crowned Champions in 2012/13 and again in 2015/16 and is now player/assistant manger, playing the full ninety minutes at the age of 41 against Dundee’s Under 20s in the first round of the Irn-Bru Cup at Station Park last Tuesday.
McBain’s stay at Dens was brief but he was a repeated thorn in the Dark Blues’ side when he faced his former club in both the SPL and the First Division and he can look back on his career in the Highlands with pride with five winners’ medals in his trophy cabinet.
