Lochee United Football Club was first established in 1892 as a juvenile outfit and the team spent many of their early years operating as such.
They spent a short period of time as an amateur side just after the last war, before going on to establish themselves as a club in the then Dundee Junior Football Association, later to become the Tayside Region Junior Football Association.
Prior to 1959 the club had not had a permanent home ground and had played at a number of different venues over the years. However, things changed that year when they moved into their present home at Thomson Park, the ground being opened by the then Rangers captain George Young.
Having become established in the top division the "Bluebells" began to bring silverware to Thomson Park regularly from 1960. The late seventies started what proved to be a hugely successful decade for the club culminating in the winning of seventeen honours from 1977 to 1987.
This golden period ended in 1987 and Lochee United suffered the ignominy of relegation in 1993. Despite winning promotion back to the top division at the first attempt the club were not, until recently, in contention for any honours.
In recent years, the Bluebells fortunes have been on the up, and they have once again become one of the leading junior teams, winning the Tayside Premier League quite convincingly, and thus elevating themselves to the newly established East Region Super League.
Lochee United finished 4th in the East Region Superleague in season 2003-04.
In season 2004-05 success continued with the team reaching the final of the O.V.D. Scottish Junior Cup but losing to rivals Tayport, but became East Region Superleague Champions.
Season 2005-06, 2006-07 brought various cup success for the club. The season 2007-08 saw Lochee United becoming East Super League Champions(pic below) for a second time, managed by ex-Dundee United and Nottingham Forest stalwart amongst other teams Ray McKinnon, and also winning the DJ Laing Cup and the Redwood Leisure Cup to complete another fantastic season.
For winning the East Region SuperLeague, Lochee were awarded a place in the Scottish FA Cup and created history by becoming the first Dundee JuniorLeague team to qualify for Scottish football's most illustrious knock-out tournament. Lochee were awarded a home tie against fellow Junior outfit Bathgate Thistle, who qualified by winning the Junior Scottish Cup, in the 1st Round. Winning that game comfortably by a scoreline of 3-1 Lochee were in the hat for the 2nd Round with the SFA doing the draw live at Thomson Park, Lochee were again drawn at home this time to Highland League outfit Buckie Thistle. Disposing of Buckie Thistle by a scoreline of 3-0 Lochee were in the hat for the 3rd round. Again Lochee were drawn at home, this time to tougher opposition in Scottish 2nd Division side Ayr United.
After 5 postponements due to the winter weather this game finally went ahead on 17th Dec 2008 at Thomson Park where Lochee forced a draw after levelling the match with 4 minutes remaining, 1-1 and thus faced a replay at Somerset Park, home of Ayr Utd.(pic below of action at Thomson Park) Lochee lost the replay 3-1, with Paul Blackwood scoring the goal of the game and captain Charlie Cargill was sent off. Fantastic 300+ travelling support went through for the game.
Finishing fourth bottom of the SuperLeague, missing relegation by 3 points, Lochee United finished off the 2008/9 season creating history along the way, winning the East Of Scotland Cup, defeating Glenrothes in the final 3-0 and thus becoming the first Junior side from the Tayside area to win the trophy in all its history of winners.
Picture below of Lochee Uniteds players with the EOS Cup 2009...
Season 2009/10 brought no silverware sucess for Lochee United, though reaching the semi-final of the Emirates Scottish Junior Cup was the highlight of the season. Lochee lost to rivals Linlithgow Rose 4-2 on aggregate over a two-legged tie. Lochee managed to finish as high as 5th in the SuperLeague securing 32 points from 22 games.
It was the end of this season that Lochee United lost their manager, Ray McKinnon, having resigned from the club after four years as manager and previous years as a player and taking up a new job with the SFA as a Technical Developement Officer. Another former Lochee player and top professional like Ray Mckinnon in Paul Ritchie was appointed the new manager for the 2010/11 season.
