Farquharson, from Elgin, was thirty-five at the time of the formation, too old to play but not to referee. M(a)cColl was twenty-nine, born in 1861 on the border between Tradeston and The Gorbals in Glasgow and a right-back. His father, also Hugh, was a successful clothier and, as a chid, the family moved to Pollockshields. At nineteen and still there in 1881 Hugh Jnr. was an Apprentice Marine Engineer (with Napiers), having been raised within a mile of both Maxwell and Queen's Parks as the passion for football had already taken hold of South Glasgow and beyond. He is said to have then worked for Cunard before joining Howden in Glasgow as chief draughtsman.

How and when M(a)cColl, known in Spain and for the rest of his life as Hugo, arrived in Seville is unknown. It may have been in 1889 as he is said to have spent six years in the city. However what is known is that he played for three successive three seasons in the Seville-Huelva fixture. It was also in Seville that he met fellow Scot, Gilbert Reid Pollock, who in the second game against their close Andalusian rivals was in the Seville team and is credited with scoring the first ever, recorded away goal in Spain. And it was these two who became business partners, not in Scotland but in Sunderland. There in 1895 M(a)cColl had set up as a builder and repairer of marine engines and boilers with a John Jamieson. But Jamieson would die the following year and Pollock would step into his shoes, the two creating what was a decade later a substantial concern. At its peak McColl and Pollock would employ about 500 men.