The Scotland Epistles Football Magazine

Another Shoot cover and this time it’s from May 19th 1973 with Peter Lorimer and Sammy Nelson of Northern Ireland battling for the ball. Scotland had played Ireland three days earlier, however as Lorimer and Nelson weren’t in the line ups that day, this is more likely form the previous years game played at Hampden on May 20th, 1972. Technically it was a home game for the Irish but due to the ‘troubles’ , the SFA had refused to send a team to Ireland so the game was played at Hampden.
Funny enough, I was in a pub last night and there was a group of old guys trying to out do each other with quiz questions and one asked “Who scored on his home ground for the away team?” The answer was ‘Kenny Dalglish’ in reference to his goal at Anfield against Wales in 1977. Had I thought about it I could have proffered a few others including Peter Lorimer. Scotland beat Northern Ireland 2 nil that year with very late goals from Denis Law (86 mins) and Peter (89mins). God help you if you are one of those people who insist in leaving games five minutes early every week. This would be Denis’s 44th cap for Scotland but despite making another eleven appearances, he never scored again.
Peter would score again to give Scotland the winner against Wales four days later and in twenty one internationals scored four goals, including of course the opener against Zaire in ’74. Peter was well known for his lethal shooting and in fact if you look at the Scotland v Brazil game from ’74 you will see him try to hit free kicks from about 40 yards. He holds a few records for Leeds, as their all time goalscorer with 238 goals and the youngest player at fifteen ever to play for them.

As for the Scotland line up that day, it was; Bobby Clark (Aberdeen), John Brownlie (Hibs), Willie Donnachie (Man City), Bobby Moncur (Newcastle), Billy McNeill (Celtic), Jimmy Johnstone (Celtic), Billy Bremner (Leeds), George Graham (Arsenal), Archie Gemmill (Derby), John O’Hare (Derby), Denis Law (Man Utd). Lorimer came on for Jinky Johnstone after 61 minutes.
Although there is no George Best in the Irish line up there is Danny Hegan. Danny was born in Coatbridge and was one of the first players to be eligible to play for Ireland under the ‘father’ rule in 1969, although, this did not apply for the Home International Championships until 1972.
As to the magazine, there is a few photos from the Home Internationals of ’73 inside and on the back cover a poster of a Scotland player . . . but more of that later.