The Scotland Epistles Football Magazine

Your fanzine needs you – or at least a small amount of your money as we strive to convert ‘Likes’ into ‘Sales’ or ‘Scotland Epistles’ is likely to go the same way as fellow Scotland fanzines ‘Que Sera, Sera’ and ‘Haggis Supper’ etc only with considerably fewer editions produced – albeit glossy, full colour, B5-sized editions…..

I suppose an alternative ‘ending’ would be to go online like ‘The Famous Tartan Army Magazine’.

And so it came to pass that Scotland were eliminated from the 2015 Rugby Union World Cup at the Quarter Finals stage – the sixth time we have gone out at this point in the competition and the second occasion that Australia have done us in. But we came close, helluva close to making it to the semi-finals and in many ways it was even more painful than the recent Poland result. Cue reference to Glorious failure, defeat from the jaws of victory etc etc etc.Now call me a sore loser, but time for a quick chant of – ”Rolfie Harris, he’s one of your own…….”

Paul will be 39 on the 17th October. Paul gained his one and only Under-21 cap at the age of 19 in 1996 as a Millwall player having started out at Hamilton. Maybe he was the scapegoat that day as the Under 21s got beat 4-0 and it took a while for Paul to get back onto the International scene. Club stints at Raith, Hibs, St. Johnstone and even a loan spell at Morton would all happen before as a Hearts player, Paul was thrown quite literally into the arena as a Scotland player.

In his first game in charge in March 2005, Walter Smith surprisingly gave Paul his debut against Italy in Milan in a World Cup Qualifier. Paul would be the only uncapped player in Walter’s team that night. Scotland were to be undone by the magic of Andre Pirlo as he scored the only two goals in the game. Still, Paul had done enough to prove his worth and would be a big part of Scotland’s revival under Smith and then Alex McLeish.

Next up for Scotland and Paul was a two nil victory against Moldova at Hampden with Christian Dailly and James McFadden providing the goals in a 2-0 win. Paul would also play in the return game against Italy, which saw Scotland go into a 1-0 lead in the thirteenth minute with a Kenny Miller heading in from a perfectly flighted cross from Hartley. No doubt Italy had their chances to equalise but it was not until the 75th minute that Grosso was able to score.

Four days later Scotland would go to Norway and with Miller on fire would go into a two nil lead with Hartley again supplying a cross that would lead to Miller’s second goal. Kenny was injured in the 40th minute but anyone who saw that game will tell you had he not; he would have surely broken Scotland’s hat trick hoodoo that night, such was his finishing. Scotland held out for a 2-1 win.

A month later in what was to be Smith’s poorest game in charge of Scotland as we lost 1-0 to Belarus, Scotland’s chances of qualifying were gone but the damage had been done long before Smith and Hartley had been involved with the National team. A home draw against Slovenia followed by defeat at Hampden by Norway under Berti Vogts early in the campaign had been our undoing.

With this in mind, perhaps it was the freedom to play without any consequences that saw Scotland beat Slovenia 3-0 in Celje with all three goals being top quality with perhaps Hartley’s only Scotland goal being the best; a wonderful chip with the keeper stranded from the edge of the area was executed perfectly.

Hartley would play in the most important games of the 2008 Euro Qualifiers winning his tenth cap in the 1-0 win at Hampden with Gary Caldwell providing the great moment. Hartley’s 12th cap on 24th March, 2007 came with two major changes; at this point he was now a Celtic player and Alex McLeish was in charge of the national team. A nervy 2-1 win with a Craig Beattie winner in the 89th minute was enough to get McLeish off to a winning start.

It was back to Italy for Hartley and Scotland a few days later but poor defending was our undoing as Luca Toni gave Italy a 2-0 win.

However, happier times awaited Scotland on September 12th, 2007 as James McFadden provided that piece of magic in Paris that has gone down in Scotland folklore; football and otherwise. We all remember where we were that night when Scotland beat France 1-0; as for Paul Hartley I’m sure he remembers too as he was picking up cap 16.

Paul missed the next two games of the Euro campaign; a 3-1 win against Ukraine at Hampden followed by the misery of the 2-0 defeat in Tbilisi to Georgia.

November 17th, 2007 will long live in the memory as Scotland went 2-1 down to Italy at Hampden and there’s not a lot I can add to that except that was never a foul!

Next up a game a friendly against Croatia at Hampden that ended in a one all draw and another change of manager with George Burley now in the revolving chair.

Paul played in the first game of our 2010 World Cup campaign; a toothless one nil defeat to Macedonia in Skopje and was dropped for the game against Iceland in Reykjavik. Scotland would grind out a 2-1 win with goals from Kirk Broadfoot (!!) and James McFadden.

Hartley wouldn’t be involved in the next four games of the campaign but would return as a Bristol City player in September 2009 coming on as a sub against Macedonia for Scott Brown at Hampden. Brown had literally taken the game by the scruff of the neck and  a few Macedonians too if truth be told and had opened the scoring in 56 minutes; 17 minutes later it was a case of replace him or have him sent off choice for Burley. Some of that fire seems to have gone out of Scott Brown if our latest failed campaign is anything to go by. A wonder goal by James McFadden would see out the game.

Paul started in the do or die game against Netherlands four days later where a Scotland win would see us get through to the play offs. Despite hitting the woodwork it was not to be and a David Weir mistake in 82nd minute gifted Netherlands the games’ only goal.

Another campaign and another failure but both Norway and Scotland had been poor in so many games with both ending up with ten points each, a full 14 behind the winners Netherlands.

Paul’s final and 25th cap came with another Manager in charge of his first game; Craig Levein. Paul came on as a sub at half time in a 1-0 victory over the Czech Republic with Scott Brown providing the winner.

So Happy Birthday Paul and all the best.

David Stuart

Scorcher and Score 1972

Well, it’s not quite a classic Magazine cover but it is a great Comic cover all the way from May 1972 with Scotland as the Top team on the cover.

It’s a montage of Denis Law with Hughie Gallacher in the long pants as part of the Wembley Wizards; he looks about fifty though. The final drawing is of Tommy Docherty, the then Scotland Manager and Billy Bremner. So if Billy’s about 5ft and 5in., what height is Tommy Docherty if Billy’s a whole head height above him? In saying that I quite like the illustrations as at least they are drawn well.

Inside there are quite a few comic stories including the classic Billy’s Boots (if only I had a pair when I was younger, the Glasgow 277 BB would have won so much more), Nipper and even the Lags Eleven which was all about a prison football team. Personally I preferred the Tiger. There’s also some real football features but I’m not getting too excited over colour pictures of Nobby Stiles, Hereford United and others when Colin Stein Star of the Week is in black and white.

There’s also an illustration of some Scotland and England action including the Colin Stein incident from 1970 when Brian Labone hacked him down and we never got the penalty and a drawing of Bobby Moncur and Bobby Moore leading out the teams the year before.

Of the adverts there’s one for Cresta juice. It’s frothy man!

David Stuart

I recently bought some cuttings from 1978 just before the World Cup and it’s interesting to get a flavour of things. Somebody recently asked me if at the time, I thought Scotland were going to win the World Cup. Well, to be to be honest I can’t remember thinking that but who knows I was only fifteen at the time. However, it is interesting looking at some of the comments from the TV times 8 page pull-out on Scotland’s chances.

Ally MacLeod: “The thought of Scotland coming back without the World Cup just hasn’t entered my head” Ally goes on to say: “We want to be in Argentina playing the Scottish way: tactics are secondary.”

Brian Clough: “Scotland have a lot of talent, but it must be blended. I have only one reservation I would have dearly loved to have seen Andy Gray in the team: he’s the best centre forward in Britain.”

Mike Smith (Manager of Wales): Scotland have a superb pool of players whom I expect to do well. Of the 16 finalists I pick Argentina, West Germany, Brazil and Scotland to share the first four places.” And he also says “But one word of warning to the Scots: don’t take Iran – whom we recently beat 1-0 – too lightly.”

Ron Greenwood (Manager of England): This World Cup is one of the most open for years. And if a little fortune smiles on Scotland, they could go all the way to the final.”

Danny Blanchflower (Northern Ireland Manager): Scotland have a great chance of winning their group: they have great belief in themselves, they’ve always been brash enough to think they could win anything.”

Sir Matt Busby: They have a very good squad – not just 11 but 20 or more top-class men and that’s very important in a competition that which takes place over three weeks. I am very optimistic – I don’t put it beyond Scotland to win the World Cup.”

So even the great and the good can be wrong sometimes.

Elsewhere in the pull-out it notes that bookmakers William Hill have made Scotland fifth favourites with Brazil, West Germany, Argentina and Holland in front of us. Odds on Scotland to win it were 8-1.

There’s not too much hyperbole in the Radio Times cuttings nor the Sunday Telegraph although it is interesting in their front cover they feature three players that never took part in the World Cup; Danny McGrain was a long term injury and was never part of the squad. Gordon McQueen had been injured in the Home Internationals and although he would travel to Argentina he never regained fitness. Andy Gray was also shown but only made the reserve list for the World Cup. Also on the list were Jim Stewart of Kilmarnock, John Blackley of Newcastle, Arthur Graham of Leeds, Willie Miller of Aberdeen and Coventry’s Ian Wallace.

David Stuart

Who? You know . . . Warren Cummings, the last Scot to be capped whilst a Chelsea player? No, not yet? Don’t you remember he replaced Maurice Ross (Oh dear another duff player) for the second half against the mighty Hong Kong Select in May 2002.

Nah, still don’t remember him. Well, it’s his birthday on October 15th and he will be 35. 35? Is he still playing then?

Well, I know you’re expecting me to tell you a tale of injury woes and such like, given he was one of Hans Hubert’s boys. Well, sort of; he did suffer a double leg break while playing for Bournemouth in 2005 and also a broken arm in 2007 but he did play for Bournemouth for nine years playing over 250 games. He never did get a game for Chelsea though but played on loan for West Brom and Dundee United.

However, Warren Cummings is still out there kicking a ball with Havant and Waterlooville in the Conference South.

Although he only played for the full squad the once, Warren played nine times for the Under 21 team. As said his only cap came in the Reunification Cup against Hong Kong Select. The full team for that day was as follows;

Rab Douglas, Lee Wilkie, Robbie Stockdale (remember him?), David Weir, Christian Dailly, Maurice Ross, Scott Severin, Scot Gemmill, Allan Johnston, Kevin Kyle and Steven Thompson.

Cummings, Scott Dobie, Gareth Williams, Goalkeeper Paul Gallacher, Garry O’Connor and Graham Alexander all made second half appearances.

Goals from Kevin Kyle, Steven Thompson, Christian Dailly and Scot Gemmill gave Scotland a “famous” (LOL) win.

Happy 35th birthday Warren and all the best for the season to come.

David Stuart

I didn’t see Scotland beat Cyprus 8-0 in 1969 so the 6-0 demolition of Gibraltar represents the largest margin of victory that I have witnessed to date. I’ve also now seen two Scotland hat-tricks in the same calendar year- although to tell you the absolute truth I actually missed one of Steven Fletcher’s goals on Sunday evening as I was distracted by an inflatable crocodile – or was it an alligator?

Anyway, inflatable sharks, goldfish and scores of beach balls meant that at times, watching the one-sided, meaningless game of football took second place to playing volleyball, dancing, murdering songs by Erasure and the Beatles and general ‘fannying-about’ in a Euro 2004 white elephant of a stadium that is situated in the middle of nowhere.

Charlie Cooke will be 73 on October 14th. Charlie was one of a glut of great Scottish wingers in the 1960’s with the likes of Jimmy Johnstone, Willie Henderson, Willie Johnston and Eddie Gray all playing at the top of the game. Like Eddie McCreadie, Charlie was one of my early heroes as he was part of that flamboyant Chelsea team that flourished in the late 60’s, early 70’s and probably more importantly to me; he was always in the football cards of the time.

Having started at Aberdeen in the early sixties, Charlie moved to Dundee and then Chelsea in 1966. His first cap came in 1965 as a Dundee player in November, 1965 against Wales in a Home International at Hampden. Also making their debuts, were goalkeeper Bobby Ferguson of Kilmarnock and Jim Forrest of Rangers. Remarkably both Willie Henderson and Willie Johnston were also in the line-up, which must’ve ran the Welsh ragged as Scotland ran out 4-1 winners with Bobby Murdoch scoring two and one each for John Greig and Willie Henderson.

Scotland were to be less cavalier in their next game, so only Charlie of our triumvirate of wingers made the selection as Jock Stein tried to shuffle the pack of an injury decimated squad to face Italy in Naples in a World Cup Qualifier. In a masterstroke of Leveinien stature, Jock gave Ron Yeats of Liverpool the number nine shirt to confuse the Italians but really he was just playing an extra centre half. Those clever Italians sussed this and Scotland lost three nil.

Charlie returned to the Scotland team in June 1966 as World Cup Prospects Portugal and Brazil came to Hampden. Scotland lost one nil to Portugal featuring Eusebio and drew one all with Brazil with Pele, Gerson and Jairzinho all playing at Hampden. Stevie Chalmers of Celtic would score the Scotland goal.

After a two year wait, Charlie was back in favour as he played in the Euro Qualifier decider as Scotland faced England at Hampden in February 1968, knowing a win would see them through to the Euro play-offs. Unfortunately, like many a Scotland team, we failed to progress as we drew one each with John Yogi Hughes scoring the Scots equaliser. This was followed by a friendly with Netherlands that ended nil nil.

Charlie played in our first three World Cup 1970 qualifiers; the first in November ’68, a fine 2-1 win over Austria with Law and Bremner doing the damage. Then the game in Cyprus which Scotland won 5-0 with Alan Gilzean and Colin Stein grabbing doubles and Bobby Murdoch the other. As for the game against West Germany at Hampden, Charlie came on as a sub for Bobby Lennox in 63 minutes with the score one nil to Germany. Bobby Murdoch would score in the 88th to equalise.

As for that years’ Home Internationals, Charlie played in an eight goal thriller at the Racecourse, Wrexham against Wales with Scotland winning 5-3. Reports of the time suggest that this was perhaps Charlie’s finest performance for Scotland as the Scots lost an early two goal advantage to have the score sit at three all until Charlie seemed to take the game by the scruff of the neck and saw Scotland score two late goals for the victory.

Charlie also played in the one all draw with Northern Ireland but missed out in the Big One against the Auld Enemy and given we were pumped 4-1, maybe he wasn’t too aggrieved about that.

Cap twelve came in the 8-0 mauling of Cyprus at Hampden, 13 in the final game of the Mexico ’70 campaign as we lost 2-0 in Vienna to Austria. 14 in that muddy 3-0 defeat to Belgium in 1971 in the first of a new Euro qualifier campaign which we posted the video of a few weeks ago.

By the end of 1971 Scotland had a new manager in Tommy Docherty, who as Chelsea manager had splashed out a club record £72,000 for Charlie in 1966 but Charlie didn’t gain any more caps under him and by 1972 had moved to Crystal Palace.

By ’74 Charlie was back at Stamford Bridge and a resurgence in his career saw him picked for his last two caps for Scotland under Willie Ormond; for firstly a Euro Qualifier against Spain in Valencia which ended in a one all draw and then a friendly at Hampden which ended with a Scotland one goal victory over Portugal through a Artur own goal.

Happy Birthday Bonnie Prince Charlie.

David Stuart

Allan Evans will be 59 on October 12th. Allan is a member of that possibly extinct breed of Scottish player who has won the European Cup as it was known in old money. He achieved this with Aston Villa in May 1982 beating Bayern Munich 1-0 in Rotterdam. There were three other Scots involved that day too.

Allan’s defensive partner was Ken McNaught, who was never capped despite playing over 200 games for Villa. His father Willie, won five caps for Scotland as a Raith Rovers player in the 1950’s. I have mentioned Des Bremner’s one and only cap before which came in April, 1976 when he played for 36 minutes as a sub for Kenny Dalglish against Switzerland at Hampden. Des was a Hibs player at the time. The final player was a guy called Andy Blair; who was on the subs bench. Andy also played for Coventry, Wolves, Sheffield Wednesday and Barnsley in his time and won five Under-21 caps. Although, he never got to play in the final he did get to play against Barcelona at Villa Park in the Super Cup the following season. After a 0-0 draw at the Nou Camp, Villa beat Barcelona 3-0 in the return leg with all four Scots playing and Ken McNaught scoring the third.

Allan gained four Scotland caps in total; all under Jock Stein and was part of the 1982 World Cup Squad. His first cap came against Netherlands in a friendly at Hampden in March, 1982, Jim Bett then of Rangers also made his debut in this game. Allan played alongside Willie Miller that night. A Frank Gray penalty and a Kenny Dalglish goal was enough to give Scotland a 2-1 victory. Next up a month later was a Home International against Northern Ireland in Belfast, where Allan played in defence with Alex McLeish, who was replaced by Alan Hansen in the 75th minute. The game ended in a one each draw with John Wark scoring for Scotland. This game had been brought forward due to I imagine the aforementioned European Cup match being played on May 26th.

Allan would miss the next Scotland match against Wales at Hampden on 24th May but would find himself back in the line-up for the England game at Wembley on the 29th. Scotland lost one nil with Evans lining up with Hansen in defence.

Allan’s final Scotland game came in our opening match of the 1982 World Cup against New Zealand. Again he lined up beside Hansen but given Scotland lost two goals to the World Cup minnows, Allan was among the players dropped by Jock Stein for the next game v Brazil.

So that was Allan’s final involvement in a Scotland shirt but who knows if some day someone builds a time machine and we can go back to Malaga ’82, maybe with a wee word to Big Jock at half-time he will replace either Miller or Hansen with Evans and the disaster against the USSR doesn’t happen. Then again, given our seemingly endless torturous fate maybe we would still have found a way to shoot ourselves in the foot.

Happy Birthday Allan and all the best to you.

David Stuart