Socrates MacSporran

Socrates MacSporran
No I am not Chick Young, but I can remember when Scottish football was good

Tuesday 9 July 2013

Midsummer Madness - So Let's Ignore The Fitba

HERE we are, at the height of the Scottish summer - ie that fortnight in the year when our leading football intellectuals try to kid us on they know something about sport other than how to continue the Old Firm argument for the profit of their papers.

If you are unlucky, you will find them in the media tents at the Scottish Open and The Open, writing even more pish about golf than they by and large manage to write about football.

Not that they are all bad, big Shuggie Macdonald of the Herald has played a blinder at Wimbledon this year.

Speaking of Wimbledon, the big idea this week is to try to assess where Andy Murray's win ranks in the pantheon of Scottish sporting success.

Let me say immediately, great admirer of Murray though I am - if only we could find a squad of as-focussed, hard-working footballers - he isn't (yet) Scotland's greatest tennis player.

That title belongs to, and will belong for some time yet, to the late John Donald Budge, the pre-war World Number One. Budge may have been born and died in the United States, but, his father was Scottish - rumoured to have been a one-time Rangers reserve player, so, Budge was a member of the Caledonian Diaspora, one o oor ain.

He won all four Grand Slams, so, until Murray matches that achievement - he's our Number One.

Now, to the big debate - Scotland's greatest sporting achievement.

I would tend to go with the Alan Wells Olympic Games 100 metres gold medal in Moscow. This achievement has, ever since, been down-played due to the absence of the Americans. Still, you can only beat whoever is up against you on the day, so Wells won and, 100 years hence on the list of Olympic 100 metres champions you will find A Wells (Great Britain) listed alongside Jesse Owens, Usain Bolt, Carl Lewis and all the rest; there will not be a wee asterik and a line such as (* the USA did not compete at this Olympiad).

So, a Scot winning the biggest race in the biggest event in sport has to be up there.

In team sport, it's easier; Celtic, winning the biggest club tournament in the world in Lisbon in 1967 has to be out on its own. I actually reckon that Celtic team could have won a head-to-head with the then top international team in the world, reigning World Champioins England. After all, Messrs Simpson, Gemmell, Wallace and Lennox were in a Scotland team which did just that. Surely, with Bertie Auld and Bobby Murdoch playing the Baxter/Bremner midfield roles and the other Lions filling-in as required, Celtic/Scotland would still have won at Wembley in 1967; and, unlike Slim Jim, wee Bertie would surely have gone down the Denis Law line and wanted to destroy them with goals.

To further muddy the waters - individual effort in a team sport - discuss.

Alec Jackson at Wembley in 1928; Jimmy Cowan, Wembley, 1949; Jim Baxter, Wembley, 1963 and 1967; a couple of Andy Irvine performances spring to mind. Then, there's my favourite - Rhona Martin's delivery of "the Stone of Destiny" in that Olympic curling final - now, that was a pressure shot.

There is one other individual Scottish win which has to be in the mix. For Eric Liddell to withstand the pressure to compromise his religious beliefs and run in his best event, the 100 metres, in the 1924 Olympiad, and still win his gold medal in the 400 metres, breaking the world record in the process, well - that's worthy of the highest praise.

However, as ever when talking sport - it's all about opinion. Sadly, there's just that one football match which can get into the mix.

Worst-ever Scottish performance - well, that would be a fitba long list, but, let's not go there.

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