Fergie Rises

by Michael Grant

  When Aberdeen returned to Hampden to face Hearts in the Scottish Cup final, Anderson was not with them. By then desperately ill, he watched the game on television, having tapped out his prediction of the score: Aberdeen 3, Hearts 0. On the Monday after the final Alex Ferguson and his wife, Cathy, took the cup to his home. ‘It was heartbreaking to see how he had been ravaged by that dreadful wasting disease,’ said Ferguson. ‘I never saw Chris alive again after that visit.’ Fifteen days later, after Ferguson had flown out for the World Cup, he was told that Anderson had passed away. Before his illness the expectation had been that he would eventually succeed Dick Donald as chairman. His death cast a sombre mood over the club. Jim Leighton wore a black armband for one of Scotland’s warm-up games in Los Angeles. All the Aberdeen men felt an acute sense of loss.

  Anderson’s death coincided with another ripple of turbulence at the club. Black had slipped away to Metz, and the day before Ferguson set off for Mexico, a fifth member of the Gothenburg team, Neale Cooper, confirmed that he wanted to leave under freedom of contract. He blamed Scottish referees. ‘I feel I am being victimised. I was booked nine times this season, only three of which have been justified. The manager agrees with that. It is impossible for me to stay on.’ Ferguson thought Cooper was going to Sheffield Wednesday, but the player changed his mind and joined Aston Villa instead. ‘I had a chance to go to Celtic and I met people from Parkhead. It was all hush-hush. Their chairman was there, Davie Hay was the manager. Fergie knew about it. But the deal wasn’t worth it. I’d get the same money with Aberdeen without the hassle. Aberdeen was my team even though I later went to Rangers. Aberdeen is still my team. All my life.’ Cooper’s departure was no surprise; his contract had expired and he had declined to sign a new one. What Aberdeen had not anticipated was the impact the World Cup would have on their season.

  Jim Leighton and Willie Miller played in all three games in Mexico, Alex McLeish played in one, and though Jim Bett was an unused member of the squad he was also there for the duration. By the time they returned, halfway through June, they had been away for more than five weeks. Pre-season training started within a month and Aberdeen were due to play their first friendly, in a suburb of Gothenburg, on 22 July. Travel broadens the mind, and World Cups inflate footballers. They are playing at the very pinnacle of the game, their actions and words transmitted around the planet and devoured by hundreds of millions of people. Despite the early elimination, the experience of Mexico was one of the highlights of the Aberdeen players’ careers. But the comedown was brutal. Leighton went from the pulsating adrenalin rush of facing Uruguay in Neza to a friendly against Stuttgart in front of only seven thousand at Pittodrie.

  The goalkeeper said: ‘When we came back from Mexico I wanted to leave. I felt I had done everything at Aberdeen. I’d seen Gordon [Strachan] go to Man United, Mark [McGhee] had gone to Hamburg, Eric [Black] had gone to Metz. I had won everything I could win. There was nothing else that I could do. I’d had the taste of playing in Mexico, I learned a lot about myself by playing there, and after that it took me three or four months to get back into enjoying football again. I’d played at a level that was the highest anyone can play at. To come back to pre-season a couple of weeks later was impossible. I wanted to leave but Fergie wouldn’t have let me go.’

  The mood at Pittodrie was further darkened by the realisation that Frank McDougall was in serious trouble with a back injury. He had first suffered with it around the time of the Scottish Cup final and over the summer it became worse. An appearance as a late substitute in the second game of the season, at home to Hibs, turned out to be the last match of his career. Months of treatment and examinations culminated with a doctor telling him he would never play again. The news was delivered on his twenty-ninth birthday. McDougall delivered the best pound-for-pound return of all Ferguson’s signings, with forty-four goals in seventy-five games. The previous season, his partnership with Black had yielded thirty-five goals. Suddenly the team had neither of them. It soon showed. After ten league games Aberdeen had won only four times and were sixth in the Premier Division. They went out of the League Cup to Celtic in September, and out of the European Cup Winners’ Cup in October, losing 4–2 on aggregate to the Swiss team, Sion. The evidence of decline was impossible to miss: four years earlier they had beaten Sion 11–1 en route to Gothenburg.

  These defeats came as major shocks to the club, not least because Ferguson had returned from Mexico intent on shaking things up. Before going away he had told his assistant, Willie Garner, to draw up a schedule for pre-season training and to persuade John Hewitt to sign a new contract (which he did). As soon as Ferguson was back he asked Garner to come and see him at the stadium. Garner remembered: ‘He said, “Bring your pre-season plan and we’ll have a meeting in the morning.” So I come in and he suddenly goes, “I’ve got something to tell you, it’s the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do in my life.” I thought, “Oh, where are we going with this?” He said he was taking Archie Knox back as co-manager and there wasn’t a position for me. I said, “Seriously?” There was no discussion. I wasn’t on a contract so I was out the door. I had to sign on for unemployment money the following morning. That was hard to take. I thought we were doing well, the club was moving in the right direction, but he just wanted Archie back. Today I can look back on the whole period with real pride. Three years with a guy like that, it’s a life experience.’ Ferguson felt Garner was too young and easy-going to continue as his assistant and that his closeness to some of the older players, his old team-mates, made it difficult to assert his authority. Garner disagreed but the boss’s decision was final.

  Knox had been part of the Scotland backroom team in Mexico. He had still been the manager of Dundee while he was on World Cup duty, as he had been for the two-and-a-half years since Ferguson had given him his blessing to leave and become a boss in his own right. Six days after the Uruguay game the pair of them stood side-by-side in the Pittodrie boardroom. They were presented as ‘co-managers’, not that anyone was fooled by that. ‘This is a relationship we know works,’ said Ferguson.

  Aberdeen’s main summer signing was the Dundee midfielder Bobby Connor, to whom Ferguson had given a Scotland debut in April. Between the Sion games he paid another Swiss club, Neuchatel Xamax, £215,000 for the former Dundee United striker Davie Dodds. Back in May Ferguson had sat with the Scottish press pack in Los Angeles and catalogued the key players he had lost over the previous six years: the five he name-checked were Steve Archibald, Gordon Strachan, Mark McGhee, Eric Black and Neale Cooper. ‘I have something like a million pounds available for new men coming to Pittodrie,’ he said. In the summer of 1986 £1 million sounded like a lot of money in football. A couple of months earlier it would have sounded like headline news. But by the time he briefed them in LA, Ferguson, who had been such a gift to the press over the last eight years, had a rival for their attention. All of a sudden the story was not the Aberdeen manager and his budget. It was Rangers, the charismatic young leader they had just appointed, and what already looked like an open-chequebook policy to go out and hunt down any player they wanted. The 1985–86 season had been particularly wretched for Rangers, even by the standards of the dismal early 1980s. For the only time in their history they lost more league games than they won. They struggled to finish even fifth in the table, went out of Europe and the Scottish Cup in the first rounds and lost to Hibs in the League Cup. Their crowds were dwindling. Years of mediocrity had pushed them towards irrelevance.

  On Tuesday, 8 April deliverance arrived. ‘Souness is to take over at Ibrox’ said the Glasgow Herald on its front page. Rangers had sacked Jock Wallace and flown in Souness from his Italian club, Sampdoria, to take over as player-manager. It was impossible to miss the significance. Souness was box office. Handsome, tanned and fit, he looked ready for anything. He bought instant international profile and prestige, and most realised he would not have agreed to move if Rangers intended to limp along at the same level of investment they had allowed J
ohn Greig and Wallace. This was an unmistakable declaration of intent. The writers were briefed that Rangers would be pursuing bigger and more expensive targets than Scottish football had seen. Rangers were at last waking up to their potential to make millions from bigger crowds, sponsorship, corporate hospitality, advertising and merchandise. Souness was to be the figurehead for a new era. ‘One has the feeling that things are about to take off at Ibrox again after the lean years,’ wrote Jim Reynolds in the Glasgow Herald.

  When he was presented to the media, Souness went through the obligatory question-and-answer session about whether he had been given the freedom to sign Catholics. ‘How could I possibly be in this job if I had been told I could not sign a Catholic? I am married to one. Do you think I could go home in the evening if I was under such a restriction?’ This was significant, but the biggest story was about money. ‘I would like to think that in my time at the club players with the class of Michel Platini and the likes would be happy to come here. Rangers are as big as Manchester United, certainly bigger than Liverpool or Everton, Arsenal or Tottenham. At the moment, all I can promise the fans is that I will bring quality players to the club.’

  The line was a familiar one, but from Souness it sounded different. The Scottish transfer record stood at £450,000, when Celtic signed Mo Johnston from Watford two years earlier. Within two months Souness had smashed that to land goalkeeper Chris Woods from Norwich City. Another two months later he broke it again to bring Terry Butcher from Ipswich. There was an unsuccessful £500,000 bid to take Richard Gough from Dundee United, too. Not only were the signings expensive, they brought a calibre of player who would previously have considered it unthinkable to move to Ibrox over one of the big English clubs. Woods was twenty-six and a regular in the England squad. At twenty-seven, Butcher was an even bigger international name, and at the peak of his career. When Rangers began their season at Hibs four players–Souness himself, Woods, Butcher and striker Colin West, signed from Watford for £180,000–had been added to the previous season’s unimpressive squad. Hibs beat them and Souness was sent off for a crude tackle. The setback was only temporary. They beat Celtic in the season’s first Old Firm game and after eight league matches had reached ten points, the same as Aberdeen.

  Souness knew the New Firm remained a major obstacle to Rangers’ ambitions. Butcher said: ‘When he signed us he outlined the fact he didn’t like any other team in Scotland. Particularly Aberdeen, particularly Celtic, particularly Dundee United.’ On 27 September Ibrox hosted what turned out to be the only meeting between Ferguson’s Aberdeen and Souness’s Rangers. The dynamic between the two men at the World Cup had been complicated and unique. Ferguson was Souness’s manager and had exercised his right to drop him, even though Souness was his captain. At the same time they were rivals, simultaneously plotting signings and how to beat each other in the coming months. They even shared a right-hand man. Walter Smith was Ferguson’s assistant for Scotland and Souness’s for Rangers.

  For almost three-and-a-half years Aberdeen had not lost a game at Ibrox. But a new Rangers was stirring and that September clash became symbolic. ‘Britain’s most attractive-looking fixture of the day,’ wrote the Glasgow Herald. The crowd was the biggest in Britain that day, too. The stadium was packed with just over 40,000 fans, all but 3,000 of them roaring on Rangers. The first half was cagey. Rangers tried to make the running but Aberdeen were calm and resolute. It was tight, and the breakthrough did not come until five minutes into the second half. Souness drove a low shot which hit the post and rebounded into the net off Jim Leighton’s head. Ibrox was euphoric. Aberdeen still posed a threat but the momentum was against them. ‘Now in outstanding form, Rangers poured down on Aberdeen,’ wrote Alan Davidson in the Evening Times. Nine minutes from time Ally McCoist scored a second from a swift counter-attack. He looked offside when he collected a pass from Robert Fleck and tapped the ball into the net, but referee Jim Duncan let the goal stand. Aberdeen crowded the linesman at the halfway line. Leighton, McLeish, Miller, Weir, Bett and Connor were all in the official’s face. Even Knox joined in until he was led back to the dug-out by a policeman. McCoist had been playing against Aberdeen since 1983 and never previously scored against them: ‘I remember Leighton chasing the linesman halfway down the park that day screaming that the goal was offside. Willie with his face tripping him, Alex no’ happy. I’m thinking, “Fucking hell, you can’t grudge me a goal at last, you miserable bastards!”’

  Another flashpoint came in the directors’ box when Aberdeen director Ian Donald was butted. He had asked a nearby Rangers supporter to sit down after the second goal. Donald played down the incident and chose not report it to police. The game finished 2–0.

  Celtic may have been the reigning champions at the time, but Aberdeen had been the dominant team of the previous five years. Now, suddenly, Rangers threatened to undo them. Terry Butcher can still remember the edge to the atmosphere that day: ‘Aberdeen was the big game. It was the whole hostility of Aberdeen against Rangers. You thought to yourself, “What the hell have I walked into here? Jesus Christ”. I was used to some rivalries down south but never as intense as that. There was a nastiness about the Aberdeen fixture, from history, and it seemed to get even nastier. To beat Aberdeen showed how far Souness had taken Rangers straight away. I can still feel a tingle now. When we played Aberdeen it was a war, a bloody war.’

  The significance of the win was immediately obvious to McCoist: ‘That day at Ibrox was a massive, massive result because Souness really wanted to win that one. We were just starting to take over. It was obvious Aberdeen weren’t going to go down without a fight because that had been instilled in them by Fergie. It was like we were the new kids coming on to their block and Aberdeen were probably a little bit like a boxer who had had one fight too many.’

  The game was covered on STV by the experienced broadcaster Jock Brown, whose journalistic instincts kicked in. ‘There was still the story about supposed bad blood between Fergie and Souness over the World Cup. So at the end of the game the producer says to me, “What interviews should we try for?” and I said, “There’s only one interview to go for: the two of them together.” He says to me, “Oh, you’ll never get that, it’ll never happen.” I told him, “Well, I’ll never know unless I ask.”’ Brown approached the dressing rooms, having devised a mind game of his own. He told Ferguson that Souness had already agreed to the interview–and then fed Souness the same line. ‘It worked. I got them both in front of a camera and the opening question was, “Well, the whole world will be astonished to see the pair of you standing side by side here after the World Cup, what are relations like between you?” I used to get told that when you interview like that you would get two minutes, maybe two-and-a-half, and then there’d be a guy in your ear saying, “Right, wrap it up”. That day we went for seven minutes. And they showed every word.’

  The two managers stood on the Ibrox pitch in front of Brown. Ferguson was in a suit and red tie, Souness in an open-neck shirt and a Rangers club blazer. The body language was fascinating: when one of them was talking to Brown, the other would look away into the distance. Otherwise they seemed relaxed. When they discussed the offside goal Ferguson even gave Souness a playful nudge. Souness was first to take the question about whether there was bad blood between them because of Ferguson’s decision at the World Cup. ‘That’s a nonsense. Alex came to me and spoke about it at the time. I disagreed and wasn’t happy about not playing in the last game, but he was the manager and I had to accept that. We got on great before that and we get on great now. It makes good reading for people to write about vendettas and us not getting on. It’s a nonsense.’ Then Ferguson took his turn: ‘You do get fed up reading, “This is going to be Graeme Souness’s revenge match”. It is nonsense. Graeme will now appreciate even more so that when you make decisions you hurt yourself too. People forget that. Life is too short for the likes of Graeme and me to be thinking and talking about revenge.’

  When Ferguson looked at Souness
he no longer saw the captain he had dropped in Neza; he saw the threat posed by a 33-year-old player-manager with the resources to assemble the most formidable domestic force Scotland had seen for a generation. Since 1978 Ferguson had taken on the remnants of Rangers’ treble winners, championship-winning Celtic sides led by Billy McNeill and Davie Hay, vibrant Dundee United teams under the inspirational leadership of Jim McLean, and the powerful unit who had helped Hearts become a major challenger. But none of them had possessed Souness’s clout in the transfer market.

  Jim Leighton could sense the awakening of a sleeping giant at Ibrox: ‘Aberdeen and Dundee United changed the face of Scottish football because we weren’t scared of going to Glasgow and winning. As soon as Souness went to Rangers the whole thing changed again because they were throwing money at it. We weren’t the same force after that and United weren’t the same force. It was about them having an aura again. Souness changed the face of Scottish football.’

  Rangers had already beaten Celtic, the league champions, but defeating Aberdeen that day was seen as the evidence that they were back. IBROX MEN PASS THEIR BIGGEST TEST, said the Evening Times headline. ‘It took a side of all the class and experience of Aberdeen to prove that Rangers have turned the corner and moved on to a route leading to true prosperity,’ wrote Alan Davidson. Ferguson was gracious in defeat, but keen to emphasise Aberdeen’s poor luck. It had taken ‘a shot in a million’ and a ‘very controversial’ late goal to beat them, he said, and Jim Bett had been outstanding in midfield. He had also watched the Rangers players’ reaction at full-time: hugging each other, clenched fists pumping the air, arms aloft to their jubilant supporters. Ferguson spun this as a compliment to his own team’s mighty reputation.