Connections - Scotland 1

There have been connections between Tottenham and Scotland since the clubs earliest days. It might surprise some that Scotland although never making too much impact at international level have produced over the years a steady stream of top class players. Up to a few years ago every English club had one or two Scots in their ranks. Tottenham had three in their great Double winning side. In this series we will explore some of the links with our friends ‘north of the boarder.’

Our first fixture with a Scottish club was in 1901 when we met Hearts at White Hart Lane. That meeting has been discussed previously (1). After those two games we played Queens Park in
1903 (2). Over the years fourteen of our players have played for the country.  This figure includes Sandy Brown, who played one game for his country but the game was later deleted from the records. The reason for this will also be covered later in the series.

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The first of these (after Brown) was Dave Mackay when he earned the first of his eighteen caps as a Spur in April 1959 in the game V England. This is quite surprising considering the large number of Scots who have featured for the club. It can be partly explained by the “Anglo’s.”  For many years any Scottish player moving south was branded a traitor (4) and considered ‘an Anglo.’ Even though the Scottish FA held trial games between home players and English based players it was extremely diffident for an Anglo to break into the Scottish national team. This may seem one of those unproved beliefs but it has been documented over the years and the SFA and their National Football Museum have both accepted that this did in fact occur.

The Tottenham player with the most caps for the country is Colin Calderwood (top)  with 33 Caps. His first coming in March 1995, his last three years later. In that time the defender scored one goal for Scotland V San Marino in his second game. He later captained his country. Colin spent six years with Spurs as a player signing in 1993. He played 200 times for the club in league and cup competitions scoring seven times (5).  Joining us from Swindon, he later played for Aston Villa and Nottingham Forest. Colin was in the Scottish squads for Euro 1996 and the World Cup two years later. He later managed Northampton and Nottingham forest winning promotion with both teams after starting his coaching career with Spurs youth teams. He has also managed Hibernian. Colin’s career got off to a strange start. When he left Scotland he played for Mansfield Town before joining Swindon. He had just turned 17 when he made his debut. It then emerged that his registration papers were still being held by his junior ream in Scotland who had not forwarded them and Mansfield had two points deducted for fielding an ineligible player.

The other Scots to score for their country whilst at Spurs are, Alan Gilzean with 8, Dave Mackay 4,  Steve Archibald 3, Gordon Durie 2, John White and Alan Brazil1 each.  

Left - Alan Gilzean in his Dundee days. Not sure who the sheep are.

Tottenham’s first competitive meeting with Scottish clubs came in 1953 in the Coronation Cup when we traveled north for the competition (3).

In 1964 Tottenham returned to the country (for the first time in six years) when they were invited to play in the Glasgow Charity Cup, three weeks before our domestic season started. This competition ran from 1877 - 1966.

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It started as a knockout competition but for the last four years of its existence a team from England was invited to compete in a one off game for the trophy. They would play a Glasgow XI made up of players from all the teams in the city. This according to several records is the only time that players from Rangers and Celtic played on the same side (outside of internationals). Glasgow beat Tottenham 4-2  at Hampden Park in front of 58,768 (6).  Spurs had Scots, Brown, Mackay and Robertson in a full strength team. Saul and Robertson scoring for Tottenham. One source informs me that no programme was issued for this game which would appear strange. Before kick off there was a minutes silence for John White who had died a few weeks before. 

A few little facts to show how the Scottish influence (and football transfers) has changed over the years. We had five Scots in the team that won the FA Cup in 1901 including manager John Cameron. When Brazil played Scotland in London in 2011, Spurs had one player in the Scottish side (Hutton) and two in the Brazilian (Gomes and Sandro). It was not until the 1930’s that Spurs fielded a league side without a Scot being included. Tottenham have had three Scottish managers, more than any other country other than England. They are Cameron, Peter McWilliams (7) and George Graham.
  COYS
Keith Harrison.
t- Keith 16024542
f- peter shearman (old non de plume)



Notes - 1 - Spurs and the World Club Championship.
2 - The connections with Queens Park will be featured later in this series.
3 - Hotspur Towers - Coronation Cup
4 - In Hotspur Towers - Glasgow Rangers, we reveal how our players were treated when we met them in competitive action. This will be published tomorrow.
5 - Stats from Bob Goodwin, The Complete Record.
6 - A number of sources put the score at 4-3 but studying the match reports confirm it was 4-2
7 - Hotspur Towers - Tottenham and the Roaring 20’s series. 

Thank you also - THFC, BBC, League Managers Association, my football facts, Scottish football historical archive, the University of Sterling. Glasgow Herald. Patrick Thistle a history,