The forgotten story of ... Willie Johnston

[pete 2,499]

Sent home from Argentina '78 and escorted from the pitch at gunpoint — the silky left winger will be remembered for all the wrong reasons

 

 

No matter how great a player used to be, it seems the bad usually outweighs the good in the memory. Diego Maradona is remembered more for the Hand of God than anything specific he ever did with his feet. Eric Cantona will always be defined by that leap into the crowd at Selhurst Park, catalyst for the modern Manchester United or not. And Graeme Souness, a sublime all-round midfielder, perhaps the greatest in British history, is now usually painted as the wild thug who rammed his studs into Steaua Bucharest's Iosif Rotariu's special parcel, rather than the man who delicately set up the 1978 European Cup for Liverpool.

 

Then there's Willie Johnston, fated to go down in history for one thing: failing a drug test while representing Scotland at the 1978 World Cup. Which is a terrible shame as it misrepresents everything about Johnston: mainly because he was one of the fastest and most skilful left wingers of the era, still the only Scottish player to score twice in a European final, but also because the drugs bust, the result of an innocent misunderstanding, skews his status as a bona fide bad-boy hero whose scrapes with The Man would become legion and legendary.

 

Johnston's career started with a bang: in only his fifth first-team game for Rangers he was one of the stars in a 2–1 win over Celtic in the 1964-65 League Cup final. Immediately afterwards there were the first signs that Johnston might prove troublesome to handle. The Rangers manager, Scot Symon, had promised his team a £500-per-head bonus if they won the trophy, but Johnston later found there was only an additional £50 in his wage packet. When he approached his boss over the matter, Symon explained that "too much money can turn a boy's head". He also offered him a piece of sage advice: steer clear of Jim Baxter. Some chance, Baxter, a fellow resident of Fife, had already taken Johnston under his wing. And, after Symon's wage chicanery, he had taken the 17-year-old to a hotel bar and bought the him a couple of beers.

 

The following season would see Johnston win his first caps for Scotland and lift the Scottish Cup, but Celtic's period of total domestic dominance was about to get under way and Rangers would win nothing else for five seasons. Johnston, however, would spend the period gaining a reputation for being something of a hothead. By December 1970 he had been sent off five times and banned for a total of 105 days. It was an unprecedented total in Scottish football, especially when juxtaposed with the plight of the former Rangers defender Willie Woodburn, who in the 1950s had been effectively banned for life by the SFA for being sent off twice.

 

"I would get my retaliation in first," he later reasoned. "People were kicking lumps out of us. It wasn't nice. They'd kick you to death. They were hurting you and making sure you were going to stay hurt. Off the ball, high tackles, attempts to break your leg."

 

One of those dismissals saw him sent off in a New York friendly against Fiorentina for not much more than being hacked down. When Johnston refused to leave the pitch, Antonio Rattín-style, a cop came on and drew a revolver on the player. Johnston decided it would be a good time to quell his protests and left quietly.

 

Rangers won the League Cup again in 1970-71, once more beating Celtic. And once more Johnston found himself out of pocket after the match. Johnston had enjoyed a productive game down the left, so much so that at one point no Celtic player went out to meet him on the wing, for fear of being diddled. Johnston decided to sit on the ball and wait, shades of apocryphal stories of his mentor Baxter. Several incensed Celtic players charged in, though to little effect as Johnston retained possession and managed to lay it off to a team-mate. The new Ibrox manager, Willie Waddell, fined him £40 for heaping shame on the club.

 

But Rangers and Johnston had rediscovered the ways of winning trophies, and the next season would see the club's greatest triumph. Rangers had already lost two Cup Winners' Cup finals: the very first edition, in 1961 to Fiorentina, and another to the emerging Bayern Munich of Franz Beckenbauer, Gerd Müller and Sepp Maier in 1967, just one painful week after Celtic had won the European Cup. It would be third time lucky as Rangers romped into a 3–0 lead in the 1972 final against Dynamo Moscow, Johnston scoring two. Dynamo pulled two back but Rangers held on to enjoy some inauspicious celebrations (they were presented with the trophy in the bogs thanks to their fans rampaging on the Camp Nou pitch).

 

It would be his last positive contribution in a Rangers shirt. Early in the next season, Johnston got his retaliation in first yet again, this time flinging a punch at a Partick Thistle defender who happened to be perambulating up and down his hamstrings at the time. The SFA — who had already, if you believe Johnston's version of events today, advised successive Scotland managers not to pick the player since he received a 42-day ban in 1970 — visited a 63-day ban upon the winger. His time in Scotland had become untenable. Several days later he was sold to West Bromwich Albion for an Anglo-Scottish transfer record fee of £138,000.

 

Johnston's antics at the Hawthorns are the stuff of typical Seventies Maverick legend. He once playfully kicked a referee up the arse. He took a swig from a fan's can of beer while waiting to take a corner. And over the course of two matches, he successfully negotiated the purchase of a greenhouse from a supporter stationed near the touchline. But he was rarely in the sort of bother he found himself in up north. In addition, his form was such that by 1977, and with the World Cup finals looming, the Scotland manager, Willie Ormond, was prepared to give him an international recall. "You're the best winger in England," Ormond told Johnston. "I want you in my team but the SFA doesn't want you in the squad. Prove them wrong." Willie would do so by — fatefully — grabbing his chance to go to Argentina the following year under new manager, Ally McLeod, with both hands.

 

What happened at the 1978 World Cup is well documented. After Scotland lost their opening match 3–1 against Peru, Archie Gemmill was asked to supply a urine sample. But Gemmill was severely dehydrated and so Johnston took his place. After filling an unmarked sample tube, Johnston thought nothing more of it. And then his world caved in on itself — he had tested positive for the stimulant Fencamfamin, innocently taken as a constituent part of over-the-counter medicine Reactivan.

 

The story was kept under wraps for a day as Johnston vigorously denied all allegations. "I was in the best form of my life and had no need for artificial stimulants," he says today. "And in any case the Peru match was the worst of my international career, so you could hardly say Reactivan was performance-enhancing."

 

But the gaff was blown live on television by young reporter Trevor McDonald, who approached a speechless Johnston at an official function. "Once the story went public the SFA were unwilling to fight my corner," says Johnston, who to this day remains unhappy with McDonald. Although obviously the SFA ("amateurs") and Fifa ("They were always looking for a drugs scapegoat; if this happened to an English player, or someone from a big country like Italy or Brazil, they would have turned a blind eye at the time") took most of the flak.

 

On his return to Britain, Johnston's life was made a living hell and he soon upped sticks for Vancouver, where he won the 1979 Soccer Bowl with the Whitecaps. He is also fondly remembered in the US for instigating a 20-man brawl against the New York Cosmos, after a clash with the notoriously hot-headed Giorgio Chinaglia; his Vancouver team-mate Alan Ball sat it out in the centre-circle alongside Cosmos defender Franz Beckenbauer.

 

Johnston would eventually head back home, returning first to Rangers, then moving to Hearts. But the final years of his career were dogged by controversy. His most shameful act came during his stint at Ibrox, when he stamped on John McMaster's head; the Aberdeen player needed the kiss of life as a result. "I'm not proud of that," he says today. "It's no excuse but I thought he was Willie Miller. Miller was a great player but he was a hard man and deserved some of his own treatment back. Unfortunately I got the wrong player."

 

Then at Hearts Johnston was sent off for allegedly butting Davie Provan, though he maintains the Celtic man, attempting to impede a throw-in, went down with no contact having been made. As he walked down the tunnel, Johnston got in a "wee altercation" with the Celtic manager, Billy McNeil. In both instances, SFA bans were not long in coming.

 

His final appearance in front of an SFA disciplinary board was, ironically, nothing to do with a red card. Portions of a book Johnston had put out, relating to the Provan incident, had been published in a national newspaper and the SFA mandarins were not happy. Johnston was summoned to state his case and did so — but to no avail. He was fined £200. "You'll all be going to lunch now?" asked Johnston of the panel. "Yes," replied SFA suit Ernie Walker. "Then the wine's on me, you arseholes." Johnston walked out of the room, for once up on the deal — the newspaper serialisation had made him £1,000.

 

Johnston was clearly very far from perfect, a hot-tempered man prone to occasional bursts of serious violence. Then again, he was operating in an era when brutal challenges on the more skilful players was the norm. One wonders whether the likes of Cristiano Ronaldo, Wayne Rooney or Didier Drogba would be able to keep their tempers in check in such a climate. And while other Seventies mavericks such as Rodney Marsh, Stan Bowles and Charlie George are fondly remembered for their swashbuckling styles, it would be a travesty if that era's last forgotten star went down in history simply for taking the wrong pill, the Alain Baxter of football.

 

Sent Off At Gunpoint, the very entertaining story of Johnston's career, is written by Tom Bullimore with Willie Johnston (£17.99, Know the Score)

 

http://www.theguardian.com/football/blog/2008/dec/23/rangers-celtic

 

Great read. I remember Colin Stein getting kicked to pieces as well. He must have been sent off a good few times as well.

[Germinal 27]

Curious description of Barca '72.

 

I can't speak for any other Bluenose but I'll never apologise for the Bears taking on Franco's fascist swine. It's like asking Jesse Owens to apologise for spoiling Adolf's evening when he won the 100m in 1936.

[colinstein 294]

the swigging of the can of beer before taking a corner was when he played for Vancouver. It's on youtube

[jhunter 0]

He was fined £200. "You'll all be going to lunch now?" asked Johnston of the panel. "Yes," replied SFA suit Ernie Walker. "Then the wine's on me, you arseholes." Johnston walked out of the room, for once up on the deal — the newspaper serialisation had made him £1,000.

 

 

they don't make them like Willie any more that is for sure

[alexscottislegend 2,375]

I actually think he had hit his best form at West Brom. He very rarely failed to get in a cross, usually with his left foot, something you can't say for many modern wingers.

[colinstein 294]

He also said they switched Kenny Dalgleish's sample with his.......and he left Rangers because the new contract they offered him was shite. He told them to stick it up their arse.

[Bearman 9]

For a winger he had a smashing goalscoring record...an average of 1 in every 3 games for Rangers. No bad!

[Widget 1]

A legend

 

 

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[SiamBear 0]

A legend

 

 

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One of my all time favourite Rangers.

[Frankie 8,663]

We certainly enjoyed his company at the Gersnet dinner in January....

 

A definite character!