nothing better than having a snigger at the Ibrox Disaster - is running a
poll/survey/competition as to who is the greatest ever Scottish football
manager. Unbelievably at time of writing this apology for objective
journalism actually has Celtic's Willie Maley ahead of the daddy of them
all. I refer of course to the one and only William Struth.
Now Maley might have been many things to many Celtic-minded people and he
may have been in charge of some successful Celtic teams. But only the most
deranged person who delights in shielding from reality could argue that
Maley's light switch went to anything other than remotely dim immediately
Bill Struth arrived on the scene as Rangers manager.
Without further ado lets look at the facts.
In the 19 full seasons from 1920/21 (Struth became manager at Ibrox in May
1920 following the tragic death of William Wilton) through to the end of
season 1938/39, Rangers (and therefore Struth) won the Championship of
Scotland FOURTEEN times. Celtic and Maley chipped in with just FOUR.
Motherwell breaking the Old Firm monopoly in season 31/32.
Given that the League Championship is the only game in town and always has
been in football worldwide, there basically is no contest here of which to
speak of. Struth leaves Maley for dead. It is not up for debate. In fact
it must be rather embarrassing for any Celtic fan to claim otherwise.
Although how you can embarrass the masters of self delusion is another
matter altogether.
But we're nothing if not fair-minded here at FF, so let's look at how they
faired against each other in the other domestic head to heads. In the same
period Rangers won the Scottish Cup 6 times and so did the yahoos. Three of
Celtic's Scottish Cup triumphs were won in the period between Struth taking
over at Ibrox and the Scottish Cup hoodoo-bursting year of 1928. To be fair
to Celtic and Maley here, it was scarcely their fault that Rangers could win
everything else in sight domestically, except Scotland's premier Cup
competition.
However the Scottish Cup was as near as it gets to parity for Maley in his
personal duels with Struth.
In both the Glasgow and Glasgow Charity Merchants Cups Rangers once again
clearly led the way.
Of 19 Glasgow Cups competed for over the period Rangers lifted it on ELEVEN
occasions compared to Celtic's SIX.
The Glasgow Charity Cup yielded the same amount of triumphs with another
ELEVEN wins in the period against SIX for Celtic.
So that means in 76 domestic trophies competed for in the period between
1920 - 1939 Struth won 42 against Maley's rather meagre 22. I'll repeat
again. Maley just simply wasn't in Struth's league.
Then there was their league head to heads.
Thirty-eight league tussles between the sides over the period saw Rangers
emerge with the spoils on TWENTY occasions against Celtic's SIX. This
included Maley going FOURTEEN years (1921-35) without a league victory at
Ibrox. TEN years without a Ne'erday victory (1928 - 1938) and SEVEN
straight seasons (1920/21 - 26/27) without a win in his ain midden.
That was then followed up by another SIX barren seasons. (1931/32 -
1936/37) Is that a Maley I see in your back pocket, Mr Struth?
Of course there were other differences in standards of behaviour that set
Struth apart from his OF counterpart. Even now 70 odd years down the line
it beggars belief that Maley was never taken to task for his bitter, twisted
barb aimed at Sam English at the official Accident Enquiry of October 15th
1931into the tragic death of John Thomson. In fact as poison goes, Maley's
remark stands out in clear relief as to what lurks behind the fevered brows
of the Celtic-minded.
Of course the bigots who would defend Maley here would try and paint the
homely little picture that Maley was under particular stress at losing his
star goalkeeper. But given the fact that John Thomson's family apportioned
no blame whatsoever to the hapless Sam English, then the notion that Maley
was somehow under more pressure than Thomson's family is totally
preposterous.
Of course it wasn't just Northern Ireland Protestants who were victims of
Maley's malice. Even his own came under attack if the situation demanded
it. And even sometimes if it did not. The quite shameful way he treated
Jimmy McGrory, probably the greatest Celt in their first half a century of
existence, gives us another quite telling insight into Maley's character.
Let's see now, trying to sell McGrory to Arsenal behind his back coming home
from a visit to Lourdes of all places was bad enough in itself. But the way
he treated his charge when he refused to leave Celtic was something else
altogether. First of all he made sure McGrory lagged behind other less
talented Celtic players when it came to wages. And there is another
charming wee story of how Maley refused to acknowledge McGrory (by this time
Kilmarnock boss) after his team had knocked Celtic out of the Scottish Cup
in 1938. Just an all round good guy was oor Wullie.
The stories regarding Struth are legion. My particular favourites are of
him as an old man him hiding the match ball in Lisbon in 1948 before handing
it to George Young just before kick-off. You see he knew that the
Portuguese were scheming to get rid of all the regulation British match
balls which was a stipulation of the friendly v Benfica going ahead in the
first place. On the morning of the match Benfica officials had declared
that all the British balls had mysteriously disappeared overnight. Struth
said nothing and bided his time until the match was about to start. Okay it
might not sound much, but Struth was getting on by this time. So just how
fly would he have been in his heyday?
Then there was the one of The SFA sending Rangers the bill back to Ibrox
because Tory Gillick had ordered the works in a hotel whilst representing
Scotland in an inter league fixture down in England. The Guv'nor promptly
sent it back with a wee note telling the authorities that if they couldn't
keep and treat Rangers players in the style to which they were accustomed
then don't pick them at all. The bill was never seen again. No one and I
mean no one dictated to Rangers under Bill Struth.
Perhaps my favourite anecdote though concerns Struth when he took over as
chief trainer at Clyde back somewhere around 1908. The Clyde legend, Mattha
Gemmell, was already working at Shawfield at this time and he was worried
that Struth naturally would bring in his own men.
Struth however knew what Clyde meant to Gemmell and offered him the job as
assistant trainer to him. Thing is the money on offer at Shawfield wasn't
enough for Gemmell who also worked full time in a local factory. Regards
Gemmell's affection for the Bully Wee, there is the famous story of another
Scottish club asking him to become their manager. Gemmell said yes, but
only on one condition. That he was allowed to go and watch Clyde every
Saturday!
Struth then struck a deal with Gemmell. Athletic meetings at some football
stadiums during the summer were popular back then and what Struth did was
share all the takings from these meetings 50/50 with Gemmell. This extra
money allied to the wages on offer meant that Gemmell could then quit his
day job and devote himself full time to Clyde, which he did for the best
part of the next half a century. The simple fact of the matter here is that
Struth as trainer was fully entitled to keep all the gate money for himself,
it was one of the perks of the job. But that wasn't his style. Bill Struth
had the human touch all right, and don't let anyone say otherwise.
Struth and Gemmell were to have a friendship that was to last a lifetime and
in fact on Clyde's very first visit to Ibrox after the Boardroom coup of
1947, Rogers Simpson took Gemmell away to the boardroom and explained why
the coup had happened. Gemmell took the secrets of that meeting to the
grave.
So there you go, some people would tell you, would have you believe that
Bill Struth and Maley were great rivals. Contemporaries they may have been
but as rivals go this was strictly Ali v Richard Dunn.
The way both men finished with their respective clubs is also significant.
Maley was sacked on Ne'erday 1940 and was so full of recrimination and
bitterness that it is said that he never set foot back in Celtic Park.
Struth on the other hand stepped down as boss in 1954 (possibly should have
stepped down sooner) and stayed on as a Director of the club until his death
in 1956.
Ladies and gentlemen. I humbly suggest that Bill Struth is not just the
greatest manager that Scotland has ever had, but football worldwide. The
fact that today nearly 50 years down the line from his death, Celtic minded
journalists working to their own agenda are trying so very hard to belittle
his achievements rather proves the point.
I'll also leave you with the words of John Rafferty in his book 'One Hundred
Years of Scottish Football' - ³Rangers in those years of success were a
wonderfully functional team. As great players moved on others came in. Bob
McPhail, Dougie Gray, Tully Craig, Sandy Archibald, Jimmy Fleming - they
kept a tradition going and added to an over-powering reputation of Rangers
which was becoming fearsome to lesser clubs until it seemed that Scottish
football was being controlled from the marble halls at Ibrox.²
I put it you dear reader that never before or since has one man wielded such
power in the Scottish game. Bill Struth is the greatest manager anywhere.
And he's ours. Enjoy the significance of this man and never, ever forget
his achievements.
Yours in Rangers,
THE GOVANHILL GUB
PS, Maley did get the better of Struth on one occasion and that was when
Celtic won the Empire Exhibition Cup in 1938. I think we can put that
victory down to one fact and one fact alone. Struth's 'wonderfully
functional team' of the early 30s was by then over the hill and the club was
going through a transitional period. Still it would be churlish of us to
deny a strictly second rater (and Maley certainly was compared to Struth)
his 'Crum' of comfort.