SIMPLY THE LOST
Day Charlie Adam found Argentina World Cup hero Caniggia wandering helplessly around a Dundee scheme
CHARLIE ADAM and the mean streets of Fintry had never seen the likes before.
Argentina legend Claudio Caniggia, lost and alone, aimlessly wandering around the Dundee housing scheme Adam called home.
That was his bizarre first meeting with the ex-Dens Park striker – as a starstruck teenager asking the World Cup hero for an autograph he still has to this day.
Really, Caniggia should have been the one posing a question – for directions.
Just three years later the pair would be reunited as team-mates at Rangers, although Adam never told him of their initial encounter.
Until now, as the 32-year-old looks forward to seeing the man from Buenos Aires return to Scotland for two special events taking place in his honour next week.
Adam said: “I was growing up in Fintry, I think I was about 14 at the time and playing with my mates one day.
“We were kicking a ball around the streets and saw this man walking around on his own. As we got closer and closer to him we realised who it was but he spoke no English whatsoever.
“I don’t even know how he ended up there but there he was in the street, so I ran to my auntie’s house to grab a piece of paper and got his autograph.
“I still have it now. It’s in my mum’s house with all the rest of my memorabilia. I still collect stuff now.
“It was surreal. I think he was lost. He must have been just out walking around and got lost.
“Fintry is not the kind of place you want to be walking around in the dark. It was quite a rough area as we well know.
“But I feel I was privileged to have the background I had there. It brought me up and made me the person and the player I am now. “I loved being there but I don’t think Caniggia was ever back again. “He disappeared and that was
that. We just left him. I was too busy running around enjoying myself to help him find his way back but he must have got home fine.
“It was amazing and then seeing him sign for Rangers when I was there was incredible. He didn’t remember me and certainly I never mentioned it to him. He still didn’t speak English. “Just being around him at that time with so many great players was wonderful. He loved drinking coffee and had the odd fag now and then as well. But he was a top athlete.” Stoke midfielder Adam was back north of the border on Saturday for Kris Boyd’s testimonial between Kilmarnock and a Rangers legends select. And looking back it’s incredible to think a team-mate of the legendary Diego Maradona should grace Scottish football with his talents. But Adam fears the days of seeing such a superstar like Caniggia signing for a Scottish club are gone.
He said: “It will be difficult to see a guy of that stature here again. He was a world-class player. There are probably only two clubs that could afford it and it will always be difficult now when you have the money in England.
“He affected games and was incredible when he was in Scotland. It would be difficult to see someone as big and global to come in again.
“It was wonderful to have a player like that at Dundee and he wasn’t the only one at that time. They had Georgi Nemsadze, Beto Carranza, Fabrizio Ravanelli, Fabian Caballero, Jonay Hernandez and even Nacho Novo when he was there.
“Dundee fans were living the dream. They got to the Scottish Cup Final and probably should have beaten Rangers that day.
“Of course it all went wrong and unfortunately the club paid for that time with the big salaries they’d been giving out.
“But looking back it was an amazing time to be a Dundee fan. Those were good times.
“Then to work with Caniggia at Rangers was incredible. He was a wonderful talent and seeing how he applied himself when at 34 or 35 was terrific.
“He was still as good as anybody in the club because he looked after himself and was a top player. It’s nice he’s coming back to Scotland and I’m looking forward to hearing the stories of a truly top player.”
● Adam was promoting An Audience with Claudio Caniggia at the Whitehall Theatre, Dundee (Nov 29) and The Record Factory, Glasgow (Nov 30). Tickets from thelongestforty.com.