The Courier & Advertiser (Perth and Perthshire Edition)
‘The deal was done’ over Dundee clubs’ merger
Documentary to reveal how close city came to having one football club
The night a “deal was done” for the two Dundee football clubs to merge will be revisited in a BBC documentary tonight.
Scotland’s Game reveals how arrangements – right down to the strip the merged team would wear – had been agreed before a last minute fall-out put paid to the plan.
The programme also features Maurice Malpas and Jim McInally, two of the big names from Dundee United’s glory years under Jim McLean.
McLean drove a ‘corner shop’ club, as he called it, to the heights of European football – and had ambitious plans to swallow up his city rivals in 1999.
Roger Mitchell, ex-chief executive of the SPFL, said: “People don’t remember, or certainly some people don’t want to remember, that that deal was done.”
Maurice Malpas described how young United players who did not come up to scratch were taught a tough lesson by senior members of the squad.
He tells the programme: “I played reserve team football at 15, against men. Now, physically, you couldn’t handle it, but mentally you grew stronger, and you grew stronger quicker. We had experienced players who literally would punch you, if you weren’t doing the right things.
“There was none of this mollycoddling, you got a whack. You either grew up or shipped out – it’s as simple as that.”
Jim McInally, who played beside Malpas, says the manager strengthened the bond between the players.
He tells the documentary: “Something I always think was paramount to our success was, Jim McLean had a policy that we all stayed within eight miles of the city. We would socialise with each other quite a lot. Our wives were close. We were a close bunch of guys.
“We trained a lot – we were really fit – even Christmas day we could train because we all stayed here.”
The opening episode of Scotland’s Game, I Play for Money, is on BBC1 Scotland at 9pm.