No one plays with a smile on their face now. I played to win ...but I enjoyed it too
BARCELONA BEAR DAVE SMITH LIVED THE DREAM EVERY TIME HE WORE SHIRT FOR CLUB HE LOVED
THE remembrance is not all sweet, does not taste exclusively of champagne and triumph. ‘I have made my mistakes in life and I think about them every day,’ says Dave Smith. Later, in an expansive conversation, he remarks of the Ibrox disaster: ‘The boys who played that day will never forget it until the day we die. It is never far from my thoughts. I go every year on the anniversary to the memorial in Markinch to the five lads who died.’
Smith is known and rightly feted for his role in the 1972 European Cup-Winners’ Cup final when Rangers defeated Dynamo Moscow but he is, in essence, a Rangers man, a character who has withstood the buffeting of life at 78 but holds the club he loves close. There is pronounced victory in his CV but there is also poignancy.
‘It was my oldest brother, Jim, who took me to Rangers. I would go to see them at Pittodrie and then at Ibrox,’ says the Aberdonian who followed on.
Jim died, aged 26, before his younger brother signed for Rangers. ‘I go back to George Young days. My brother loved Rangers. I told him I would play for Rangers one day but he died in 1963.’
Smith, a cultured and elegant player who could and did play in central defence or midfield, signed for Rangers in 1966.
Of his lost brother, he says: ‘Nowadays, he would have been given a transplant. But then…
‘He had damaged valves. He would have loved to have played football at the top level. We all played,’ he says, referring to his brothers Doug, a legend at Dundee United, and Hugh, who played for Forfar Athletic and Morton.
‘But Jim had to stop and have a rest. He never found out the problem until he tried to join the RAF. He was turned down and later died. But Rangers? It all came from him.’
It has been a strong bond. Smith now travels down from Angus on a Fraserburgh supporters’ bus named after him. How does that feel? ‘I don’t like to think of it that way,’ he says of the obvious tribute. ‘I just want to say the boys are very good to me.’ He will be in Seville next week. ‘I am still very much a Rangers supporter,’ he insists. ‘Football has changed but in many ways I have not. I love football, I loved playing it. The one thing that annoys me is that so few play now with a smile on their face. I know it is a serious business and I played to win. But I enjoyed it, too.’ His career had its knocks. He was part of the side that lost to Berwick Rangers in the Scottish Cup in 1967 and then to Bayern Munich in extra time of the European CupWinners’ Cup later in that season. ‘We lost that final at Berwick,’ he says. ‘If George McLean or Jim Forrest had been in that side against Bayern, we would have won in 90 minutes.’ Both had been moved on in the wake of the Berwick humiliation. He is not overly emotional about the triumph in Barcelona. He talks calmly and accurately of the road to the final and the events of the night but when pressed for one memory that stays with him from a glorious career, he states simply: ‘One memory? To be quite honest with you, every time I pulled a shirt over my head. I always say Barcelona was just another game to me. I just loved playing. I would love to play tomorrow. ‘People just don’t realise how important it is to pull on a Rangers jersey. ‘There are 50,000 at Ibrox every second week and every one of them would do anything to put on that jersey even once.’ Many will be unaware in the Sandy Jardine Stand that a hero of Barcelona is among them. ‘Aye, that’s where my season ticket is,’ he says. ‘It’s nice when people remember you but I am not one for a great fuss. I am there to see the football, watch Rangers.’
It is notable that he sits in a stand named after a team-mate. ‘Aye, I think of that,’ he says. ‘It’s very sad. Sandy would have been the last person you would have thought would have died early…’
These reflections are not elaborated upon. He brushes away a further invitation to examine the past and his thoughts.
‘It’s just good to remember how great a game it is,’ he offers. ‘I played Junior football into my forties, five-a-sides into my seventies. I left Rangers too soon because I simply wanted to play every week. But I don’t regret a moment at Rangers. I am proud to have played for the club.’
It is the simple, authentic statement of the Rangers man.
THERE were others. Smith played alongside a team of legends but he also had a close relationship with three of the great Rangers men: Willie Waddell, Jock Wallace and John Greig.
It was Waddell who managed Rangers to triumph in Barcelona and who led the club after the tragedy of January 2, 1971, when 66 fans died.
‘He was the right man for Rangers at the right time,’ he says. ‘If Waddell had not been there after the Ibrox disaster, I do not know what way the club would have gone. He made sure we went to the funerals, encouraged us to talk to the survivors and the families. He rebuilt the stadium with his drive.’
This recollection brings him back to Barcelona ’72. ‘Waddell told us we should be doing it for the people who were not here,’ he says. ‘We didn’t need an incentive but it added to it.’
He is more light-hearted when he recalls a favourite anecdote of his time with Waddell. ‘I had broken my leg and stood at the bottom of the staircase at Ibrox and asked him if I could have two tickets for the game on the Saturday.
‘He said: “Complimentary tickets are for those who are playing. Are you playing?”
‘I replied: “Look at me. I have a cast up to the top of my thigh. Do I look as if I am playing”.’
Waddell later sent an emissary to Smith with two tickets. ‘I told him where to stick them,’ says Smith. The story tells much about the stubbornness of both personalities. ‘He wanted to show who was boss,’ says Smith. ‘And that’s understandable. I had no real problem with that.’
The other tale concerns the day the Rangers players decided to join the union and sent Greig, the captain, and Smith, the vicecaptain, to inform Waddell.
‘There was a light outside his door. It was red. You pressed a button and had to wait until the light had gone green before you entered. So we go in and tell him what the players have decided.
‘He looked at us over his specs and said: “You’re not joining a union”. That was it, that was the end of the story.’
He adds: ‘I had huge respect for him. You could argue with him but you couldn’t win. He did stand up for us in other ways, though.’
His relationship with Wallace has been dogged by rumours of a rift, particularly as Smith left for Arbroath in 1974 under his watch.
‘People seem to think I fell out with Jock but I was actually very friendly with him,’ he explains. ‘I used to babysit for him, so that doesn’t suggest any bad feeling. I didn’t agree with the way he wanted to play football but, as a manager, you can’t knock him. Look at what his Rangers teams won.’
The departure of Smith can be traced to the signing of Tom Forsyth. ‘Jock told me Tom couldn’t play in midfield and could he go back into defence with me being shifted into midfield. I told him that as long as I was playing, I didn’t mind.’
Smith, though, was perceived not to be physical enough in the centre of the park. ‘I couldn’t play like that,’ says Smith of an invitation to kick things other than the ball. ‘So I was dropped,’
Smith was also very close to Greig, the Greatest Ever Ranger, when they played together. ‘I have never been one to say this player is better than this yin. I will say this about John, though. He was a good man to have in your team. He gave everything he had. He was
also a better football player than some realise. I played against him at Pittodrie once and the ball came over inside the box. John flicked it over my head and volleyed it into the top corner before I could move.
‘So he was skilful but he was an excellent captain who led from the front. He probably shouldn’t have played in the final in Barcelona as he had an injury but nothing was going to stop him and he launched into a tackle in the first minute. He crushed the boy. He always went for it.’
So, of course, did Smith, whose elegance could not disguise a teak-hard will to win. ‘That was the great joy of Barcelona,’ he says. ‘We won.’
And the medal? ‘It’s with one of my grandsons. His dad supports Rangers and so does he.’ The lineage of Rangers men stretches through the generations.
‘the road to Barcelona’ by Dave Smith is published by Arena Sport (£14.99).