I had to rub my eyes when I saw Rod Stewart carrying a TV set into our hotel in Largs for a bored Denis Law
Tommy Hutchison on his adventures with 1974 Scotland World Cup squad
TOMMY Hutchison did a double take when he saw a rock star walking up the steps of the Scotland team hotel in Largs.
It was only two days before a World Cup qualifier against Czechoslovakia in September 1973, and here was Rod Stewart carrying a new portable TV into the foyer for Denis Law.
‘It was my first time with the squad and it was a sight I didn’t expect to see,’ laughs Hutchison now, at his home in Fife.
‘Willie Ormond was the manager and he wanted us all to take a nap in the afternoon after training. Not many of us could go to sleep as we were still buzzing, so we used to just sit in our rooms getting bored.
‘There was nothing to do in the hotel, no kettles in your room to make a cup of tea, let alone a television to watch.
‘Rod, who was a big mate of Denis, heard about this and bought a TV for him and delivered it himself so Denis didn’t get bored in the afternoons.’
Hutchison, with Coventry at the time, could see why Rod put Law on a pedestal. It wasn’t just because he was a brilliant footballer but because he was one of the game’s true gentlemen.
As witnessed by the Lawman’s reaction to the frosty reception Scotland skipper Billy Bremner gave Hutchison when he first joined up with Ormond’s squad.
‘I played against Leeds a few times with Coventry. Billy would have recognised me from those games and he knew I had been called up,’ says Hutchison.
‘Yet he sat in this big armchair in the hall of the hotel giving the impression he didn’t know who I was. He said: “Tell me, son, who is it you play for?”
‘Denis Law was watching this nonsense and called me over. “Hello there, big man. Pull up a chair and sit with me”.
‘He turned to the waitress walking past and said: “Excuse me, hen, can you get this man a cup of tea when you have a minute please?” He couldn’t have been nicer. A real super player, a gentleman and a real legend.’
Hutchison, then 26, made a famous international debut alongside Law two days later in front of 100,000 fans at Hampden. A 2-1 victory over Czechoslovakia — the winning goal headed home by Joe Jordan — secured qualification for the World Cup in West Germany the following year.
He was part of Ormond’s plans from then on, playing in the Home Internationals and making the famous 1974 World Cup squad eliminated at the group stage despite not losing a game. Hutchison made some lifelong friends during his Scotland adventure and had some fun along the way. It included an incident which has become part of Scottish footballing folklore.
‘Jimmy Johnstone was some guy and one of the funniest moments was when he got in trouble by deciding to go out rowing at Largs,’ says Hutchison, now 75.
‘He was coming back from the pub after the Wales game in the Home Nations. Jimmy found a boat with no oars and sat in it singing Michael Row the Boat Ashore and then for some reason The Man Who Sold the World by David Bowie. The one that was a hit for Lulu.
‘As a joke, Sandy Jardine pushed the boat into the water, thinking it would stay in the shallow bit, but it was taken out by the tide.
‘David Hay and Erich Schaedler went out in another boat to try and rescue him but it sprung a leak and they came back to shore.
‘One of the players came back to our hotel and phoned 999 for the coastguard to rescue Jimmy. Not surprisingly, after that, we had an 11pm curfew and were banned from late-night trips to the pub.’
When Scotland arrived in West Germany, the players thought they had entered a war zone. ‘With members of the Israeli team at the 1972 Olympics in Munich having been killed, security was really tight,’ says Hutchison, who won 17 caps between 1973 and 1975.
‘When we arrived, we walked out of the plane straight on to a bus that was allowed to park at the bottom of the aeroplane steps on the runway.
‘We couldn’t even leave our rooms
There are two players I felt could get past me even if I had them cornered — wee Jinky and Franz Beckenbauer
Thousands welcomed us home. Imagine if we had won the World Cup
to play table tennis without a security guard going with us. David Hay was given a warning for going for a walk on his own one day outside the hotel grounds as the security team feared a sniper could have taken him out.
‘When we took a bus to training, there were security guards with guns on the bus with us and a helicopter circling in the air.’
Before the tournament started, Scotland players took matters into their own hands when they failed to reach a financial agreement to wear Adidas boots at the tournament.
‘Billy Bremner was our chief negotiator as captain, but no deal was reached,’ recalls Hutchison, who also played for Blackpool, Manchester City and Swansea.
‘We felt that was unfair, so we all sneaked into the boot room and unstitched the Adidas stripes and put boot polish over them so it looked like we were wearing black boots with no markings. If we were not getting any money from Adidas, why should anybody know we were wearing their boots?’
In the first game against Zaire in Dortmund, right-footed left winger Hutchison came off the bench in a 2-0 win.
‘I was gutted not to start but competition was intense,’ he says. ‘I had never seen training sessions like it, with the tackles flying in the week leading up to the game.
‘One time, Billy Bremner, who always got stuck in himself, had to pull Joe Jordan and Martin Buchan apart to stop them knocking lumps out of each other. Willie Ormond was worried some of us would be injured in training and miss the World Cup.
‘As for the Zaire game, we should have won by more than just two goals as we were far the better side. I did ask the Zaire full-back for his top at the end but he said they only had one set of jerseys for the whole tournament, so he had to keep it and get it washed.’
Hutchison didn’t feature in the 0-0 draw with Brazil in Frankfurt but had a view from the bench of one of the most agonising misses in Scottish football history.
‘The Brazilian goalie made a save, the ball came out to Billy Bremner but he didn’t have time to react and get his feet right,’ he reflects. ‘The ball hit him on the shin and went just wide. Billy had his head in his hands after it happened — and so did we.
‘I was on the bench alongside Jimmy Johnstone but, if I had been picking the team, I would have started Jimmy as he was such a skilful player. I felt he would have been one of the few players in our squad who could’ve made the most out of the limited possession we were likely to have against Brazil and produce some magic.
‘There are only two players that I have played against who I felt, even if I had them cornered, they would somehow get past me — wee Jimmy and Franz Beckenbauer.’
In his new autobiography, Hutch, Hard Work and Belief, Hutchison reveals that Johnstone refused to go on late in the game against Brazil as a substitute.
He writes: ‘With a few minutes left, Willie Ormond told Jimmy to warm up, but Jimmy refused, saying: “Ah’m no going on there”.
‘I don’t know why he refused. Perhaps he thought that the game, with both teams going hammer and tongs at each other even in the final minutes, was too fast for him.
‘Maybe he felt that, with only two or three minutes left, he wasn’t going to have time to do anything. Whatever the reason, that was his last chance to appear at a World Cup finals gone. If it had been me being asked to go on, I certainly would have.’
The game ended goalless and, with Yugoslavia beating Zaire 9-0, the Scots had to beat the Yugoslavs in their final match to qualify for the knockout stages.
Sadly, it wasn’t to be and, although Hutchison played his part by setting up an equaliser for Jordan with two minutes left, the 1-1 draw wasn’t enough, with
Brazil beating Zaire 3-0. Scotland hadn’t lost a game but were out.
Ormond had a superb team, and they had done the nation proud, but there was an agonising sense among the players of what might have been.
‘Back at the hotel that night, there was plenty of talk,’ Hutchison tells Sportsmail. ‘We all felt that we had been the better team in all three games, possibly just shading the match against Brazil.
‘Looking back, it was our game against Zaire that cost us. We could and should have beaten them by more. We were entertained that night by Lonnie Donegan and Rod Stewart and, when we arrived back at Glasgow Airport, there were thousands of fans to welcome us home. Imagine what the scenes would have been like had we won the thing.
‘From a personal point of view, I was £500 appearance money up and two pairs of blackened-out Adidas boots better off because of the World Cup. Although I had spent a total of only 36 minutes on the pitch, it was an experience that I will always treasure. We never lost a game in the tournament and no other team had that record.’