Skippy is getting ready to hop back Down Under for new start
Scott Mcdonald will pack his bags and leave Scotland next month to finish his playing career in Australia, the land of his birth.
He has been in the UK for the best part of 20 years, and enjoyed good times with the likes of Celtic, Motherwell, Middlesbrough, Dundee United and Partick Thistle.
Before the 35-year-old takes up his new role at Western United in Melbourne, he has taken time out to reflect on his time in the UK.
And the man who had the greatest impact upon that was Gordon Strachan.
He signed the striker for £700,000 from Fir Park in 2007, and it’s fair to say the Hoops got their money’s worth.
The league title he helped win in his first season went some way to paying back Celtic supporters for denying them the flag on Helicopter Sunday in 2005.
It was also Strachan’s third title on the trot, and Mcdonald said: “He was the first manager since Jock Stein to do that and it gets overlooked.
“I think that’s partly because he did not have that Celtic connection to start with. “It disappoints me that he is not held in the same esteem as others. “Not everyone warms to Gordon as a person, and he has had his difficulties in terms of how he comes across in the media.
“But speak to the players who worked under him. If, like me, you had his trust and did well under him, then he was great.
“He used to call me ‘Stephen Hawking’, and chide me with: ‘You think you know everything’.
“Do you know what? He was bang on!
“I had to laugh because it was such a good line. And I believed the majority of what he told me anyway.
“No matter what, his achievements are there in the history books. Three
consecutive titles and twice to the last 16 of the Champions League.
“The Champions League nights stand out for me, of course. They were something special.
“I still feel it on those occasions if I’m there doing media work with the headphones on. The atmosphere still sends shivers down my spine.
“You remember those occasions and also the Old Firm games which were so exciting to be involved in.
“The night we won the league at Tannadice in 2008 was one of the best nights of my life. “Only the births of my children would rank higher. “We all enjoy those moments of individual glory, the goals against the big teams and so on. But when you are part of something bigger – a successful club winning a title – it means everything.
“That year it went to the wire and, coming so soon after the passing of Tommy Burns, it was very emotional.” Mcdonald could have had Scott Brown for company on his new venture Down Under, but the Celtic skipper knocked back advances from Western to stay with the club he led to the treble Treble.
The man they call ‘Skippy’ admitted: “It would have been amazing to have Scott there, but I can see why, in his shoes, he has chosen to stay at Celtic. “If he had decided to move and Celtic had done nine and then ten-in-a-row, how would he be feeling? He would regret not being a part of it, for sure.
“Whatever happens, Scott will go down as a Celtic legend, and he has a chance to be standing next to Billy Mcneill if he can achieve these milestones. “Western United are a brandnew club, and it’s great to be getting in at the very start. “There are lots of new challenges, and the chance to be a really huge influence on how this club develops.
“The league is salary-capped, so everyone is on an equal footing.
“It’s back to where it all began for me, my home country and my home town.
“But I’ll always keep an eye on how my old clubs – all of them – are getting on.”