JIM MCLEAN
(1937-2020)
In stark contrast to Docherty, McLean spent his entire managerial career with just one club. Of all the managers to have taken charge of over 1,000 professional matches in European football, he is the only one of the post-war era to do it with one team: Dundee United.
Having worked as a coach at local rivals Dundee, McLean took the United job in November 1971, and remained in charge for 22 years. In 1983 he lifted the club’s first, and only, top-flight league title, having won back-to-back League Cups in 1980 and 1981.
When Rangers tried to hire him in 1983 he turned them down, partly due to their policy of not signing Catholics, and partly out of loyalty to the squad that he’d built at Tannadice Park. Four years later he was almost rewarded with another trophy, as United reached the final of the UEFA Cup, yet were beaten over two legs by IFK Gothenburg.