My Dad, Diego Armando, Ronnie Simpson

The son of an old Rangers player was buried today, after a Church of Scotland funeral service in Corstorphine. A Scotland international who kept goal in our country’s most famous ever victory and who ensured a Scottish side was the first to ever bring the European Champion Clubs Cup to Britain, was mourned by all true lovers of the game.

Ronnie Simpson was a gentleman and was as revered in Newcastle in the fifties as he was in Glasgow in the sixties. Winning FA Cups with Jackie Milburn is probably only surpassed as an experience by winning the European Cup with a team from Glasgow.

It was his off-field civility and warmth as much as his his class between the sticks which made the passing of another Lisbon Lion so genuinely sad. But, for me, Ronnie Simpson represents above all else, the stupidity of the hatred we celebrate whenever Rangers and Celtic clash - be that on the field, in the streets or on the internet. He showed, through becoming a Celtic legend from such a natural “Rangers” background, that it really all is a load of bollox. Bollox for which, considering our signing policy of more than a century, Rangers FC are much more blameworthy than Celtic FC.

When looking at their respective lifestyles, it’s almost offensive to mention Diego Maradona in the same breath as the man who kept Inter at bay in Lisbon in 1967. Yet the greatest footballer ever to grace this planet certainy has his reasons for going off the rails - and his bear total descent into the abyss can be used to further the point I’m making here: That, in the end, the bigotries and politics are all just excuses for us to ADORE football.

I don’t know how Ronnie Simpson’s father felt about him playing for Celtic but I know my ain pater, raised as a Kilmarnock fan, almost actively encourged me to support The Rangers, lest I experience his pain. For that, and every other aspcet of my upbringing, I’ll always be truly thankful. However, there is one dark cloud in our relationship which I feel I can share with the few close friends I have gathered round this website beside me. My dad didn’t take me to my first Scotland game until 1980.

I know, I know, that might seem like he was taking EXTRA good care of his son - sparing him the full horror of Caledonia’s bungling XI until I had enough of a grip on the real world to withstand the god-awful rankness of it all. And, yet again, he probably did get it just right in preparing me for manhood with a 0-0 World Cup qualifier against Portugal. Nae goals, nae fitbaw - nae much chance of me ever again fooling myself into thinking football was all about fun and glory.

So, to most neutral observers, my paw did me a huge favour in NOT taking me to a match some sixteen months earlier. Because, as a doh-eyed, fresh faced ten-year old I would have doubtless found what happened at Hampden on June 2nd 1979 an all TOO devestating introduction to the harsh realities of following Scotland in the flesh (Instead, as a world-weary, brow-beaten eleven year old, the 0-0 with Portugal was digested with the help of a mere hour-long sulk on the bus home). Agentina came to Glasgow and stuffed Scotland 3-1.

As a ten year-old Scot, that’s a bad thing. As a thirty year-old Scot - for that’s the age my dad was when he and his mate callously trooped off to Dumpden, sans offspring, in the summer of 79 - it was sobering (well …) but bl**dy magic! And here’s the problem: I’m the one who yaks endlessly about fitbaw in my family. My dad tends to just stick to a normal level of sports-orientated chatter before listening to me politely for the next few hours. But When it comes to “Argentina at Hampden in ‘79″, he’s suddenly ARCHIE FEKIN MCPHERSON, ALAN GREEN AND STUART HALL ALL ROLED INTO ONE!!

I mean, my dad was at Wembley in 67 - the greatest result in Scotland’s history - yet he barely gives that a mention. Now that I’m old enough to appreciate I was BRUTALYY DENIED the chance to see Dieo Armando in the flesh - when he was barely starting out on the international scene - All we get is “Ooh - that’s the best team I’ve ever seen - I’m tellin ye - they were brilliant. The Scotland fans were applauding them while they stuffed us …”

Aye, Dad - but could ye noh have talken me along with you??!! Then I wouldnae have hud to spend the rest of my life wondering if I’d ever get a chance to see the man who plays best the game I love the best??!! Christ, my auld man even gets all literary when he starts reeling it off - secene-setting and everything: “We were on the old Celtic end - it was a roastin’ hot day and there was room enough for me and Michael to have a seat on the terracing … No roof on the Celtic end back then - my heid got totally sunburned … while Scotland were takin’ a rosting on the field from the greatest team I’ve ever …” AYE, - AWRIGHT, FAITHER … ENOUGH!!!

I first heard this tale, no doubt, the night he came back from the game. I’d be confused by my father seemingly “enjoying” a Scotland defeat but as the years went on and I watched more World Cups live on the box, I began to realise the traitorousness was not endured by Scotland but by me, his only son! That may have been my last chance to see the best player of all time (so far - Chris Burke’s fair coming on!) with my ain twa een.

If you’re going to play for a football mad nation, play for Argentina. If you’re going to be poor somewhere, don’t be poor in Argentina. The leap from suffering the latter and enjoying the former would be a psychological challenge to a young man from even the most stable of family backgorounds. But that poverty negates the chance of true stability.

Can we really blame Diego for going off his trolley? Don’t think so. You add to his Boca Juniors beginnings the fact he played for Barcelona and then went on to win Napoli their only ever Scudetti and European trophy and you have a bloke whose played for the equivelant of four COUNTRIES during his career - each as demanding, each as grateful when he pulls it off.

It’s been said a million times before but I’m going to say it agin, Dieo Maradona is the omly man to have won a World Cup single-handedly - at least, as close as it’s ever possible to come to winning it single-handedly. So many of Pele’s greatest moments are spectacular misses or acts of great charity and kindmess. Maradonna ripped the best club and national teams in the world in two and killed them off. That’s what football afns want to see.

How could he ever be normal when surrounded, for all his adult life, by so many folk who want to adore him and will do anything to make him feel good or to get a piece of his greatness? Christ - here’s some sad git from Ardrossan still holding a grudge against his dad for not prophesising in 1979 that Maradona would be the best player of all time and not taking me to see him when he was still a kid (Mind you, Argentina WERE World champs at the time - you’d think your Dad would still want to take his son to see the World Champs !!! Sod the “roof over my head”, the “clothes”, the “food” etc - it counted for NOTHING, Dad!).

And here’s some sad git from Ardrossan, wishing he could get over to a Buenos Aires hospital to light a candle. If the blessed bugger does recover he’d better get himself fit enough to do some sort of charity tour. I want to see him rolled onto a pitch near me some day … and I know who can buy his own ticket!

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Published:
04.27.04 / 10pm
Category:
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