Andrew Watson: Scotland's first black international footballer

Twitter recently led me to a fantastic post by Andy Mitchell on his Scottish Sports History blog.

Before the England v Scotland he sought out the modest grave of Andrew Watson, a footballer whose significance in the game has often been overlooked:

"I placed a Scottish saltire flag and a few flowers on the grave to commemorate his place in Scottish football history. But I have a strong feeling that Andrew Watson deserves more, a prominent and permanent memorial that truly recognises his place in sporting history as the first black international footballer, the first black administrator (he was secretary of Queen's Park) and possibly the first black professional player (at Bootle)."

I couldn't agree more.

Watson's progress in the game - and the acceptance of that progress - still seems hugely relevant today, even in what we like to consider our more enlightened age.

Andrew Watson also captained Scotland and, in his three games for his country, we beat England twice (6-1 away, 5-1 at home) and Wales once (5-1).

To his list of "firsts" we could possibly add:

• First black captain of an International team (v England 1881)
• First black player to win a major competition (Scottish Cup 1881)
• First black player to play in the English FA Cup (London Swifts 1882)

The SFA annual of 1880-81 described Watson as:

"One of the very best backs we have; since joining Queen's Park has made rapid strides to the front as a player; has great speed and tackles splendidly; powerful and sure kick; well worthy of a place in any representative team." (Football Unites, Racism Divides)

A remarkable story. A story that, as Andy Mitchell points out, deserves more recognition than a neglected grave in a Richmond cemetery.

Forgotten Scotland Players: Paul Bernard

Another week spent dodging ever more dire warnings about the state of Scottish football.

This time everything's got a lot Grimmer with Aberdeen losing a lauded protégé to the mysterious land of riches that some people call England.

Highly rated youngster leaves Aberdeen area to chance his arm in England? If Jack Grimmer turns out to have a career like Denis Law's not too many Scotland fans will be complaining.

Still, it would be churlish not to concede that Grimmer's departure to Fulham exposes once again the divergence between football on either side of Hadrian's Wall. We're not so much the poor relations as the member of the family locked in the attic to save embarrassment.

Of course it wasn't always this way.

Not so long ago we could compete. Not only on the pitch but to an extent financially. Really, it wasn't that long ago.

Look back to Aberdeen in the mid-1990s. An Aberdeen where the memories of Alex Ferguson's achievements burnished even brighter than they do now.

An Aberdeen where signing a player for a million pounds wasn't some kind of bad Doric joke. An Aberdeen who did actually sign a player for a million pounds.

Hindsight. It's a wonderful thing.

Hindsight might tell Aberdeen that signing a player for a million pounds wasn't the sort of sustainable business decision they could afford to make.

Hindsight might tell Aberdeen that signing a player for a million pounds to show the Old Firm that there was still life in the north-east was folly.

Hindsight might tell Aberdeen that if you're going to sign a player for a million pounds you better make damn sure he's worth the money.

But hindsight is like finding the instructions after you've built the Ikea furniture. Which is why Aberdeen ended up paying a million quid to play a wonky wardrobe in midfield.

Paul Bernard.

The deal looked promising. Bernard was young, he'd built a reputation at Oldham and he'd already won two Scotland caps.

But something went awry.

Born in Edinburgh, Bernard grew up in Manchester and joined Oldham as a teenager. He made his debut in the 1990/91 season.

In just his second game he scored the equaliser as Oldham came from two down to beat Sheffield Wednesday and win the Second Division title on what we'd call a "helicopter Sunday" if it had been a Sunday and a helicopter had been involved.

That win, which denied Billy Bonds' West Ham a title they thought they'd won, saw Oldham back in the top flight after almost 70 years.

It also gave the young Bernard a ringside seat for an era of English football history: the Second Division Championship win gave Oldham a place in the last First Division, their survival ensured they became founder members of what was then called the Premiership.

In 1993/94 Oldham and Bernard were relegated, finishing second bottom on 40 points, ten ahead of bottom place Swindon but three away from safety.

That season he'd also featured in the FA Cup semi-finals as what Alex Ferguson described as a "dogged" Oldham took Manchester United to a replay before going down 4-1.

Back slumming it in the Football League Oldham faced some re-entry issues. 61 points wasn't enough for any more than a mid table finish as their away form - four wins and 13 defeats - dented any hopes of an immediate return.

Despite the reduced glamour of his surroundings - and fewer appearances than he'd managed in the previous two seasons - Bernard had made someone sit up and take notice.

Craig Brown was taking his Scotland team to Japan for the Kirin Cup at the end of the 1994/95 season and Bernard was on the flight.

A 22 year old in a Craig Brown squad might be considered something of a rarity and would probably not expect to play a major part in proceedings.

But Brown obviously saw the Far East as a place to experiment.

On 21 May 1995 Bernard, as he probably expected, took his place on the bench for a 0-0 draw with Japan that featured Jim Leighton as captain, Brian Martin and Rob McKinnon in the starting XI and a John Spencer red card.

Bernard came on for a 13 minute debut when he replaced Scott Gemmill.

Did he impress? Well, he certainly didn't do anything catastrophic enough to change Brown's mind about trying something different in the final game of the tour against Ecuador.

This time Bernard started in a reworked side and lasted the whole ninety minutes. His first full game was marked by a Scotland win: goals from John Robertson and substitute Stevie Crawford grabbing a 2-1 victory.

So it's the summer of 1995. Our hero - only recently described on an Oldham website as a "charismatic midfielder" - is now a full Scotland international and faces big decisions about his future.

He looks north.

Manager Roy Aitken had seen his transfer budget swollen by a share issue. Aberdeen, shaken by the sacking of Willie Miller and their apparent descent from the summit of Scottish football, needed to make a statement.

That statement largely involved making Paul Bernard the first - and still the only recorded - £1 million signing for a non-Old Firm club.

Did they actually pay £1 million? There are hints that so keen were Aberdeen to show their intent that the widely quoted figure was actually made up of both the transfer fee and Bernard's own signing on fee.

Whatever the truth, Bernard had the label: he was Aberdeen's £1 million pound man.

So drenched in despondency has the Aberdeen tale been of late it's tempting to say that Bernard was a disaster from the off. That's not true.

Aitken's side started well enough and even recaptured some silverware with a league cup win in November 1995. In what was Aitken's first full season they finished third in the league, pipping Hearts on goal difference.

They weren't ripping up the ground they'd lost on the Old Firm - there was a 28 point gap between Aberdeen and second placed Celtic - but they were offering hope for the future.

The million pound man was still just 23, Aberdeen looked to be on the up and European football was about to return to Pittodrie. Certainly Bernard's impact was somewhat muted but he had a lot to live up to with the price tag and he was acquainting himself with the Scottish game after serving his apprenticeship in different circumstances at Oldham.

Still, when Scotland travelled to Euro 96 the midfield maestro from the win over Ecuador was not part of the squad. If Bernard had thought a move to Scotland would increase his international chances he was mistaken: he was never to bother the Scotland team again.

His club career also faltered. Over 30 appearances in his first season at Aberdeen were followed by just 40 or so in the next three seasons.

What went wrong?

Injuries played a massive part. Maybe bad luck did as well. Perhaps the injuries contributed to a loss of form. Or maybe the pressure of being the million pound gem in a team that endured periodic struggles was too much.

If his first season had been underwhelming with hints of potential the next three were a disaster and the "million quid signing" tag became something of a Scottish football punchline.

He enjoyed a slight renaissance in 1999-2000, playing more regularly and scoring four goals - one of them coming in that memorable 6-5 away win over Motherwell when two Scottish international goalkeepers conceded 11 goals between them.

But Aberdeen were now under the control of the idiosyncratic Ebbe Skovdahl. With cost cutting to the fore and Skovdahl keen to mould his own team the end of the road had come.

Paul Bernard drove his Ferrari out of Pittodrie for the last time in October 2000.

The next stop was Barnsley where he went a season without a league appearance before joining Plymouth and managing fewer than a dozen games.

He returned to Scotland with St Johnstone in 2003 and appeared sporadically for a couple of years before a season with Drogeha United brought the curtain down on his career.

At 22 Paul Bernard had enjoyed instant success at Oldham, seen the dawn of the Premiership age, become a full Scotland cap and been the million pound signing who might just have ushered in a new era in Scottish league football.

At 33 he was retired: in a decade he'd barely doubled his career appearances, failed to add to his international caps and become a byword both for unfettered spending and an era of Aberdeen malaise.

He was probably quite comfortably off though which might just make this a very modern football tale.

A tale, all the same, of lost potential and, for whatever reason, of a talent squandered.

Forgotten Scotland Player number 12: Paul Bernard, Oldham Athletic. 2 caps.

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Forgotten Scotland Players

To mark Remembrance Day two more entries in the Scottish Football Blog's Forgotten Scotland Players series.

Two players who were part of the most famous Hearts team of them all.

Forgotten Scotland Players: George Sinclair

Football in Scotland didn't stop during the conflict of 1914-1918. Players, officials and supporters fought for their country. Many never returned.

But, rightly or wrongly, the game continued. It did so against a backdrop of criticism and recrimination that the sport was ignoring its patriotic duty and encouraging others to do the same.

Yet some players had answered the country's call without delay.

One of those was the Hearts winger George Sinclair. Formerly a regular soldier he'd left the army in 1905.

He signed for an under performing Hearts in 1908. When George McCartney replaced James McGhee as manager he decided that Sinclair was of only four players who would meet the standard he was demanding.

Sinclair, he recognised, was one of the finest wingers in Scotland. In a new era for Hearts he was deserving of his place.

Scotland's selectors seemed to agree. In March 1910 Sinclair made his Scotland debut against Ireland in Belfast as the Scots fell to a 1-0 defeat.

As McCartney strove to build a team that would achieve his goal of being the "perfect combination," Sinclair continued to impress.

In 1912 he was again called into the Scotland team. On 3rd March he was part of the team that beat Wales 1-0 in front of 31,000 fans at Tynecastle.

Two weeks later he got his revenge in Belfast as Scotland, sent on their way by a first half double from Blackburn's Walter Aitkenhead, beat Ireland 4-1.

Two years on and McCartney's Tynecastle dream was coming close to being realised.

In the summer of 1914 Hearts played a friendly in a Copenhagen before returning to Edinburgh to beat Hibs 6-0 in the Dunedin Cup.

People suddenly realised that McCartney might have been deadly serious when he predicted that his team would win the league.

Then, on 4th August, Britain wasn't provided with the assurances it demanded that Belgium's neutrality would be respected by an advancing German Army.

The European powder keg had exploded and Britain was about to join the conflagration.

When Sinclair had left the Field Artillery in 1905 he had made a commitment to rejoin the forces in the event of such a conflict.

On 5th August 1914, in keeping with that agreement, he rejoined his battery. Britain was at war. And so was George Sinclair.

Driver George Leckie Sinclair of the Royal Field Artillery didn't serve in the famous McRae's Battalion that became inexorably linked to Hearts.

His war took a different route. And he was one of the lucky ones.

Injured while on active service he was discharged from the army. His injuries weren't serious enough to stop him from playing football and he returned to see out his career with Hearts, playing his last game in 1920.

He was also apparently spared the after effects that scarred the lives of so many veterans.

When a free scoring Hearts side, perhaps fulfilling the destiny that was denied the team of 1914, won the championship in 1958 Sinclair was running a pub in Edinburgh's Abbeyhill.

Forgotten Scotland Players number 10: George Sinclair, Hearts. 3 caps.

Forgotten Scotland Players: Bob Mercer

When George McCartney began his rebuilding job at Tynecastle he immediately recognised that the player he could build the team's success on was already at the club.

Robert 'Bob' Mercer was a young centre half when he first met McCartney.

In the pre-war years footballs were like boulders, boots like concrete and defenders were rugged characters. Mercer was a modern centre half before the phrase was invented.

Ball playing, skillful. Classy.

He was the young talent at the centre of the manager's "perfect combination" philosophy.

He was just 22 when he made his Scotland debut, alongside team mate George Sincliar, in the 1-0 win over Wales at Tynecastle.

His second cap came in March 1913 as Scotland beat Ireland 2-1 in Dublin.

Mercer was injured during the course of Hearts' impressive start to the 1914-15 season. An October return proved too soon for his damaged ligaments and he was ruled out again.

Despite his injury, as the captain of the league leaders and as one of Scotland's bright young things he was a lightning rod for the ire of those who felt football wasn't pulling its weight in the war effort.

When Hearts answered the call from McCrae's Battlalion, Mercer's injury meant he was unable to join his team mates.

15 players did join McCrae's Own. Three of them were to die on the first day of the Battle of the Somme on 1st July 1916.

Mercer was eventually to join the Royal Garrison Artillery. In 1918 he was caught in a severe gas attack.

Unlike many of his team mates he survived. He returned to play for Hearts for another two seasons.

In 1919 he joined George Sinclair in the side that won the SFA's Victory Cup.

It was clear, however, that Mercer wasn't the same player. When a doctor diagnosed a weakened heart, Hearts insisted he retire. He reluctantly left the club but went on to play another couple of seasons with Dunfermline.

In 1926 he played a game as a guest for Hearts in Selkirk. He collapsed and died of heart failure.

The "war to end all wars" had claimed another victim.

Forgotten Scotland Player number 11: Bob Mercer, Hearts. 2 caps.

31 Hearts players saw service during the First World War. Six were killed in action. Another three died during the conflict. Three more, including Bob Mercer, died after 1918 as a consequence of injuries suffered during the war.

Forgotten Scotland Players: Henry Renny-Tailyour

Meandering through The Sunday Post (the scrapes that Oor Wullie finds himself in!) I spotted something in Brian Fowlie's TV review of Scotland's spectacular win in Liechtenstein:

"Craig Mackail-Smith's goal calmed things for a while, I'll swear the commentators paused to take a breath.

"I did wonder if the Brighton striker was the first player with a hyphenated name to score for Scotland. That information wasn't forthcoming."

I'd wondered the same thing myself. And now I can reveal all.

He's not. Double-barrelled Scotland caps are almost as old as the international game itself and they have always carried a goal threat.

They're not common. My trawl of the archives suggest Mackail-Smith is only the second Scotland player to greedily snaffle two surnames all to himself.

But his predecessor had a storied career.

March 1873. Scotland, representing the burgeoning Scottish Football Association for the first time, travelled to London to take part in football's second international football match.

After a 0-0 draw in Glasgow in 1872, England claimed the first cross border bragging rights with a 4-2 victory in London. The visitors could only afford to send eight players down south. The team was supplemented by three exiles.

One of those exiles scored Scotland's first ever international goal in the 25th minute of the match.

Henry Renny-Tailyour. Not an ordinary name for a Scotland player. Not an ordinary life for a Scotland player either. Before the days of tanner ba' players learning their craft playing football on the streets there were internationals like Henry.

Scottish footballers should be born in Scotland? Henry wasn't. He was born in India in those far off days when the sun never set on the British Empire.

He grew up in Montrose. Or near Montrose. I have to assume that the Renny-Tailyour's family estate amounted to slightly more than a typical Montrosian dwelling of the time.

From Montrose to Cheltenham College and then, as was the way for gentleman of the age, the British Army.

It was as a lieutenant in the Royal Engineers that Renny-Tailyour cut a dash through the early days of organised sport.

He had played for Scotland against England in 1871 but the match was scratched from official records because the Scottish team was drawn entirely from the London area.

In 1872, the year of his sole Scotland cap, he played for the Royal Engineers in the first ever FA Cup Final. They lost that game to The Wanderers and were foiled again in 1874 by Oxford University.

In 1875 the Royal Engineers finally got their hands on the trophy. Lieutenant Renny-Taylour scored in a 1-1 draw and then again in 3-0 replay win. That it was the Old Etonians that were beaten in the final will have made the experience that bit sweeter for the goalscoring Old Cheltonian.

Given his football commitments it's difficult to see how much time Henry had for engineering - royal, military or otherwise - but he progressed to the rank of colonel in the Sappers.

Amazingly though he didn't confine himself to just football and the army.

Scotland and England had met in the very first rugby international in Edinburgh in 1871. In 1872 England hosted a return match. Lining up for Scotland that day was Henry Renny-Taylour.

It's a unique achievement.

He played in the second official football international and he played in the second official rugby international. He remains the only person to have represented Scotland in both sports. Both games were played, incidentally, at The Oval. Both were lost. But for a gentleman amateur like Henry that might not have been the point.

The venue was fitting: between his football, rugby and military careers he also found time to play 28 first class cricket matches as a middle order batsman and right arm bowler.

On retiring from the army, and sport, Henry topped off what sounds like a rather enjoyable career as managing director of Guinness. I suppose there just weren't the same punditry opportunities in those days.

He died in 1920 at the age of 70, back at home in Scotland.

It seems that, unhindered by a double barrelled surname, he gave life both barrels.

Forgotten Scotland Players Number 9: Henry Renny-Tailyour, Royal Engineers. 1 (official) cap.

Forgotten Scotland Players: Barney Battles

Barney Battles.

A name worthy of echoing down the decades. And Scottish football can boast two of them.

Both with a tale to tell.

Barney Battles Senior played for Celtic, Liverpool, Dundee, Hearts and Kilmarnock and was capped for Scotland three times.

In 1896 he went on strike at Celtic because he'd been criticised by a number of journalists. It seems a wonderfully modern reason for withdrawing labour, confirming that football today doesn’t have character enough to even harbour original grudges.

Tragically Barney Battles died in 1905 at the age of just 30 when a bout of ‘flu developed into pneumonia.

Some months later Scotland played Ireland at Celtic Park and the gate receipts were donated to his pregnant wife.

That October she gave birth to a son. She named him in tribute to his father.

Scottish football's second Barney Battles was born. But the game in his homeland would have to be patient.

The younger Barney attended Edinburgh's Holy Cross High School, since amalgamated with St Andrew’s Junior High School into St Augustine’s, before his mother decided the family would enjoy a better life an ocean away.

And so a teenage Barney found himself in Boston.

Perhaps not entirely predictably he discovered an America that offered him the ideal place to launch his football career.

The game has often enjoyed sporadic booms in the States but lacked sustainability. The early 1920s was a boom time as the American Soccer League made inroads in the north east of the country. Immigrant communities offered talent and supporters, industrialists offered sponsorship.

Barney was in the right place at the right time.

He impressed with the Boston Celtics and then, at the age of 19, was offered professional terms with the Boston Soccer Club, known as the Wonder Workers. In his first season he was something of a scoring sensation as the club won both the Lewis Cup and the American Professional Soccer Championship, a mash up competition between the ASL and the older St Louis Soccer League to determine which team could be considered national champions. He scored both home and away in a two legged decider against the Ben Millers.

International recognition was immediate. Battles was picked to play for the United States national team against Canada in Montreal, the hosts winning 1-0.

He continued to impress as the Wonder Workers performed consistently in the ASL and finally landed the championship in 1928.

But by the late 1920s the ASL - which had contributed to soccer becoming America’s second largest spectator sport - was splintering. The economy was careering towards the misery of the Great Depression.

It was time to come home.

Willie McCartney, who would later cross the city and become the architect of Hibs’ Famous Five, had taken over from his father as Hearts manager in 1919. Hearts remained a big club but throughout the 1920s they had struggled to recover from the sacrifices their great pre-war team had made during the First World War.

The manager liked what he saw in the 23 year old Battles. A £9 a week contract was signed and - a tribute to either his celebrity spreading across the Atlantic or because of his famous name - 18,000 turned up to watch him make his debut in what amounted to a match between Hearts and Hearts reserves.

His first competitive game was at Hampden against Queen’s Park. Not a bad homecoming for a footballer. And a fine place to score a first competitive goal for a new club. A goal in his first game, two goals in his second game and three goals in his third game. The young Barney had a certain flamboyance.

What standard of football had he been playing in the States? If his return to Scotland involved a step up in class he didn’t let it show. He scored 31 goals in 28 league games that first season. In the local cup competitions that used to round off the Edinburgh football season he scored a scarcely credible 11 goals in just three games against Hibs. Across all competition he scored 68 times, including five in a league representative match against Ireland.

I’m not an expert on the feats that build a Tynecastle legend but he must have been getting pretty close.

He scored 26 league goals the following season and another seven on a Scottish Cup run that was ended by Rangers in the semi final. He also scored another four for the Scottish League side. In one game. Against Ireland. Again.

How to top that? Barney had an answer. In 1930/31 he missed some games with appendicitis, scored hat-tricks in three straight games and ended up with 44 league goals. Hearts finished fifth that year and scored 90 league goals. Barney came very close to contributing half of that tally.

This was a striker playing something close to fantasy football. Even Scotland’s infamously rubbish selectors had to pay some attention. They did. Amazingly though they chose to give him his only cap right the start of his annus mirabilis.

25th October 1930. Scotland v Wales at Ibrox. A 1-1 draw. Inevitably Scotland’s 42nd minute goal was scored by Barney Battles.

It was to be his only Scotland cap. He had a goal a game record. To offer those maligned selectors an olive branch of understanding it is important that they preferred to pick Hughie Gallacher throughout Barney’s Tynecastle pomp. Gallacher, of course, had an international goals to game ratio of 1.15 across 20 caps.

Sadly, just when it seemed nothing could stop Battles at club level, a knee injury proved more troublesome than his appendix. His appearances for Hearts became more sporadic. Over the next four seasons he retained his goalscoring ability but the fitness to enjoy a sustained run in the team eluded him.

In 1936 he retired from playing. Willie McCartney had already left Hearts and tried to tempt Barney to Easter Road. He refused:

“What would the Hibs or any other do with a player who because of some physical handicap was liable to let them down in the course of the game?

“So I stayed out, having retired from active participation at the comparatively early age of 29.” (London Hearts)

Journalism followed. He opened an eponymous pub in Newhaven - the boy born in Fisherrow who conquered football on both sides of the Atlantic drawn to the coast again - that lives on in the memory of locals of a certain age.

Two international caps for two different countries. And a goalscoring record at Hearts that would have left his father, the doughty defender he never knew, awestruck.

Forgotten Scotland Players number 8: Barney Battles Junior, Hearts. 1 cap.

Forgotten Scotland Players: Eddie Colquhoun

Hot on the heels of Eddie Connachan, our Forgotten Scotland Player number 6, comes another delve into the archives for number 7.

Another who strutted his stuff against Czechoslovakia at a neutral venue.

Another called Eddie.

Even more than that - another from Prestonpans.

If you haven't sampled its delights, Prestonpans is an East Lothain seaside/rural/post-industrial idyll and home to my alma mater, the august institution what learned me to write rubbish an' that.

Those of you that have been to the 'Pans will appreciate that I'm drunk as I write this. It's a coping mechanism to survive the memories of that long, hard slog of an education.

Anyway, Prestonpans - and, seriously, check out the annual arts festival or local club Preston Athletic - gave Scottish football both Eddie Connachan and Forgotten Scotland Player number 7, Eddie Colquhoun.

Edmund Peter Skirving Colquhoun for the nomenclature completists. Not, I think, many Edmunds in Prestonpans. Not then, not now.

A young chap on the make called Edmund would always be looking for an escape to a greener, more pleasant land.

Eddie's chance came when he way just 17. In 1962 he signed for Bury, possibly blinded by the bright lights of the big city, and his professional career was underway.

His time at Bury was spent languishing in the lower reaches of the English Second Division. But the young centre back impressed.

Bury were relegated in the 1966/67 season but Colquhoun was already headed in the opposite direction, to West Bromwich Albion and the First Division.

A couple of years later came the move that would define his club career.

Sheffield United had just been relegated from the top flight. New manager Arthur Rowley - 434 goals in 619 league games - was rebuilding for a promotion push.

Eddie was the defensive rock he needed. And he was prepared to pay the best part of £28,000 to get him.

Promotion wouldn't actually come for three seasons - Rowley was succeeded by his predecessor John Harris - but Eddie's impact was instantaneous enough for him to be made captain for his home debut.

The fans took to him as well. Soon the terrace choir had a new song:

We ain't got a barrel of money, We ain't got Woodward or Currie, 

But with Eddie Colquhoun, Promotion soon, United!

A centre half of the old school it appears. Richard Savage of Def Leppard - once a United hopeful -remembers a training game:

"The ball was played up to me, I dummied, turned, beat Eddie Colquhoun as if I was Kenny Dalglish and shot at goal. Next goal kick, Eddie Colquhoun walked up behind me and gave me the biggest kick on the back of my ankles and said, ‘Do that to me again and I’ll f**king kill you.’

"This was the club captain and I really looked up to him. Being shy, I wasn’t the sort who would say ‘F**k you’ and do it again." (Four Four Two)

Promotion, if not a natural rapport with youth team players, followed in 1970/71 and it was in 1971 that Scotland came calling.

October of that year and a European Championship qualifier against Portugal at Hampden. Colquhoun makes his debut in a 2-1 win.

For the next 18 months or so he's never far from the Scotland squad, winning nine caps in total.

Those nine games included a 0-0 draw with Czechoslovakia in July 1972. The match, part of the four team Brazilian Independence Cup, was played in front of 5,000 fans in Porto Alegre.

In Eddie's first eight caps Scotland were beaten only twice: by their hosts in that 1972 tournament and by the Dutch in Amsterdam in the winter of 1971.

Then, on Valentine's Day 1973, came a massacre. England romped to a 5-0 win at Hampden. Allan Clarke (twice), Mick Channon, Martin Chivers and a Peter Lorimer own goal broke stout Scottish hearts.

It was the game that gave Bobby Moore a 100th cap. And the game that ended Eddie Colquhoun's international career.

Although sent homeward victorious England didn't qualify for the 1974 World Cup. Scotland did. But Eddie would play no part.

It was back to Yorkshire. In 1975 Sheffield United finished sixth in Division One, the highest finish Eddie enjoyed in his career. But the following season they were relegated.

By 1978 Colquhoun was ready to leave Second Division United and extend his career, as was then the way, in the brave new world of the North American Soccer League.

Good times: Eddie's Detroit Express colleagues included players like Trevor France, Alan Brazil, Jim Holton and Ted MacDougall.

By 1980 he was calling it a day. A testimonial was held at Brammall Lane. In one half of Sheffield, Eddie and his 1970/71 promotion winning team are celebrated still.

Playing at a time when richly talented Scots seemed to have the run of England, Colquhoun did more than enough to hold his own.

Nine caps in a competitive era are testament to that.

Forgotten Scotland Players number 7: Eddie Colquhoun, Sheffield United. 9 caps.

> A Twitter correspondent tells me that Eddie used to be seen stubbing out his cigarette as he made his way on to the pitch at Brammall Lane. Magnificent. (Thanks to @schillaci19)

Forgotten Scotland Players: Eddie Connachan

1961. Scotland continue to just about hold their own the world stage. But not when it counts. The Sixties have dawned on the back of two chastening World Cup experiences. The decade will go on to swing but its major championships are denied a tartan tinge.

In November 1961 Scotland travel to Belgium for a World Cup qualification match against Czechoslovakia. It’s the third meeting between the sides in a year after a 4-0 reverse in Bratislava and a 3-2 win at Hampden.

Both sides had beaten group whipping boys Republic of Ireland so, despite the far superior Czech goal difference, a clash at the neutral Heysel Stadium was required.

Three team qualification groups. No place for goal difference or a head-to-head count back: a different world.

The Beatles were still learning their trade in Hamburg, JFK had only been in the Oval Office for a matter of months. Man was nowhere near the moon. The Prague Spring would have seemed inconceivable in a Czechoslovakia still in the clench of Stalinism.

It’s unlikely that any of this preoccupied the Scottish Football Blog’s sixth Forgotten Scotland Player as he prepared for his international debut.

In the winter of 1961 Eddie Connachan must have felt something of a spring in his step. Jock Stein might have been the architect of Dunfermline’s 1961 Scottish Cup victory but it was Connachan, the goalkeeper, who was vociferously celebrated.

His heroics as custodian (when did "custodian" drop out of common parlance?) in the final and replay against Celtic had seen his euphoric teammates carry him shoulder high from the pitch and led Celtic captain Billy McNeill to say:

"I have never seen anything like it. He broke our hearts and did as much as any `keeper I have ever seen."

450 minutes of cup football and not a single goal conceded. And, as a miner from Prestonpans, Connachan had even done his shift underground on the Monday and Tuesday before the Wednesday night replay.

By the time Scotland travelled to Belgium Connachan’s Dunfermline had already made it through to the quarter finals of the Cup Winner’s Cup.

Four years after arriving at East End Park at the age of 21, signed from Dalkeith Thistle, Eddie Connachan was scaling football heights from the Kingdom of Fife.

And now a Scotland cap.

No ordinary debut either. A World Cup place at stake, the unusual surrounds of a neutral venue and a big international being played in front of only 7000 fans.

It was an unsettled time for Scottish goalkeeping. Lawrie Leslie had played in three of the World Cup qualifiers but was replaced Tottenham’s Bill Brown for the Hampden game against the Czechs. Earlier in the year, of course, the unfortunate Frank Haffey had conceded nine goals at Wembley and carved out his own place in the hall of infamy.

So it was Connachan, the mining ‘keeper, who manager Ian McColl turned to for the biggest game of all.

Given the national team’s predilection for getting so far and then going no further it was always going to be a tough test for a rookie goalkeeper. And so it proved.

Scotland, a team riddled with names like Baxter, Law, Brand and White, took a first half lead through Ian St John.

Czechoslovakia equalised in the seventieth minute but the advantage was restored moments later when St John got his second. With 15 minutes to go Czechoslovakia equalised again and this time Scotland couldn’t find a response.

Two more Czech goals in extra time rounded off a 4-2 victory.

It must have been an agonising debut. Four goals conceded and the familiar feeling of that familiar failing: Scotland getting close but not close enough.

Yet Connachan had domestic form and age on his side. And this was a Scotland team that conceded 18 goals across eight games in 1961. There was no reason to think he wouldn’t feature again.

And he only had to wait until May 1962 for his next cap. A home debut, over 67,000 fans and a visit from Uruguay.

Having played for 120 minutes in his first international, Connachan’s second - and final - cap would last only 45 minutes.

Two goals down at half time McColl chose to make his goalkeeper the victim of the still relatively rare phenomenon of the friendly international substitution. He was replaced by Billy Ritchie of Rangers who immediately conceded a goal in what would be his only international appearance.

Late goals from Jim Baxter and Ralph Brand offered up a more respectable 3-2 defeat but the match remains an oddity for bringing the curtain down on two very short lived international goalkeeping careers.

By 1963 Dunfermline were prepared to let Connachan when an offer of £5,500 was received from Middlesbrough, then languishing with only middling success in England’s Second Division.

Almost 100 league appearances followed but Ayresome Park was witnessing a decline in fortunes. By 1966 Middlesbrough found themselves relegated to the Third Division and Connachan was back in Scotland with Falkirk.

He spent only two years at Brockville making less than 30 league appearances before moving to South Africa in 1968 - by which time his old boss Stein had won the European Cup with Ronnie Simpson, five years Connachan’s senior, in goal. The fluctuating fortunes of football.

While playing in England Connachan had taken his coaching badges and when he retired from playing chose to stay in South Africa as coach of East London United.

Still resident in South Africa today, Eddie Connachan was inducted into Dunfermline’s Hall of Fame in 2007 and returned to East End Park earlier this year to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of his Scottish Cup shutout.

Forgotten Scotland Players number 6: Eddie Connachan, Dunfermline Athletic. 2 caps.

Forgotten Scotland Players: Nicky Walker

Do our footballers ever ruminate on how a modern Scotland can persuade the rest of the world that it is embracing innovation and shifting away from our old "tartan and shortbread" image?

Probably not.

But at least one star of yesteryear is probably immensely relaxed about the nostalgic power of plaid and a unleavened biscuit phenomenon.

Joseph Nicol Walker, scion of the famous biscuit empire that bears the family name, now enjoys a position of prominence with the firm his great grandfather founded.

But before becoming the Queen's official oatcake supplier Nicky Walker enjoyed a long football career. A career distinguished enough to see him become the Scottish Football Blog's fifth forgotten Scotland player and the first goalkeeper to make our list.

It was a career that began close to home. Aberlous Villa, his first club, were formed in 1924, some 28 years after Joseph Walker founded the biscuit company that would become Scotland's biggest food exporter in the same Speyside village.

From Aberlour to the bright lights of Elgin and a teenage stint in the Highland League. A stint eye-catching enough to attract the attention of Jock Wallace at Leicester City.

Walker's stay at Filbert Street was short, perhaps a city that cherished it's fried potato snacks over crumbly sweet biscuit goodness unnerved him, but it did offer the chance to build a relationship with Wallace.

When the manager took over at Motherwell his goalkeeper followed. When a diminished Rangers called on Wallace to return and steady the ship he again took Walker with him.

But these were not vintage times at Ibrox. Rangers continued to toil and Wallace struggled to recapture former glories. Walker got his chances but was missing for the only trophy that Wallace won in his second spell - Peter McLoy started the 1984 league cup final against Dundee United.

With the sacking of Wallace and the start of the Graeme Souness revolution Walker's chance of establishing himself as a long term number one were hit by the arrival of Chris Woods.

He hung about - short loans at Dunfermline and Falkirk followed - but it was clear that only a move out of Govan would bring opportunities. In 1989 he bowed to the inevitable and signed for Hearts.

Was Walker welcomed as a hero? Not so much. This was a move that perhaps reflected managerial anxiety over incumbent 'keeper Henry Smith's ability to combine occasional ball dropping moments with longevity and Tynecastle cult hero status.

But Smith rose to the challenge and cemented his place as number one in Gorgie. It was Henry who travelled with Scotland's Euro 92 squad while Walker ended the 1991/92 season on loan at Burnley.

Yet the Hearts manager couldn't make his mind up. Joe Jordan - then an oft bewildered Scottish Premier League manager still awaiting his transformation into an Italian baiting Champions League coach - turned back to Walker in 1993.

And here we have our international breakthrough. Andy Roxburgh's Scotland take on Germany (managed by some chap called Vogts) at Ibrox on 24th March 1993. Nicky Walker wins his first cap.

His Scotland clean sheet lasted 19 minutes before Karl-Heinz Reidle put the Germans ahead. But that's where the scoring stopped in a sound Scottish performance that will forever be remembered as the game that Duncan Ferguson showed what might have been had headbutts, jail terms and SFA hate not intervened.

Although he remained in the shadow of Andy Goram and eventually a resurgent Jim Leighton, Walker had now become an internationalist.

But the life of a professional footballer is an oft unsettled one, managerial changes at Tynecastle saw him slip out of favour under Sandy Clark and then out of the door completely when Tommy McLean arrived as boss.

McLean's vision for Hearts - which no doubt included something unintelligble about attacking widemen playing from "in tae oot" - had room for the potential of Craig Nelson but none for the experience of Walker.

Our hero of a trillion afternoon teas found himself as the makeweight in Nelson's move from Partick Thistle. A new dawn was breaking for Nicky Walker and it was breaking over Firhill.

Nelson would go on to make only 24 league appearances for Hearts while Walker would play 53 times for Thistle. Walker would play for Scotland again. Nelson would never play for Scotland.

But it wasn't all plain sailing. Under the stewardship of Murdo MacLeod the Jags struggled in the 1995/96 season. Only seven clean sheets were kept as the team's paltry eight wins saw them slump to second bottom.

Under the short lived play-off scheme - there is no such thing as a new idea in the world of Scottish football - that meant a two-legged promotion/relegation decider with Dundee United, runners-up to Dunfermline in the First Division.

United ran out 3-2 winners and it was a relegated Walker who doubled his caps tally with an eight minute substitute appearance against the USA in Conneticut.

That match, a 2-1 defeat, was a warm-up for Euro 96 and Walker was part of the Scotland squad that graced the tournament with the usual mixture of grit, determination, passion, fleeting glory and ultimate failure. As so often with his international call-ups there was little doubt that he was very much the third choice travelling companion to Goram and Leighton.

Domestically he had emerged from a relegation season with his reputation enhanced and Aberdeen spent £60,000 to keep him in the top flight. His Pittodrie stay didn't work out and he failed to notch up even a score of league appearances. The end was nigh after - in one of Wikipedia's more ignominious football entries - "he was supplanted by Derek Stillie."

He returned to his Highland homeland and Dingwall's finest, Ross County. The move brought his most sustained run of first team action, first on loan and then as a permanent signing. Close to 140 appearances followed as County established themselves in the SFL.

2001 saw a brief, romantic return to Aberlour Villa before he signed for County's Highland rivals Inverness Caledonian Thistle.

There was a strange twist in this autumn of his career. In September 2001 he was denied an appearance in the Highland derby against his old club when he was stranded in the United States during the air traffic confusion that followed the September 11th attacks.

Inverness veteran Jim Calder took his place in a match that saw County manager Neale Cooper win his first derby after five years in charge. Walker returned in time for the next match and promptly conceded six against Airdrie.

As he approached his forties Walker was going to have to devote more of his time to the family business. Inverness were his last professional club although he remained involved with football in the Highlands.

Now production director for the shortbread behomoths he's set to carry family stewardship of the firm into another generation.

He's businessman with a past though. Nicky Walker was something of a well tanned, luxuriantly haired fixture of Scottish football for the best part of two decades. Periods of that career were spent in the shadows but he often impressed.

For a while he seemed to be forever the close-but-no-cigar fall guy of the Scotland squad, always there, always willing, never playing. But twice he got his chance.

Two memories at least to sustain a man through a biscuit based board meeting or shared as a pleasant anecdote over a nice cup of tea and sample of the family's finest.

Forgotten Scotland Players number 5: Nicky Walker, Hearts and Partick Thistle. 2 caps.

Forgotten Scotland Players: Stephen Glass

Pittodrie. A cold (I suspect it was cold, it usually is) October afternoon in 1998. Scotland are enduring one of their periodic clashes with the Faroe Islands.

A 2-0 lead, the goals from Craig Burley and Billy Dodds, had lasted from the cusp of half time until the 79th minute.

At that stage Craig Brown chose to introduce our latest forgotten Scotland player.

Before the final whistle our hero had missed a chance to wrap the game up, the Faroes had pulled a goal back through a penalty and another Scotland team had turned a meeting with minnows into something of a struggle.

It wasn’t an auspicious start to a Scotland career. For our fourth forgotten Scotland player it was to be both the beginning of his international life and the end of his international life.

Few youngsters, as they put down jumpers for goalposts and dream dreams of future greatness, can imagine their entire international career lasting a little over ten minutes.

Or that they’ll miss a golden chance to score. Or that they’ll watch on aghast as Scotland lose their 11 minutes of international fame by a goal to nil. Against the Faroe Islands.

You never read stuff like this in Roy of the Rovers.

But it’s doubtful if any of this really registered with Stephen Glass at the time.

He was a likely lad on the up, destined for great things.

It was fitting that he took his international bow in Aberdeen. It was there he’d made his name.

He was part of the last Dons side to hoist silverware aloft with a 1995 League Cup win.

That victory served notice of his talent. Glass created both goals in a 2-0 win over Dundee. And possibly cycled home to Aberdeen upon receipt of the mountain bike that was his man of the match award.

By 1998 the much admired midfielder had won himself a move to Newcastle.

It all started brightly enough. So brightly that even Craig Brown, who had little time for new blood in his Scotland teams, took notice and gave him that international debut.

Things then began to stutter. His first season at Newcastle gave a few hints of the injury problems to come although it culminated in an appearance at Wembley in the FA Cup final.

Over the next year or so the injury troubles got worse and Glass was unable to force himself into Bobby Robson’s plans when he was fit. Seen as no more than a squad player he was soon deemed surplus to requirements.

In 2001 he became a successful part of Gianluca Vialli’s unsuccessful stint at Watford. Outlasting the Italian, he played for the Championship side in an FA Cup semi final.

Watford’s finances meant there was to be no extension when his contract ended in the summer of 2003. A free agent, he returned to Scotland and signed for Hibs.

I remember at the time someone describing this as the “Best Signing Of A Scottish Player By A Team Outside The Old Firm For Years.” It wasn’t.

It hinted at Hibs being giving a glimpse of the astuteness for which Bobby Williamson was oft admired but that he too often seemed to mislay in Leith. It wasn’t.

Injury robbed Williamson of the chance to see Glass at his best. But even when fit he seemed unable to perform consistently.

When Tony Mowbray arrived at Easter Road he looked to have found a way of rejuvenating Glass, reinventing him as the experienced man in an inexperienced midfield.

Perhaps relieved to let other steal the headlines rather than labouring under that unwieldy “Best Signing Of A Scottish Player By A Team Outside The Old Firm For Years” moniker, Glass responded positively enough.

But not positively enough for Mowbray to make him an automatic starter the following season, although he did eventually feature more regularly and win a contract extension.

Maybe injuries had taken their toll, perhaps the experience of falling in and out of favour at Newcastle then falling foul of Watford’s finances had diminished his confidence. Whatever the reason, Glass seemed to struggle to provide the stability and influence a young Hibs team needed. He certainly never looked like adding to that solitary international cap.

His Hibs career simply drifted away under both Mowbray and John Collins.

He left memories of flashes of his talent (one particular volley against Aberdeen remains a favourite), a fair dollop of frustration and death by a hundred puns (“Glass in frame,” Glass shattered” and on and on.)

From Easter Road to East End Park. Joining Dunfermline on loan Glass won a permanent move and was captain before injury ruined his 2009/10 season and led to a parting of the ways.

Unable to find a club in Scotland willing to take him on full time, Glass trained with Hibs and considered his future:

"I did think about calling it a day. When people stop answering the phone to you and don't return your calls, you start to wonder. You aren't looking for favours, but you do expect a bit of courtesy.” (Edinburgh Evening News)

He blames this lack of interest on managers labouring under the misapprehension that he was injury prone. But, in many ways, it was because managers were labouring under the quite correct apprehension that Glass has been injury prone throughout his career.

The Carolina RailHawks offered a lifeline and earlier this year he joined up with an expanding Scottish colony at the North American Soccer League side.

Now in his mid 30s you would expect that to be the final act in his career.

It’s an odd story.

Aberdeen, Newcastle, Watford, Hibs, Dunfermline.

The initial trajectory couldn’t be matched. But this was a solid enough career. Fans at all those clubs should have at least a couple of happy Glass moments locked away in the memory banks.

Yet there is a frustration that he wasn’t the player he looked like he could have been.

Odd too that he only got one cap, his profile remained high enough to give the impression of a player more richly rewarded.

He can perhaps count himself unfortunate. Other countries would have given him a cap long before Craig Brown - whose relative success with Scotland carried it with it a hostility to youth - did. These days being a squad player in the Premiership or featuring in the Championship would probably be enough to get him at least a handful of caps.

But it wasn’t to be.

At Hibs his career continued but didn’t quite flourish in the way it could have. Somehow there always seemed to be something holding him back, even when he appeared 100 percent fit.

It’s another example of a talented young player failing to quite make the leap. Glass didn’t have a career that ended in failure. But nor did he have the career you feel he could have had.

Maybe that’s just bad luck. But it’s a bad luck story that seems to happen an awful lot in Scotland.

He got his cap though. A reminder of what might have been? Maybe. But also a reminder of the player he once was and of what the future once promised.

Forgotten Scotland Players Number 4: Stephen Glass, Newcastle United, 1 cap

Forgotten Scotland Players: Warren Cummings

23rd of May 2002. Scotland, without a win that calendar year, were in Hong Kong playing in the Reunification Cup to mark the fifth anniversary of Hong Kong's reunification with China.

Scotland were to play the hosts in the second of their two games in the four team tournament. Three days earlier they had lost 2-0 to South Africa to continue an abject run of form under Berti Vogts.

On the day Hong Kong fielded a representative side drawn from their league although the SFA decreed that this game should be treated as a full international.

Which proved to be good news for the Scottish Football Blog's third forgetten Scotland player, whose appearance won him his sole cap.

Hong Kong offered little resistance to a Scotland side driven, the SFA website recounts, by the midfield duo of Christian Dailly and Scott Gemmill.

Dailly and Gemmill both scored in the second half. But it was the first half advantage provided by goals from Sunderland's Kevin Kyle and Dundee United's Steven Thompson that gave Vogts the cushion he needed to blood his latest youngster.

At half time Maurice Ross was withdrawn and replaced by 21 year old Aberdonian Warren Cummings.

This was an example of Vogts' commitment (an admirable if not always winning commitment) to unearthing young players and hidden talents for Scotland.

At the time Cummings was a Chelsea player although he was never to make a senior appearance for the London club.

In the two years before his Scotland cap he'd played ten league games on loan at Bournemouth and made 19 appearances over two loan spells at West Brom - a dozen of them as a substitute.

His most recent spell at West Brom had allowed him to make some cameo appearances as the club won promotion to the Premier League. But that was the closest he had come to top flight football before Vogts took the decision to fast track him into the Scotland team.

His debut did not go unnoticed. But few seem to have dwelled on it at the time. The BBC match report records only:

"Chelsea's young left back Warren Cummings was given his debut."

Cummings probably didn't care. He was 21, contracted to Chelsea and had just made a winning start to his international career.

Unfortunately on his return from Asia things didn't quite progress as he might have liked. The 2002/03 season started with two loan spells and only eight starts at Dundee United.

In January 2003 Cummings made the loan move that would come to define his career. Chelsea farmed him out to Bournemouth for the second time and he'd made 16 league starts by April of the same year.

Impressed with what they saw Bournemouth made the deal permanent that season as they enjoyed promotion from the Football League Third Division. And Warren Cummings has served them loyally - perhaps an issue or two over pay aside - ever since.

Over 200 first team appearances have followed and in February of this year, although no longer a guaranteed starter, he was made club captain.

Along the way there have been rough times. Financial fun and games and a points deduction meant they flirted with dropping out of the Football League altogether before winning their final home game of the 2008/09 season to guarantee their league status.

Things have looked up since then and in 2009/10 Cummings enjoyed his second promotion with the Cherries as they finished runners up in League Two.

And he might not be finished there. As club captain he could yet be enjoying a Wembley glory day as Bournemouth hover around this season's play off spots. Ten seasons after his walk on part in West Brom's successful promotion season - the season that gave him the platform to play for Scotland - Cummings could find himself back in the Championship next season.

A solid career then. But one that began with a cap for Scotland. Warren Cummings was plucked from obscurity by Berti Vogts for 45 minutes of international football. For most of the Tartan Army I guess he returned to that obscurity pretty quickly.

At times that might have rankled. In 2004 he addressed the issue with Bournemouth's official website:

"I've seen players called up who aren't playing every week for their club."

"It disappoints me to be honest to see players playing reserve team football and getting in ahead, of not necessarily me, but payers playing first team football."

"Other players are playing at higher clubs, but that doesn't mean they are better."

"I just try to forget about it to be honest and take it with a pinch of salt. If I ever did get called up though I'd be very happy and would want to play."

"I'd be absolutely delighted because I'm a patriotic man. If I don't I'd never lose any sleep because I don't really see it happening."

"I wouldn't say I'm a victim of playing in the lower divisions, but I doubt Berti Vogts would take time to come to Bournemouth and see me."

"I don't know if he thinks the standard isn't good enough, but I've played up in Scotland and I think Bournemouth are as good as anyone outside Rangers and Celtic."

A hint of bitterness. But it must be countered that Vogts hardly picked Cummings on the basis of a sustained run of form in 2002.

Still one cap and a 4-0 win gives Cummings a 100 percent record for Scotland. That's more than can be said of Berti.

Forgotten Scotland Players Number 3, Warren Cummings, Chelsea, 1 Cap

> Because of Hong Kong's lack of a national side at that time there were some oddities in Scotland's 4-0 win. Not least that the Scots beat a team captained by a Scotsman. Former Dundee midfielder Gary McKeown had the honour of the armband for the Hong Kong side that day. Scotland, for the record, finished second in the tournament behind South Africa and ahead of Hong Kong and Turkey.

Forgotten Scotland Players: Peter Canero

Confirmation of Scotland's friendly with Denmark had me flicking through the record books to jog the memory about our less than stellar recent performances against the marauding Danes.

We lost 1-0 to Denmark twice during Scotland's Berti Vogts experiment.

The second of those games, a clash in Copenhagen in 2004, gives us the second of The Scottish Football Blog's forgotten Scotland players.

Gary Holt, then of Norwich City, started in midfield, winning the fourth of his ten caps.

But Holt's game came to a premature end after only 16 minutes. Injured, he was replace by today's hero.

On 24 April 2004, Peter Canero came off the bench to make his Scotland debut.

Aged 23, and just a couple of months after leaving Kilmarnock for Leicester City, Canero must have felt this was the start of something big.

But football's a fickle mistress. Those 76 minutes in the Parken Stadium were to be the beginning and the end of Canero's international career.

Making his Kilmarnock debut in 1999, Canero quickly established himself as a regular at Rugby Park and in the Scotland under-21 side.

He would eventually make over 150 appearance for Kilmarnock and get a taste of European football in 2001-02.

By the end of 2003 Kilmarnock were offering a much in demand Canero a 60 percent pay rise to try and persuade him to stay in Ayrshire.

But when Leicester, then in the English Premiership (as was), came calling Canero was lured south.

In the way of such things, his transfer left a bitter taste for some with Kilmarnock settling for £250,000 and blaming the cut-price deal on the malignant influence of the player's agent.

Micky Adams, then manager of Leicester, saw the winger as a signing for the future but it took only three months for Berti Vogts, who collected Scotland players like your spinster great-aunt might collect thimbles, pitched him as a first half sub in that friendly against Denmark.

And then disaster struck.

Injury curtailed not only the rest of his 2003-04 season but the rest of his Leicester career.

By July 2005, when his contract was terminated by mutual consent, Canero had made just seven Premiership and six Championship appearances.

From Leicester he briefly headed back north, spending a couple of months at Dundee United where eleven league games produced two goals.

At the start of 2006 Canero's career took another twist when the colourful managerial pairing of Alexi Lalas and Maurice Johnston took him to New York with Metrostars.

At the time of his signing Lalas had this to say:

"His signing represents a significant upgrade to our flank play, something that is a priority for 2006."

Mo Jo added:

"Peter has a great willingness to win and work hard for his team for 90 minutes."

It was a willingness that the fans rarely saw.

By October 2006, a Metrostar blog had this to say:

"Then, the preseason came, and we started hearing rumbles that Canero was just not that good. And when Metro lined up for their first match in DC, the supposed versatile winger could not win a spot. Amazingly, the three positions he was supposed to be able to play were taken by players with little or no pro experience at those; Seth Stammler at right midfield, Carlos Mendes at left back, and Jeff Parke at right back.

"His appearances off the bench in the first two matches were indifferent at best, and Peter was invisible in his lone start at Salt Lake. Since then, a few late-game appearances, Mo's firing, a long-term injury, six games for the reserves, and finally, his first first-team time in months last weekend, seven minutes as Metro needed cover for the ejected Marvell Wynne. All that for $142,996 a year." (Metro Fanatic)

Unsurprisingly, after just nine appearance, his contract was not renewed for the next season.

And that proved the end.

Canero's injuries seem to have forced him into a low key retirement when still in his mid-twenties. Certainly he was blighted by problems at both Leicester and in the MLS.

Sadly he was destined to join that always worryingly large group of Scottish players who, for one reason or another, don't ever quite graduate from promising youngster to successful career.

The internet throws up sightings of his name on Leicester City forum discussions of "crappest ever player" and "worst ever signing."

That's a shame. It was injury rather than a lack of talent or a distaste for hard work that knackered him in the end.

But, small consolation as it might be, he'll always have that Scotland cap.

Forgotten Scotland Players Number 2: Peter Canero, Leicester City, 1 Cap

Forgotten Scotland Players: Brian Martin

While I’d find it hard to deny that I have my share of strange habits and odd quirks, it is not the norm for me to have images of bald men racing through my mind.

So I find it hard to explain why I found myself thinking about Brian Martin the other day.

But I did. And it’s inspired what might be an occasional series on ‘Forgotten Scotland Players.’

Given this is Scotland, and especially given the selection scatter gun in play during the Vogts' years, this could be a series as long running as The Archers.

But let’s start with Brian.

His career began in 1980 with Albion Rovers and quickly rocketed down a cul-de-sac. A stint at Stenhousemuir followed but it wasn’t until 1985 that he landed a move to Falkirk, switching to Hamilton in 1987 and moving on to St Mirren less than a year later.

At Love Street he established himself in the first team and caught the eye of Motherwell manager Tommy McLean.

By November 1991 McLean could claim to be a Scottish Cup winning manager. But his cup heroes were slipping away from the club and his team were heading nowhere fast, except perhaps the First Division.

He saw something he needed in Martin and duly signed him for £175,000, the only transfer fee of note that Brian ever attracted in his career.

And, at Motherwell, Martin blossomed. Motherwell survived in his first year and he was part of the team that finished third in the league under McLean and second when Alex McLeish took over as manager. Suddenly our hero was hobnobbing with Borussia Dortmund in European competition.

By 1995 the national boss, Craig Brown, was taking notice of Martin’s progress. Never much concerned with youth, Brown plucked the then 32 year old centre half from Fir Park and named in his squad for the 1995 Kirin Cup.

And so it was that on 21 May 1995, some 15 years after he took his bow with Albion Rovers, Brian Martin lined up for Scotland against Japan in Hiroshima.

The starting eleven for a goalless draw was:

Jim Leighton, Brian Martin, Colin Calderwood, Alan McLaren, Craig Burley, Paul Lambert, Billy McKinlay, Scott Gemmill, Rab McKinnon, John Spence and Darren Jackson

Three days later Scotland played Ecuador in Toyama. Brown had rung the changes but Martin stayed in the team for a 2-1 win:

Jim Leighton, Alan McLaren, Brian Martin, Colin Calderwood, Derek Whyte, Paul Bernard, Craig Burley, Billy McKinlay, Scott Gemmill, Darran Jackson and John Robertson.

Names to conjure with there. Not least the four centre halves. Stevie Crawford came off the bench to join Robertson on the score sheet.

Two games, no defeats and only one goal conceded. For a Scottish team that relied heavily on its fortitude in defence Martin’s introduction had been a success.

But his presence owed much to the absence of regulars on that trip and he soon fell out of the reckoning. By 1996 and the European Championships in England, Martin was in the crowd watching Scotland play England at Wembley.

By 1998 he was back in the lower leagues with Stirling Albion and then Partick Thistle. By the turn of the millennium he had retired from professional football but was still turning out in the juniors.

An old fashioned end to an old fashioned career.

Quite a modern claim to fame though. Along with Paul Bernard (who could feature here in the future) he made his only two appearances for Scotland in Japan.

Forgotten Scotland Players Number 1: Brian Martin, Motherwell, 2 Caps