The arrival of teenage Scottish defender Calvin Ramsay at Liverpool this summer continues a long and successful association between Anfield and north of the border.
The 18-year-old right-back will be glad to hear a familiar accent across the dressing room (and potentially across the back four) with his compatriot Andy Robertson having long established himself as a key component of Jurgen Klopp’s side and one of the finest left backs in Europe since his own low-key move from Hull City five years ago.
It’s a welcome addition also for supporters of a certain vintage who were brought up seeing a strong smattering of Tartan through the glory years of the 60s, 70s and 80s, with it often being said many of the best Liverpool sides featured a strong Scottish influence.
Indeed the club’s first ever season back in 1892/93 relied heavily on Scots after LFC’s founding father John Houlding, having evicted Everton from Anfield and set up his own team, embarked on a scouting mission north of the border with the aim of finding a “first class player for every position on the pitch”, the famous ‘Team of Macs’ which featured nine former Scottish league players being crowned Champions of the Lancashire League and gaining entry for the first time to the top flight of the Football League.
And that’s before you consider the influence of Billy Liddell, Bill Shankly and Kenny Dalglish, three of the most iconic figures in the club’s long and decorated past.
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There are numerous other Jocks whose endeavours in the red shirt to varying degrees wove them into the fabric of English football’s most successful club and this weekend marks the anniversary of the arrival of one who played a largely unsung but nevertheless valuable role during one of Anfield’s most eventful periods.
Gary Gillespie had already made history at the age of only 17 when he became the youngest player to captain a Scottish league club after being handed the armband by his boyhood club, Falkirk. Despite having not long made his debut for The Bairns and playing part-time while working in a bank, the youngster’s calm assurance and ability on the ball prompted manager Billy Little’s show of faith and confidence much to the teenager’s surprise and enduring pride.
“I used to go and watch Falkirk on a regular basis when I was younger”, he recalled. “My grandad always took me from a very young age to watch them. Being that young, when I was nine or ten, it was intoxicating with all the smells, the liniment, the Bovril, the pies. It was always fantastic, I used to sit on my grandad’s knee!
“We weren’t the best team in the world, we were in the lowest division at the time and we were struggling a bit, so that probably helped get me a chance in the first team. When you’re young you don’t fear too many things and it was a fantastic opportunity that I got, I never thought much of where we were playing. I went in to see the manager one day and he told me he was going to make me captain. I was quite shocked about it to be honest with you because I’d literally just broke into the first team and at such a young age as well. The manager at the time Billy Little had actually been my English teacher at school and also my next door neighbour as well, so whether that had any sway into the fact I was made captain, I'm not sure. He probably picked me because I was the one guy who was going to get a regular slot in the team. It was such a great honour to have.”
The honour wouldn’t be Gillespie’s for long as inevitably his impressive progress drew the attention of bigger clubs both north and south of the border and despite reported interest from Jock Stein’s Celtic, before the end of his maiden season with Falkirk in March 1978 the young defender joined First Division Coventry City for an initial fee of £40,000, managed at the time by former Liverpool midfielder Gordon Milne, who said "He can become a great player. The lad has such mature head. Obviously he has a lot to learn about our game, but the potential is incredibly exciting.".
“The opportunity to go down to Coventry, who were in the English First Division at the time, was just too good to pass up”, Gillespie admitted. “I had a little trial with them then packed in my job at the bank to sign! It was something I always wanted to do, I didn’t see myself working at the bank the rest of my days, although I’d probably have been better off if I did! I moved there in the March and come the start of the next season I made my debut at age 18 in the English First Division. It was a bit of a baptism of fire I have to say, being just a young guy getting thrust into that kind of spotlight. It was great there. They were a very forward-thinking club that gave their young players opportunities, and there were a lot of them down there. It was always a bit of a battle to stay in the First Division, we weren’t in the upper echelons of the league, but it was a great place to grow up from when I was 17.”
Highfield Road proved the perfect breeding ground for the young Scot and - despite injuring his knee ligaments in only his fifth reserve game at Everton, an unfortunate portent of the injury woes he would suffer throughout his career - he recovered in time to get his first taste of playing at Anfield only five months after joining and even got to spend time with Bill Shankly himself.
"Certain things in football you forget everything, but I remember this day very clearly. Of course the tie up was our manager Gordon Milne had been a player under Shankly and the great man came for pre-match lunch with us at the Post House hotel out in Haydock and actually ended up traveling on the bus into Anfield with us. We got there slightly more than an hour before the game. Shanks got off the bus with us too and led us into Anfield. Just to be sat down at the same table, literally opposite each other, and being in his presence was so special in itself. Listening to him talking about football was fascinating for a young lad like myself. He was one of those great oracles that you could just listen to for hours and hours on end. I even remember he had that brown suit on, an orange shirt and a red & white striped tie. Well his dress sense wasn't fantastic was it? That was Shanks; a great aura with a great personality."
Gillespie made almost 200 league appearances for the Sky Blues over the next five years, helping them maintain top flight status during that period while demonstrating elements of the cool defending and ability to bring the ball out from the back which had made fellow Scot Alan Hansen regarded as one of Britain’s finest defenders during the same time at Liverpool. With Gillespie’s stock continuing to rise and his personal ambitions stretching beyond a virtually annual relegation battle, it was only a matter of time before another step up beckoned and it arrived in the summer of 1983 when he became Joe Fagan’s first signing as Liverpool manager after taking over from Bob Paisley.
“It was a funny time at Coventry around the time that I left”, the Scot remembered. "There were nine of us players that all had contracts up, how that happened I’m not sure. They did want me to stay, they offered me a contract, but I went out and I talked to some clubs including Arsenal. I was more or less ready to sign for Arsenal, it was the time where Charlie Nicholas had just come down and joined them and they had very big plans. I had told the Arsenal people I’d spoken to that I’d give them a call the next day, but when I got home I got a call from the club saying Liverpool wanted to talk to me. I told Arsenal I’d had another offer and went up to talk to Liverpool. They were League Champions then and had a fantastic pedigree and team. I thought it was the next big step for my career and it was quite an easy decision. I would’ve actually made more money signing for Arsenal but going to Liverpool was something I thought I had to do.”
Dislodging two of Liverpool’s finest ever central defenders in Alan Hansen and Mark Lawrenson was always likely to be a big ask for the young Scot during a period when Anfield’s dominance of the domestic scene - their 1983 title win was the club’s seventh in eleven seasons - and this proved to be the case with Gillespie having to wait until the following February for his first team debut. Handed a starting shirt due to Lawrenson being unavailable through injury for the first leg of the League Cup semi-final against Third Division Walsall, he didn’t get off to the most auspicious of starts with an unfortunate error causing an own goal which helped the Midlands minnows secure a shock 2-2 draw.
"There was a big pressure to perform and we were expected to hammer Walsall”, he admitted. “At one point I was trying to clear the ball off the line. It smacked Phil Neal in the back and bounced in for an own goal. Nealy gave me one of his stares."
With Lawrenson soon available again for the Treble-chasing Reds, that unhappy evening against the Saddlers would be Gillespie’s only first-team appearance of his debut season although with five substitutes allowed in Europe he was on the bench for all nine fixtures of Liverpool’s successful European Cup run which saw them remarkably defeat Italian champions AS Roma on their own ground to clinch the club’s fourth continental triumph in seven years and seal an unprecedented hat-trick of trophies with a third league title in successive years and fourth consecutive League Cup also secured.
Back then it was not unusual for young players joining Liverpool to spend a season or two in the reserves learning their trade and honing their craft but a gratified Gillespie did begin to feature more regularly the following campaign, initially in the opening rounds of the League Cup, but he was soon handed an opportunity on the global stage when being picked to start in the World Club Championship against Argentine side Independiente in Tokyo. His inexperience saw him caught out early on for Jose Alberto Percudani’s sixth minute goal which decided the match but it was a memorable experience for more than reasons than one.
“It was a big plus for me to play in a game like this”, he said. “Mark Lawrenson had got injured on the flight out to Tokyo — his hamstring wasn't right after being sat down for 18 hours. He actually did a fitness test by trying to run up the slope of an underground car park at the hotel. The trophy wasn't high on our list of priorities. We were having a difficult time in the League and the focus was on winning that again — we were going for four titles in a row — but we really should have beaten Independiente. I got sucked out of position early on and they scored with a ball over the top. We were the better side but you have to give them credit. They took it so seriously and had some top players — such as Jorge Burruchaga who went on to win the World Cup with Argentina 18 months later.
“The trip was all a bit of a whirlwind. We were in economy both ways and Anchorage was again the stopover destination. The one thing the trip was memorable for was meeting Rod Stewart on the way back home. I've still got the photographs. Kenny Dalglish knew Rod and he invited all the Scottish lads in our squad for a drink with him — it wasn't just the aeroplane getting refuelled! There were six Scots in total but I seem to remember a few of our team-mates made themselves honorary Scotsmen so they did not miss out.”
It was a difficult season of transition for Liverpool following the departure of Graeme Souness to Sampdoria in Italy and relative struggle with hopes of a fourth successive league title scotched after a poor start which saw Fagan’s men in the relegation zone in late October, Merseyside neighbours Everton romping to their first championship in fifteen years although the Reds would eventually recover to finish a distant second. Disappointment followed in the FA Cup as well with semi-final replay defeat to Manchester United but a second successive European Cup final was reached against Juventus at the Heysel stadium in Brussels. Although named on the bench, a recurrence of Mark Lawrenson’s shoulder injury saw Gillespie thrust into the action after only three minutes but what should have been one of the greatest nights of his career had already turned into a nightmare when crowd trouble before the game and a charge by Liverpool supporters saw the collapse of a wall and the ensuing deaths of 39 Juventus supporters.
“We were never officially told before the game people had died but we knew,” Gillespie, whose foul on Polish forward Zbigniew Boniek brought the penalty converted by French star Michel Platini that decided the match, told the Mirror years later. "But we also knew that the game probably had to be played. With hindsight, maybe we shouldn't. But who knows what would have happened then? All I know is that there is only one word to describe the atmosphere as we walked out... eerie. There were no words exchanged. Just a look between players. A look that said, 'Let's play the game, get it over with. Whoever wins, wins’. Not a decision was contested, hardly a voice raised in anger. I actually came on as a third-minute sub for Mark Lawrenson, gave away the penalty and can hardly remember a thing about the match. What started out as an electric, exciting day had turned into a nightmare. They got the trophy on the pitch, we got our medals although mine never made it home, but everyone just wanted to escape to the dressing-room. Everyone wanted to make sure their friends, their family were safe. It was surreal, and the tragedy and enormity of what happened actually didn't sink in until we got home, watched the news bulletins and read the papers. You know, looking back over a career, I would probably like to have that medal. But in the grand scheme of things, it doesn't matter. I lost a medal ... but there were 39 families who lost loved ones."
After two years at Anfield, Gillespie found himself at something of a crossroads. Although he made 24 appearances in 1984/85 which included 19 starts and a first goal for the club against Newcastle United, his disappointment at not keeping his place in the side whenever Lawrenson or Hansen returned to fitness saw him go and speak to Joe Fagan about his frustrations and future.
“I felt when I came into the team our form didn’t drop and I was playing good football. He obviously saw my point of view and to a certain extent I could see his as well. Let's be honest, the Lawrenson and Hansen partnership was sensational. However, it didn’t do me any good as I wasn’t playing and keeping my place in the team. I was 24 coming up to my peak and wanted to be playing regularly. My ambition in football was always to play at the highest level, and if it wasn’t going to be for Liverpool then I’d have to look for other options.
"Anyway, that’s the way the conversation went. I don’t know if you would call it a transfer request, it was maybe more of a 'I want to be playing'-plea. Joe didn’t do anything about it and just left the conversation in mid-air and was never mentioned again! Heysel passed and I think everyone knew Joe was going to retire and with Kenny taking over I decided to stick it out and the following season after initially getting over a couple of Achilles tendon injuries in December 1985 I got a regular spot in the side. It was then when I felt, I was finally part of the first team."
An almost ever-present in the second half of the 1985/86 campaign, Gillespie played his part in one of Liverpool’s most memorable ever seasons as Dalglish’s side - with the Scot in a player-manager role - won the club’s first ever League Championship and FA Cup Double, edging out neighbours Everton in both competitions to return to local supremacy after Goodison’s glory of the year before. Gillespie agonisingly missed out on the Wembley final against Howard Kendall’s men after being laid low with a virus but wrote his own chapter in the title triumph. The Toffees win at Anfield in late February had put them firmly in command of the title race and hot favourites to return their crown but the Reds embarked on a winning run that kept them in touch until the season’s closing weeks and on the penultimate weekend of the league campaign with every game now a must-win in the knowledge one more Everton slip would put the title destiny back in their own hands, Liverpool entertained relegation-threatened Birmingham City at Anfield with Gillespie emerging the unlikely hero after scoring a second half hat-trick.
His first goal came a minute after the interval when, with Liverpool already ahead at the break through Ian Rush, he rose highest at the far post to nod home Craig Johnston’s corner and, after Jan Molby converted a penalty, the Scot added his second and the Reds’ fourth nine minutes later when converting from close range after a series of one-twos with Rush. Seven minutes from time, a second penalty of the afternoon was awarded when the rampant Rush was brought down by Julian Dicks and the Kop immediately made it clear who they wanted to take it by bellowing out Gillespie’s name.
"It was kind of bizarre”, Gillespie told LFCHistory, “because that season it was nip and tuck with us and Everton with West Ham still in with a shot at the league title. Not long before the Birmingham game, Paul Walsh had an opportunity to get a hat-trick from taking a penalty. Walshy missed and when we got back into the dressing room Ronnie Moran went absolutely berserk at him, as at the time it was thought the league could be decided on goal difference. He really went mad with him. If Ronnie had any hair left he would have been pulling it all out. Anyway, Rush won a penalty when the score was 4-0. I could hear the Kop shouting my name. I glanced over to Ronnie Moran stood on the touchline and he was shaking his head. Kenny was on the pitch as player manager, so it was him who actually told me to come forward. So, I ran forward to take the ball off the manager and with Ronnie Moran on the bench shaking his head at me, I felt rather nervous. Fortunately, for Liverpool and myself it went in and we went on to win the double."
Despite the heartbreak of missing out on the first all-Merseyside FA Cup final, Gillespie had now firmly established himself as a genuine option for Dalglish at centre-back with his new status reflected the following campaign when he more than doubled his appearance tally from the previous two seasons by featuring in 51 out of the 57 games Liverpool played in 1986/87. Although the Reds were only able to finish second in the league to Everton and lost the League Cup final to Arsenal at Wembley, the Scot’s increasing status within the squad saw Dalglish move a fully-fit Lawrenson to full-back to accommodate Gillespie alongside Hansen.
“It was a great testament to my playing ability that I finally was able to cement a place in the starting XI when Lawro went to play at full-back", Gillespie said. "However, occasionally we did play as a back three unit as well, as Kenny did like to mix it up a bit. The run into the double season in 1986 was when it felt like I had established myself in the team and the following season is when I considered myself a first-team regular."
Lawrenson’s premature retirement due to an Achilles injury that spring further consolidated Gillespie’s status as one of the club’s senior central defenders and another 42 appearances followed in 1987/88 as Dalglish’s rebuilt side, with John Barnes, Peter Beardsley, John Aldridge and Ray Houghton adding a new attacking dimension following the departure of Ian Rush to Juventus, playing some of the best football Anfield had ever seen and strolling to one of the club’s most dominant championship victories. The Scottish defender chipped in with goals as well including late and vital early season winners against Luton Town and Sheffield Wednesday, as well as memorable strikes in the run-in against Manchester United and in the 5-0 rout of Nottingham Forest regarded by many still as Liverpool’s finest ever 90 minute performance.
A second Double in three seasons beckoned with unfancied Wimbledon lying await in the FA Cup final and a freak injury in the Reds’ last match before Wembley against Luton played a part in Gillespie’s Wembley misfortune (he would miss out on the 1989 final through injury again) striking again. With the title long since secured and the final only five days away, the Scot and Reds midfielder Nigel Spackman suffered a clash of heads in the dead-rubber against the Hatters which put their involvement in the final only five days away in jeopardy.
“We ended up spending the night in hospital and did our fitness test in a hotel corridor. Roy Evans and Ronnie Moran threw balls and we headed them as best we could. It hurt but we were so desperate to play."
The pair were both named in Dalglish’s line-up but both appeared from the tunnel wearing protective headbands which can only have emboldened the Dons, notorious for their direct and physical approach to the game, and despite dominating much of proceedings in the way they had over the course of their stellar season, Lawrie Sanchez’s first header from a set piece and John Aldridge’s missed second-half penalty saw Liverpool fall victim to one of the biggest shocks in FA Cup history.
"They had to work on free-kicks because they couldn't play”, Gillespie claimed. “That's a bit harsh actually but we didn't do much work on set-pieces and Sanchez just got across Gary Ablett. They were a dead-ball threat, of that there is no doubt. Aldo was down afterwards. Alan Hansen more so because it was his testimonial the week after and I think the loss took about 5,000 off the gate, so he gives Aldo stick for that one. That second double was in our grasp and that is the biggest disappointment for me. The year later we won the cup and should have won the league. Three doubles would not have been unjust, that's how good that side was.
“Looking back on a personal level it was probably my most successful season. I played a lot of games and was picked in the PFA Team of the Year. We won the league and really had a magnificent side; it was a wonderful team to play in and actually quite an easy team to play in they were so good! Confidence is so important in football and we had bags of it then. We went out thinking we were going to batter teams and we often did. It was a real pleasure to be a part of that team and it was the pinnacle of my eight years at Liverpool.”
The injuries which pock-marked Gillespie’s career returned in 1988/89 with the last of his 21 appearances being against Sheffield Wednesday at Anfield the week before the fateful FA Cup semi-final against Nottingham Forest at Hillsborough which saw 97 Liverpool supporters unlawfully killed in European football’s worst ever sporting disaster. Although not involved on the day, Gillespie had a first-hand view of the traumatic impact the horrific events in Sheffield left in particular on the manager.
Speaking after Kenny Dalglish was knighted in 2017, Gillespie said “It’s long overdue. If you had saw what he did after the Hillsborough disaster, it was phenomenal. He held the city together really. He was immense. The one thing that Kenny wasn’t good at was dealing with the media and public speaking. He was a very private man, and he still is today. At times, that can be seen as quite harsh, especially with the media, but he showed his true character at that time. He was all over the place speaking at services and meeting with fans, and it was just such a comfort to the families and the people who needed it most. If you go anywhere in Liverpool, his name is synonymous with what he achieved not only on the football pitch, but off the pitch as well.”
Gary Ablett’s impressive showings at centre-back while filling in for the injured Hansen during most of the Hillsborough season along with the arrival of Swedish international defender Glenn Hysen during the summer of 1989 as well as more niggling injuries further limited Gillespie’s first team opportunities and he only featured 16 times as the club’s 18th league championship was won in 1990 although he managed to leave his mark by scoring the winner against Derby County in the final home match of the season before the championship trophy was lifted at Anfield.
Hansen’s imminent retirement saw Gillespie figure more in what would be his final Anfield season, making 31 appearances in 1990/91, but it was a campaign when the lingering effects of Hillsborough came home to roost with the watershed moment being Dalglish’s shock retirement due to stress two thirds of the way through the season with Liverpool top of the league and in the midst of another titanic FA Cup battle with Everton. It was a devastating blow to the club which would take decades to truly recover from and a seismic shock to all concerned although Gillespie admitted years later to bearing witness only a week before the manager’s departure to the increasingly intolerable strain he was under.
“I didn't see it coming, nobody did. I'd say, at the time, myself, Steve McMahon and Alan Hansen were the closest to Kenny and we had no idea whatsoever. It literally came out of the blue to us three and the rest of the players working with Kenny on a daily basis. He obviously, had been a little unwell and felt the pressure. He later told me what finally broke the camel's back for him; he was finding it difficult to make key and decisive decisions that he could previously make with ease. This inability to make these decisions in the way he wanted was probably the trigger for Kenny to step down. Knowing Kenny, he would have thought this wasn’t the way forward, neither for himself nor more importantly for Liverpool Football Club.
“A week prior to Kenny’s departure we all went out for dinner in Southport, which a few of the players and our wives used to do after the games and this didn’t really change when Kenny was made manager. We’d been out at a Chinese restaurant and Kenny and Alan Hansen entered into.. let's just say a difference of opinion. Anyway, Kenny ended up losing it with Alan Hansen. Alan and him were and still are best of friends, so witnessing this was one of those kind of like stand back kind of moments. I don't know if this would have influenced his decision or not, and Kenny would fall out with his shadow at times but never with Alan Hansen.
"Liverpool back then never finished outside of the top two, so it was the pressure that he put under himself. If a modern day manager was doing what Kenny was doing he would be the best manager in the world, so it wasn’t the pressure of the team doing badly but the pressure of maintaining Liverpool as England's top club."
Dalglish was eventually replaced in the dug-out by fellow Scot and one of Gillespie’s former Liverpool team-mates in Graeme Souness but the centre back never got the chance to play under his former captain after being sold to Celtic for £925,000 in the summer of 1991. It was a decision Gillespie and Souness would look back on with some regret although at the time the player felt he had little choice.
"We had gone away for pre-season and I found myself not starting games as Liverpool had just signed Mark Wright from Derby County”, Gillespie remembered. “Graeme didn’t discuss anything with me about my future on the trip but the Tuesday before the start of the season he pulled me and told me he wanted to make me number one centre-back alongside Mark Wright which I found a little bit strange as I hadn’t played in hardly any games during pre-season. He knew I struggled with injury and he even started telling me his idea of getting physiotherapist and coach Phil Boersma to set up a specific training plan for myself in order to increase my muscle strength. I told him I thought that was great and thanked him; however, here comes the interesting part. The very next day I was approached by Roy Evans telling me the manager wanted to see me in his office. He basically told me the club had accepted an offer for me from Celtic and he gave me the freedom to discuss personal terms with them.
“As a Celtic supporter it wasn’t that easy for me in that respect. Celtic were obviously a massive club but they were lost at that time, so for me it was the wrong time to join. They were in turmoil amongst all the directors and the stadium needed redeveloping. Therefore, looking back it was probably the wrong time to leave Liverpool, especially with the Premier League era about to start. I did have one year left on my contract at Liverpool so I could have easily stayed if I had wanted to. However, if one minute the manager is telling me he wants to make me his number one centre back and then five minutes later the club accept an offer from another club, suggested that the truth was, he probably didn’t want me there. That’s how I looked at it, that’s how I understood it and that’s why I signed for Celtic. I think Graeme has since regretted his decision to have me sold, not only with myself but also with the likes of Peter Beardsley, Ray Houghton and Steve Staunton. He probably now realises he got rid of us a little bit too early."
Despite further injuries, Gillespie managed 82 appearances for Celtic over three seasons before finishing his playing days back at Coventry under the management of former Anfield team-mate Phil Neal. After coaching spells at Highfield Road and Stockport County, he turned his hand to media punditry and has provided regular commentary for many years on Liverpool matches through the club’s official television channel. His love for the club and perceptive understanding of the game often comes shining through and has extended his association with the club he served with great distinction but not always the best of luck.
"I would have loved to have played more games. The first two years I could understand, with the Hansen and Lawrenson partnership. Also injuries blighted my career really, which was really disappointing. Nowadays I’d probably have played a lot due to the rehab and medical side to clubs. When I was at Liverpool we literally had nobody, we didn’t even have a physio apart from Roy Evans and Ronnie Moran that is! So it was a bizarre situation, but who is to say that way wasn’t wrong? Liverpool were winning absolutely everything back then including four European Cups so they were obviously doing something right. It was the best eight years without a shadow of a doubt of my life. I’ve never moved away from the area. I’ve lived in Southport since 1984 and it’s great to be still connected to the club in some capacity. I’ve been very lucky as a footballer to play with my hometown club, the big team I supported growing up, to play for my country and to play for Liverpool who were such great champions.”
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