It started with a sicknote and ended in arguably the biggest fairytale story ever penned by a Scottish player.
Paul Lambert, a good solid professional plying his trade at Motherwell, taking a punt on a trial in Germany that was to end with him marking Zinedine Zidane out of the Champions League final a year later. The midfielder would go on to captain Scotland and Celtic but Lambert admits that a decision to pull the wool over Fir Park boss Alex McLeish’s eyes in the summer of 1996 changed everything.
Speaking on the Off The Record podcast, Lambert said: “Motherwell were going to Northampton, pre-season, and Rab McKinnon had gone to Twente Enschede. I kept in touch with him and asked how the move had come around and he told me a Dutch agent, Ton van Dalen, had made it happen and offered to put me in touch with him.
