Remembering Jim

And his finest hour (and a half). Legendary Dundee United manager Jim McLean died at the weekend aged 83. Hard not to see him as the man who created 'my' team. Even although I never met him what he did at Tannadice is part of the fabric of my life. 
In 1971 Jim was a coach at Dens Park and was tipped to take the soon to be vacant manager's job there. Instead he crossed the road and became the Dundee United manager. Back then Dundee were definitely the bigger team in the city, having won the league less than a decade earlier and done well in Europe through the 1960s. I was just eight and my football allegiance was still primarily with Leeds United but when looking for a more local team to support for some reason I picked United rather than Dundee. United did reach their first Cup Final in 1974 but lost 0-3 to Celtic. Dundee went one better, winning the League Cup against the same opponents. As I have written elsewhere I still wasn't going to games but nevertheless had decided I belonged with the tangerine half of the city and was teased with the joke - why are United like a poorly designed bra? No cups and no support. Behind the scenes however Jim was creating a team that would be good enough not just to eclipse our local rivals but to become a force in Scottish and European football. Much has been written about the team he built, blending local youngsters with a few judicious purchases, about his tough motivational style and the incentive-based pay structure at the club. The time when he refused to give the players their full entertainment bonus after a 6-1 victory in the Scottish Cup. Whatever the methods they worked as United won their first trophies - back-to-back League Cups, the second at Dens against Dundee. United were regulars in European competition by then and starting to achieve notable victories over big names. In 1981 I started Uni in Durham and I remember a night in the TV lounge watching the European football highlights. Back then almost all the games in three competitions - European Cup, Cup Winners Cup and UEFA Cup - were played on the same night and there was a lot of games to get through. The number of us in the room slowly dwindled as the programme dragged on before they finally got round to the highlights from Tannadice. United had lost 0-2 away to Borussia Monchengladbach and their coach was already planning for the next round but United won the second leg 5-0.
The following season United pushed for the league title and going into the last Saturday held a slender lead over their two closest rivals - Celtic and Aberdeen. A win at Dens and United would be Champions for the first time ever and only the third time in my lifetime the league wouldn't be won by one of the Old Firm. United took a 2-0 lead, were pegged back to 2-1 but held on for the victory. Jim famously even smiled. The story is that only after the final whistle did he send out for celebratory champagne. There were other achievements - getting to a European Cup semi-final and a UEFA Cup Final chief among them - but no more trophies before Jim finally retired as manager in 1993. He remained as club chairman for several more years. In his later years he was sadly suffering from dementia. There have been many tributes over the weekend, including from Sir Alex Ferguson who described Jim as his biggest adversary in football, back in the days when Jim's United and Alex's Aberdeen stood toe to toe with each other and with the Old Firm. Jim's achievement in taking the second team in Dundee to a Scottish league title and a European final looks even more impressive now. There have been fifty-seven Scottish football seasons in my lifetime. The Old Firm have won fifty-two of those league titles between them with just Aberdeen (three times), United and Kilmarnock breaking the stranglehold.
Jim McLean RIP