Quiet Man Roars

Alistair Aird

Description

The Quiet Man Roars is the enthralling story of David Robertson, one of the finest attacking full-backs Scotland has produced in the last 30 years. Spotted as a schoolboy, Robertson signed as an apprentice with Aberdeen in the early 1980s. Initially a winger, a series of unfortunate events saw David selected at left-back for a youth game and he never looked back. He made his debut for Aberdeen at 17 and was snapped up by Rangers for just shy of £1m at age 22. David was an integral part of the Rangers side that won nine successive league championships and came within an ace of reaching the first Champions League final. Later, he played in the English Premiership for Leeds United before injury cut short his playing career, prompting a move into management. As a player, he was the epitome of the modern day marauding full-back. As a coach, he has already made his mark across the globe and been the subject of a BAFTA-winning BBC documentary. The Quiet Man Roars is the inside story of one of football's most respected characters.

Informations

• Publié par: Pitch Publishing
• Date de parution: 29 mars 2021
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781785319143
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

First published by Pitch Publishing, 2021
Pitch Publishing
A2 Yeoman Gate
Yeoman Way
Durrington
BN13 3QZ
www.pitchpublishing.co.uk
David Robertson, with Alistair Aird, 2021
Every effort has been made to trace the copyright.
Any oversight will be rectified in future editions at the earliest opportunity by the publisher.
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A CIP catalogue record is available for this book from the British Library
Print ISBN 9781785317668
eBook ISBN 9781785319143
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CONTENTS
Foreword by Richard Gough
Foreword by Walter Smith OBE
1. In the Beginning
2. Living the Dream
3. Making the Breakthrough
4. Winner
5. It s Rangers For Me
6. Nine in a Row
7. Scunnered with Scotland
8. The End of the Road
9. Managing
10. Stateside
11. From Arizona to India
12. Kashmir
13. In the I-League
14. Article 370 and COVID-19
Epilogue
The Last Word
Statistics
Photos
This book is dedicated to the memory of my mum, Muriel Robertson, who sadly lost her brave battle against cancer while I was writing it
FOREWORD BY RICHARD GOUGH
I KNEW of David Robertson before he came to Rangers in 1991. He had broken into the Aberdeen team as a young player and was full of energy and possessed a good left foot. You are always aware of the better players that play against you and back then they would either go to Rangers or Celtic or go down to England. And although David came to Rangers for just short of 1m at a time when transfer fees were starting to take a real hike, for me he was worth the money we paid as he was a good servant for the club.
In the late 80s and early 90s Rangers had a few players who had filled the left-back position, guys such as Stuart Munro and John Brown, but when David came to the club you knew almost immediately that if he was fit, he was going to play. He was a good athlete, and I took to him straight away as first and foremost, he was a good defender. You get full-backs now who get criticised for their defending and use of the ball but Robbo always defended really well. He complemented Gary Stevens at right-back and I knew as a central defender that I had two full-backs who would take no nonsense from anyone and who liked to give the wingers they were up against a hard time.
David suited that Rangers team really well. He had tremendous pace and his recovery was phenomenal; he was quick enough to get back and clear things up. I played alongside some marvellous left-backs like Maurice Malpas but he had a more defensive mindset. Tom Boyd, who I played about ten or 15 games for Scotland with, was a great athlete and very powerful. But for me Robertson had the edge. He was really quick and his partnership with Brian Laudrup, in particular, created a lot of goals for the likes of Ally McCoist and Mark Hateley in what was a successful era for Rangers.
When he came to Rangers he had to adapt fairly quickly to how we played. At Aberdeen, Willie Miller and Alex McLeish were deep-lying centre-backs but at Rangers, I preferred us to hold a higher line. I liked my full-backs to be about two or three yards in front of me but it didn t take Robbo long to adapt. With some young players you can tell them something but it doesn t register and mistakes are made. But that was never the case with David. I told him that was the way we played and he was such a good player that he adjusted pretty quickly. And a few years later when Walter Smith decided to go with three at the back rather than a flat back four, that suited David as it encouraged him to get forward even more.
Although he was quiet, David was also good in what was a lively dressing room. He was a strong character and wasn t one to be messed with. He could handle himself and the bottom line was that he was a good professional. I had a huge amount of respect for him as he was a good player and, as captain, that s what I wanted at the football club.
We speak to each other regularly and I admire the fact that he has always wanted to go and work no matter where it was. When we were team-mates I didn t see him as a future manager as he was so quiet but I take my hat off to him; to go out to Kashmir and do the job he has done tells you a lot about him as a person.
If I was asked to sum up David Robertson in three words it would be tough, good and brave. Exactly what I needed in a defender.
Richard Gough
July 2020
FOREWORD BY WALTER SMITH OBE
BEFORE RANGERS signed David in 1991 when Graeme was still the manager, we had been actively seeking a left-back. Graeme was happy enough to look beyond Scotland for players but irrespective of where our attention was, good-quality left-backs were thin on the ground. We looked at a few and went to watch David a few times too. Personally I didn t need to go and watch him and I had seen the qualities he had when he had played against Rangers.
When it came to the final decision to sign David, Graeme had left to join Liverpool but it was an easy decision for me as I thought he was the best left-back in Scotland at that time. He performed at a high level consistently and, as a manager, that s one of the key things you look for in a defender. You wanted someone who was reliable and David always was, particularly in terms of his defending and how he went about his job. He was keen to get forward too and we had players in the team who could get the ball and hold on to it, allowing David to go on the overlap. He would then have the opportunity to get in a cross or have a shot at goal. David s attitude was first-class as well.
When David came to Rangers he grew into the position and, helped by the quality of players we had in the team, he developed more confidence and became more decisive, particularly in the attacking part of his game. You have to remember this was a young player who had never made a move before. He was used to the environment at Aberdeen and he was now coming into a club that had a high turnover of staff that year due to the introduction of the three-foreigner rule. But we had a good dressing room, one that made new players feel welcome, and David soon realised that he wasn t out of place.
Ibrox can be an unforgiving environment to play in and some players struggle when they come in while others thrive. I have to say that David thrived and over the period he was at Rangers there weren t many other players who were as consistent as him. He was always prepared to go forward, always prepared to take the ball and, initially, when he played with the likes of Pieter Huistra and Alexei Mikhailichenko, they knew that when they got the ball, David would be around them and, if they could play him in, they knew he would get there.
When I decided to change our system in 1995 and go to a back three with two wing-backs, David had no issues adapting. As he was a full-back there wasn t a massive change - David maybe received the ball a bit further up the pitch than he normally would - but it would have been more difficult for a winger or wide midfielder to take on the role as they would have to look more at the defensive aspect of their game. I had no fears that David could play in that position and it s to his credit that this trait - getting the ball in more advanced positions - improved. His passing got better, his crossing got better and so did his finishing.
David played over 200 games for Rangers and, with the amount of work he put in during each of them, the consistency of his performance separated him from a lot of other players who played in that position. He was terrific over the period he was with us and he played as much of his game in the opposition half as he did in his own. There were very few players who covered the ground he did.
One of the biggest accolades I can give David is that when we sat down to pick the team we didn t need to consider him as, if he was fit or free from suspension, he was already in. The amount of games he played in that time - sometimes 50 or 60 a season - was hard going, particularly for someone like David given the work he did up and down the pitch.
I have already said about David s consistency but that word doesn t tell you about the level of performance. David s performances were of a very, very high level and to do that takes a lot of mental toughness. David had that and during the six years he was with us I don t think there many times I was disappointed with his performances. From the summer of 1991 until he left in the summer of 1997 there was a steady improvement as he became more confident playing in a team filled with exceptionally good footballers. In fact if you were to do a statistical analysis of his play during that time you would find that in every department you wanted a full-back to be good in, he was statistically high up in all of them.
I have to admit that I didn t see him as a manager. David was quiet and usually folk who go into coaching are a bit more outgoing, but he has done, and he s made sure that every bit of it has been an adventure. He s gone from the Highlands to the USA and now to Kashmir, which has made for quite an amazing story and an amazing journey. When he was a player I didn t even think he would go to other countries to work, never mind be a manager, but you can see the enthusiasm and intensity he had as a player coming to the fore again now he is in that role. I wish him the best of luck.
Walter Smith OBE
August 2020
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