Heady halcyon days at Highbury: Scots McLintock, Wilson and Graham lead the Gunners to glory in the sixties and seventies

As regular readers will know, the unique feature of this ‘Road to Wembley’ is that for each of the competing teams I try to discover and report a Scottish connection. My next match on ‘The Road’ is Arsenal v Lincoln City on the 11^th March. On the 24^th January, when I first hooked up with the Imps, I reported Lincoln City’s rich Scots heritage. Arsenal have been influenced by many Scots over the years and within my lifetime the names of Frank McLintock, Bob Wilson and George Graham spring readily to mind. All three Arsenal legends are now in their seventies and all are still thriving.

Frank McLintock is a Glaswegian who played all of his professional football in England. In 1956 at the age of 17 he signed for Leicester City and served the Foxes with great distinction, playing 168 games for them before he was sold to Arsenal in 1964 for a then Arsenal club record fee of £80000.

Frank by name - frank by nature: Outspoken McLintock in his playing days

It was at Highbury that Frank’s career really flourished. Over the next 9 years he played an incredible 314 times for the Gunners. He was rarely injured and never dropped. It was during his time with Arsenal that he won most of his 9 Scotland caps. He was regarded as a natural leader and an inspirational character. He was club captain for four years between 1968 and 1972. During this time McLintock led Arsenal to victories in the Inter Cities Fairs Cup in 1970 and a League and FA Cup double in season 1970-71. The erudite McLintock was becoming a spokesman for the club and after their fantastic achievement in 1971 he articulately observed that: “The words used to describe us during the 1970–71 season – dull, sterile, unimaginative – reflect the generally dismissive tone levelled at us. Even the compliments we got – well organised, highly efficient, powerful – had the whiff of back-handed tributes”. McLintock was also able to accurately describe why he only played for Scotland 9 times: “The majority of the Scottish press had disappeared so far up the Old Firm’s arses that they could never be objective about English-based players and the Scottish Football Association (SFA) often treated us like the shit on their shoes”. With such a way with words the stylish Frank was destined for a subsequent career in football punditry. Before that however, he completed his playing career with short spells with QPR and Brentford. He also briefly tried his hand at management and bossed Leicester City and Brentford in the seventies and eighties. He arrived at Sky Sports via a dabble with sports agency management work in the nineties.

Frank the erudite pundit: Charlie Nicholas should book lessons from this guy

McLintock also undertook some punditry for the BBC and is highly regarded on the after dinner speaking circuit. These days, at the age of 77, he is tapering down his media and commercial activities.

Bob Wilson is a former Scottish international goalkeeper who played for Arsenal 234 times between 1963 and 1974. Hence, like Frank McLintock, he also won the Inter Cities Fairs Cup in 1970 and a League and FA Cup double in season 1970-71.

Custodian of the Gunners onion bag in the sixties and seventies: Anglo Scot Bob Wilson 

Wilson became the first player born in England to represent Scotland. He became eligible to play for Scotland when the rules were changed in 1970 to allow players to play for their parents' countries of origin, if they had not already played for their own country. Wilson was selected by Scotland manager, Tommy Docherty for his first match in charge, against Portugal on 13 October 1971. His name is writ large in the history of Scottish football as the original ‘Anglo-Scot’. Despite being unfortunate enough to be born in England, Wilson is a very patriotic Scotsman and continues to support the country of his father’s birth. After hanging up his boots, Bob Wilson became the presenter of the long running BBC Saturday lunchtime football show ‘Football Focus’. He anchored this iconic show from 1974 through until 1994.

Wilson still makes occasional appearances on television, on the BBC's Football Focus and Match of the Day 2, as well as occasional work on documentary programmes for Sky Sports. These days the septuagenarian Wilson is best known for his charity work. In February 1994, his daughter Anna was diagnosed with malignant schwannoma, a cancer of the nerve sheath. After a long fight, she died on 1 December 1998, six days before her 32nd birthday. The "Willow Foundation" was set up in her memory in 1999 and operated locally, mainly in Hertfordshire. Wilson relaunched the charity in 2005 with a national remit. The organisation was established in Anna's memory and now helps some of the estimated 12,500 people in the UK, aged 16–40, who are diagnosed every year with a life-threatening illness. In 2007, Wilson was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire(OBE) for his charity work.

Like both McLintock and Wilson, George Graham was also a member of the all conquering Arsenal team of the late sixties and early seventies. The man from Bargeddie in North Lanarkshire played for Arsenal 227 times between 1966 and 1972 scoring 60 goals. As with his Caledonian teammates McLintock and Wilson, Graham too was a Scotland international donning the famous dark blue jersey on 12 occasions, netting 3 times for the Scots.

George Graham: One of the most successful Arsenal managers in their history

 However, George Graham is more readily remembered by the Arsenal faithful for his very successful spell as Arsenal manager. He managed the club between 1986 and 1995. During his spell in the hot seat The Gunners won 2 League titles, The FA Cup and 2 League Cups. Halcyon days at Highbury. His place in Arsenal folklore is secure but he will also be remembered for taking on the job as manager of Gunners’ bitter rivals Spurs between 1998 and 2001.

Taking pelters: George Graham pilloried by the Arsenal fans for taking the Spurs job

This is amazing when you consider that George has a brick patio in the shape and design of the Arsenal crest in his back garden! These days Graham does the odd spell as a pundit on Sky TV and he has admitted that the onset of arthritis has ruined his golf and forced him to take up tennis. At 72 ‘Stroller’, as he was known in his playing days, is still going strong.

The Scots had a massive influence on the success of Arsenal in the sixties and seventies and Frank McLintock, Bob Wilson and George Graham were at the heart of it all. More recently the Sky Sports pundit with verbal diarrhea Scot Charlie Nicholas was the last Scotsman to play over 100 games for the Gunners. Champagne Charlie left Arsenal almost 20 years ago. The present cosmopolitan Arsenal squad have no jocks in it. I have a call out to the twitter feed Arsenal Scotland (@ArsenalScotland) to try to find out who the last Scot to play for Arsenal was – so watch this space. It has been a while. 

Meanwhile back in Lincoln, the Imps can not stop winning as they get ready for the FA Cup tie on Saturday week. On Saturday they travelled to the outskirts of the big smoke to take on Boreham Wood in the quarter final of the FA Trophy. Genius manager Danny Cowley made several changes and the fringe squad members stepped up to the plate and the Imps won comfortably 2-0. Yhey are now in the last 4 of the Trophy and one tie away from Wembley in two competitions! Tonight the Imps play host to York City in the Vanarama National League and Sincil Bank is expected to be bursting at the seams for this match.

Will Lincoln City win again? Will the ‘Arsenal Scotland’ twitter feed unearth some more Caledonian Gunners legends? Will I finally get my ticket sorted for the match at The Emirates Stadium on the Road to Wembley from Scotland? Come back here later in the week for the answer to these questions and much more .. and .. keep reading.