Having suspended his medical studies in Glasgow in order to serve in the Boer War as a surgical dresser, Alex Glen contrived, upon returning home, to complete three more years of studies, while playing professional football, initially in the Football League’s First Division – a season each at Grimsby and Notts County – and then with Southern League Tottenham.

He moved within that League to Southampton in May 1906, in time to go on the team’s summer tour, in the initial Danish stage of which he scored eight goals in three games. He became a regular at inside-forward in 1906-07, mainly partnering Frank Jefferis on the right. This was working well, and he was scoring goals, until a breach of club discipline – being drunk, along with Bill Gray and Robert McLean – led to charges of misconduct. A sine die ban dramatically ended their Saints’ careers in March 1907. Glen was permitted to continue his Southern League journey, however, at Portsmouth and then Brentford. However, his life had an unhappy ending during WW1, as this press cutting reveals.