Becoming the first – and up to now – only opposition player to score four goals in a Scottish Cup-tie at Ibrox (in 1972 for St Mirren v Rangers) and the Buddies’ top goalscorer in Scotland’s Division Two for three consecutive seasons, Ally MacLeod soon had English club scouts flocking to Love Street. One was Campbell Forsyth, who then encouraged Ted Bates to travel north to inspect the goods and clinch the deal (see scrapbook section).

Bates initially envisaged him as Mick Channon’s understudy, so Ally’s early chances were far and few between. The arrival of a new manager, closely followed by Peter Osgood, pushed him further down the pecking order and towards a continued diet of “boring” Reserves football. So, although he loved living in Southampton, he was “glad to get away, football-wise.”

A young Alex Ferguson tried to re-sign him for St Mirren, but the transfer never materialised.

After a loan-spell at Huddersfield, under Bobby Collins, Ally now returned to Scotland, for eight years with Hibs, during which he regularly top-scored, despite often dropping back into a midfield role. In 1982, he signed for Dundee United but a serious knee injury, sustained while doing his coaching badge, meant that he never kicked a ball in anger for them. In an effort to save his career, he had one or two Reserves outings with a couple of other clubs, partly to test his knee and partly as favours to a couple of friends.

Realising that a full recovery was beyond him, he turned to the world of finance. It is a world he had sampled while he was a part-time youngster at St Mirren, with a “day-job” at the Bank of Scotland. He would now come to manage the Glasgow office of an Australian insurance company – until 2000, when he set up his own company, offering independent financial advice. Originally based in Glasgow, AML Associates are now prospering in Kincardine. Ally remains a very good friend of Gerry O’Brien, a sometimes team-mate in Southampton’s Reserves, and is a member of the same golf club as Campbell Forsyth, the man who was most responsible for his brief stint at The Dell.