Conn, Alfie

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Full name: Alfred James Conn
aka: Alfie Conn, Alfie Bhoy, Alfred Conn
Born: 5 April 1952,
Birthplace: Kirkcaldy, Fife, Scotland
Signed: 1 March 1977
Left: 30 Apr 1979 (free); 8 May 1979 (Derby County)
First game: Aberdeen away 0-2 league 5 March 1977
Last game: Aberdeen home 1-2 Scottish Cup 14 March 1979
First goal: Partick Thistle home 2-1 league 9 March 1977
Last goal: Aberdeen home 1-0 league 3 March 1979
International: Scotland
Internationals Caps: 2 caps
International Goals: 0

Biog

Alfie Conn rocked Scottish football to the core when he signed for Celtic in March 1977. Jock Stein usurped Rangers who were hoping to bring Conn back to Ibrox and it was felt in later years that Stein saw him as a replacement for Kenny Dalglish who had made it clear he was to depart in the summer of 1977. Alfie Conn was part of the infamous Rangers side that won the ECWC in Barcelona in 1972 (and were then banned from defending it the next season).

Alfie Conn’s move from Spurs to Celtic in 1977 caused a sensation. But few people knew he took a wage cut from £240 to £70 a week. Even today, he still gets recognised. He said:

“They all ask me the same question – ‘Why did you sign for Celtic?’ They all get the same answer – Jock Stein. He was the manager and he was the main reason.”

Despite coming on as a debut substitute in a 0-2 defeat at Pittodrie, Alfie had a tremendous start to his Celtic career and won league and Scottish cup winners medals by 7th May 1977. He made his first Parkhead appearance on 9th March against Partick Thistle and almost lifted the roof with a marvellous goal. The Celtic fans immediately took to Alfie and any doubts that they would not accept him were unfounded. The Celtic fans gleefully sang the popular chant:

‘He used to be a Hun but he’s alright now, Alfie, Alfie Conn‘.

On 19th March he returned to Ibrox in the green of Celtic and despite predictable constant abuse from the Ibrox support he played well and struck a post in the first half with a great shot in an exciting 2-2 draw. He came close to scoring, and hit the post with a shot but some Celtic fans accused him of doing it deliberately: “Sometimes you cannae please anyone!”.

English newspapers announced on 25th March 1977 that Spurs wanted Alfie Conn back and that the Spurs fans were in uproar over the loss of one of their favourite stars. However, nothing came of it and Spurs were eventually relegated to the 2nd division.

The 1977/78 season was a disaster for both Celtic and Alfie Conn. Despite rave reviews in Celtic’s summer tour of the Far East against Arsenal and Red Star Belgrade, he was badly injured against Dundee United on the opening day of the season and never fully recovered for the rest of the campaign. He was brought on as a second half sub against SWW Innsbruck in the European Cup and was taken off after being brutally hacked by an Austrian defender. His presence, experience and skill was a great loss to Celtic in the coming months.

After Jock Stein’s departure and Billy McNeill’s arrival as manager in the summer of 1978 a new reinvigorated Alfie Conn was seen and his early form was splendid. He was instrumental in Celtic’s fine early start when they won 12 of their first 13 matches in all competitions. He had a magnificent game at Fir Park in the 5-1 win in August when he scored two exquisite goals. He scored a wonderful winner against St Mirren at Parkhead during this period, controlling a long ball, beating the centre-half and rounding the Saints’ goalkeeper to score.

Despite earlier relying on his experienced men like Conn, Glavin and MacDonald, by the Spring of 1979 McNeill began to blood a new, younger crop of players like Provan, Conroy, MacLeod and McCluskey. So Alfie was now marginalised and never played in the hoops again after being injured against Aberdeen in March 1979. Celtic went on to regain the league title from Rangers that season (1978/79) to give Billy McNeill a great start as manager, and Alfie Conn had played his part.

He moved on in the summer of 1979 and became something of a wanderer.

Alfie Conn’s performances in Celtic’s colours will ensure he is remembered, but then again more so for having wound up Rangers’ fans for moving to Celtic than anything else. He should be best recalled as a talented player who was a superb asset to Celtic during his time at Parkhead.

Playing Career

Team	Years
Rangers	1968-74
Tottenham Hotspur	1974-77
Celtic	1977-80
Hearts	1980-81
Golden Bay Earthquakes	1980
Blackpool	1980-81
Motherwell	1981-83

Honours with Celtic

Pictures

• Alfie Conn Pics

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The Bhoy in the Picture – Alfie Conn;

Written by St Anthony

Link

There are some memories that stay vividly in the mind and I will always recall one dark morning from early March 1977.

My Father always departed to work before I wakened each morning but not before he popped over to the newsagent for his Daily Record (I know, I know !). As I lay in the warm comfort of my bed he woke me up and urged me to come and see the paper. Both of us looked on incredulously at the sight of the ex Rangers player, Alfie Conn, signing for Celtic. These years later I think that Dad woke me up because he wanted to share the moment with someone and discuss it with his boy before he left the house that morning. He only ever did this once more and that was six months later when Kenny Dalglish signed for Liverpool. Not such a great memory that one….

It’s difficult now to describe just how sensational a signing Jock Stein had pulled off back then. Alfie Conn had been an ‘arch-Hun’, with his long flowing locks, facial hair and side burns he was a player of note on and off the field and had been a member of the 1972 Rangers team which had lifted the European Cup Winners Cup in Barcelona. Stein’s transfer coup was all the sweeter because he pulled it off at a time when the Scots media had been making noises about Alfie returning to Glasgow, not to Parkhead but to Ibrox. In truth it is fair to say that Alfie Conn was the last player Celtic fans would have expected Stein to sign at that time.

He was a headline writer’s dream and predictably the papers ran with the banner headline of ‘What’s it all about Alfie ?’ after the popular Burt Bacharach record of the period. Stein was not entirely sure about making the move for Alfie. He took aside Kenny Dalglish and Danny McGrain, his captain and vice- captain, to ascertain if there were any potential problems and was assured by both that there were none whatsoever and that Conn would be a great addition to the team. Alfie was to be judged on one thing only and that was talent which was something he had in abundance.
He had been a thorn in Celtic’s side in the past. In 1973 he had scored a dramatic last minute winner in the traditional New Year fixture and the same year he had scored for Rangers in their 3-2 centenary cup final win over Celtic. He had moved to Spurs for a huge fee and the only reason Celtic were able to acquire him from North London was that Terry Neill had become the new manager at White Hart Lane and both men had a clash of personalities.

Alfie made his Celtic debut as a late substitute in a 2-0 defeat at Pittodrie on a day when Celtic dominated the game but could not finish off their great build up play. It has to be said that he looked a different man and not only because he was in the unusual colours of green and white. At Stein’s express request the scruffy wavy hair and facial growth had gone and he now sported a clean shaven, smarter image. He was now a different man in more ways than one.

His home debut was a midweek fixture against Partick Thistle and I can recall the reaction of the Celtic crowd to his appearance. The Jungle went absolutely mad and took to him immediately although the older fans in the Celtic end and main stand remained a bit more suspicious. It has to be said that Alfie quickly won everyone over with his fine technique and flair. He scored on his debut with a great run and shot past the Scotland goalkeeper Alan Rough and looked one of the few Celtic players who was on the same wavelength as the great Dalglish. The Celtic fans lapped it up and cheered his every touch and there were even humorous arguments on the terraces as some fans noisily debated whether Alfie’s real name was Alfred or Alphonsus !
The first fixture against Rangers at Ibrox was always going to be a difficult hurdle for him and predictably both sets of fans turned their attention to him. The Celtic supporters regaled him with: ‘He used to be a Hun but he’s alright now, Alfie, Alfie, he used to be a Hun but he’s alright now, Alfie, Alfie, Conn !!!’ (To the tune of Camptown races). The Rangers reply was rather more crude:
‘Alfie’s a barrel, Alfie’s a barrel of s****!, s****! s****!, s***** !!!’ (to the tune of roll out the barrel). It’s to the shame of Celtic fans that we later adopted that same vile chant for Aberdeen’s Joe Harper.

The Glasgow Herald reported when Celtic were leading 1-0:

I am sure that more than a few Rangers fans had turned to the exits after 15 minutes when Alfie Conn jinked his way inside the penalty area and curled a shot round Stewart Kennedy towards the net. Even Alfie turned round to receive the congratulations of the Celtic players, but the ball came back off the post and Rangers took over.

It’s a pity that one didn’t go in but the game finished 2-2 with Alfie giving a great account of himself in the hoops.

Alfie created history in 1977 when he was in the Celtic team who beat Rangers 1-0 in the Scottish Cup final and thus became the only man to win medals in Old Firm cup finals for both sides. Celtic’s winning goal came from a penalty and when it was awarded there were many Celtic fans in the ground screaming, ‘Gie it tae Alfie !!!’ Andy Lynch scored the winner from the spot and Alfie had helped himself to the ‘double’ of league and cup medals.

In the summer of 1977 all looked well for Celtic and Alfie Conn. However Kenny Dalglish jumped ship for Anfield in early August and there are those of us now who believe that Jock Stein had seen the writing on the wall and anticipated Dalglish’s departure with the arrival of Conn as his eventual replacement.

As if Dalglish’s departure was not bad enough, on the first day of the 1977/78 season Alfie was carried off with ligament damage after badly twisting his leg on the Parkhead turf. He missed almost the entire season and even when he returned as a substitute against Innsbruck in the European Cup he had to hobble off and be replaced. His absence was one of the contributing factors to Celtic’s worst season for many years.

Billy McNeill returned as Celtic manager in the summer of 1978 and Alfie had a purple patch early in the season with 10 goals in the first two months and some of them were virtuoso efforts such as the goal against St Mirren at Parkhead when he controlled a long ball from defence, beat two defenders, rounded the goalkeeper and slipped the ball into the net, all in one flowing movement.
McNeill wasted no time in changing the playing personnel and he seemed eager to offload some of his more experienced men such as Ronnie Glavin, Joe Craig and Paul Wilson. In early March 1979 Alfie scored a highly important winning goal against Aberdeen at Parkhead and yet by mid April he had been released on a free transfer by the club. In later years he was to lament that he and McNeill did not see eye to eye and therefore his departure was inevitable.

During his period at Parkhead it was said Johnny Doyle humorously referred to Alfie as ‘The Currant Bun’ and Alfie would respond in kind by whistling the sash. All of this much to the delight of the other Celtic players who were entertained by their two team mates winding each other up.

In later years Alfie could be found working in the Captain’s Rest pub on Great Western Road. A friend of mine was in that establishment one day and said that Alfie spoke warmly about his Celtic days and recalled his memories of Stein, Dalglish and McGrain amongst others.

Alfie Conn was a man of many clubs and only played for Celtic for a short time in his career. However he won himself two league medals and a Scottish cup medal so it was certainly a successful period for him. He was made welcome at Parkhead and for those of us who witnessed his talent in the hoops it was a pleasure to have seen him play.

Alfie Conn on crossing Old Firm divide

by AIDAN SMITH

Updated on the 30 January 2015
source: http://www.scotsman.com/sport/football/spfl/interview-alfie-conn-on-crossing-old-firm-divide-1-3675667#.VMx08zRUHOg.twitter

Published 31/01/2015 00:00

Cavalier footballer took playing for both Rangers and Celtic in his stride

I know, I go on about hair a lot – the length of it, the unruliness of it, the fingers-in-an-electrical-socket freakery of it, but maybe this will be the last time because finally I’m to meet Scotland’s greatest. Think Louis XIV and the barnets which were kicking about in his day. Imagine Deep Purple as the houseband for the king’s court. And then visualise Alfie Conn striding in, casually flicking his gigantic tresses and scattering everyone like skittles.

He suggests the motorway services at Harthill for our morning rendezvous, on his way home to Coatbridge from the nightshift as a warehouseman in Livingston to babysit for two of his three grandchildren. At 62 Conn likes the quiet life now but back in the day it was thunderous.

For those thinking that Celtic and Rangers in the League Cup tomorrow might be a wee bit intense, here’s some perspective: in 1968 when Conn arrived at Ibrox, a 16-year-old without the required smart suit, 78,197 witnessed the first Old Firm game of the season, with 70,153 re-convening for the next one just a few days later. This was the League Cup when it was played in sections and the following season the grizzled foes were again paired together, total crowd for the two ties: 140,829. In the next campaign, same competition, there was an Old Firm final, with Conn helping Rangers to victory in front of 106,263.

And then when he’d had his fill of that – swanning off to Tottenham where he could really let his hair down, growing it a length that would have caused Ibrox overlord Willie Waddell to spontaneously combust – he came back to Glasgow and did it all over again, this time for Celtic. Some never forgave the defection.

“I don’t have much to do with football now,” he says, “because I got fed up being asked the same question: ‘Why did you sign for them?’ I even got it off fans who were too young to have ever seen me play. One time at Ibrox a few years ago I was having a smoke when this bloke approached me. I could usually spot them and the way this guy was walking I knew he had something he wanted to get off his chest. “What are you doin’ here?’ he said. ‘Sorry?’ I said. ‘I thought you’d be hiding in the same cave as Osama bin Laden.’ Fair play, though: that was quite funny.”

What hair Conn has left has turned grey. Cradling his coffee while the snow blows outside, he speaks softly, but not without humour of his own.

“I’ve got a great old photo from an Old Firm game,” he says. “The teams are running out of the tunnel and all the Celtic boys have nice short-back-and-sides. Then there us: Greigy [John Greig], Doddie [Alex MacDonald] and me, all with the massive sideboards. You grew your sideys big to make up for the Rangers rule of not being allowed to have your hair touching your shirt collar. Bloody hell, we look like Planet of the Apes.”

If you’re too young to have ever seen him play or weren’t paying attention, Alfred James Conn was a cavalier footballer with the bangs to match, an inside-forward of considerable swagger and swerve and a hero of Rangers’ triumph in Barcelona who at Spurs got given a great honour: Alan Gilzean’s old song. But of course he wasn’t just the hair apparent but the heir apparent too.

Conn was six when his dad Alfie Sr stopped playing for Hearts and the Terrible Trio were no more. “I never saw him play, which I regret, but he did take me to Tynecastle as a wee boy and we had a kickabout. And wherever we went folk would say hello or shake his hand so I knew he was pretty famous. I was very proud of Dad and to this day will tell people how these three guys scored almost 1000 goals for their club.

“Willie Bauld and Jimmy Wardhaugh were often round the house. The three of them were great friends and golfed together at Ratho Park. Then, after a spell with Raith Rovers, Dad got the chance to play in South Africa. We had a furniture clearance to sell up everything. We had a going-away party and I remember sitting on the stairs of the house when Dave Mackay gave me a ten-bob note and told me to spend it on sweeties. But the move fell through.”

The old man taught him the finer arts with a tennis ball. “That was how he practised his cannonball shot, scudding it off a wall. Hitting a small ball gave him control and timing. My shot was never as strong as his – I didn’t have his muckle thighs – but he got me to trap and dribble with the tennis ball. ‘After this,’ he said, ‘the big one’s easy’.”

Interestingly, young Conn liked rugby, too. “I loved the physical contact,” he says, and maybe this stood him in good stead for the Old Firm stramash. He was stand-off for his Prestonpans school on Saturday mornings, playing juvenile football in the afternoons. On public parks he’d battle for midfield supremacy with Alex Cropley, although the best of his generation never made it: “Jackie Murphy, every club in Britain wanted him, but he was knocked down and killed by a police car.” Conn trained with Hearts alongside Willie Bauld Jr and Hibs and actually signed an S-form with Leeds United after Don Revie was persuaded by his scout to visit these muddy parks and see the lad play. But only one club interested him.

“Dad was friendly with [Rangers’] Jimmy Millar who’d arranged for me to see round Ibrox. I’d been inside Tynecastle of course but Ibrox blew me away. Even though I’d signed with Leeds, when I came home and [Gers manager] Scot Symon was parked outside I was thrilled. Dad phoned Don and persuaded him to tear up the contract so I won’t hear a bad word said against the man. My father had wanted me to get an education but I’m afraid Rangers put an end to that.”

The debut came at 16, a substitute for Alex Ferguson. Afterwards it was upstairs to the offices to be properly welcomed, Sandy Jardine emphasising that Symon should be addressed as “Sir” before pointing Conn in the direction of a good tailor. When Alfie Sr moved the family to Kinghorn, the young buck joined the Fife contingent of Andy Penman and the Willies, Johnston and Mathieson, for the train journeys west.

“Sir” or not, it didn’t take our man long to stand up to authority. Symon had given way to Waddell and right after that 1970 League Cup triumph, Conn knocked on the boss’s door to suggest that having been a regular all year he maybe merited more than £15 a week. After a long pause, “The Deedle” peered over his specs and said: “You’re right. I’ll put you up to 17.” “I actually walked out. This was a man who’d have sent me all the way back to Fife if I’d turned up for training without a tie and there was me, aged 18, telling him: ‘Phone me when you come up with a better offer’.” So the pattern was set: Conn would forever fall out with his managers. “I couldn’t keep my mouth shut,” he smiles. Nearly all of his sendings off, nine in total he thinks, were for “lip”.

Conn loved the Old Firm tumult. “Just a wall of noise. You couldn’t hear your team-mates.” You couldn’t hear Bertie Auld’s wisecracks, but wasn’t he daunted coming up against Lisbon Lions? “No. They were great players but at that age I was pretty fearless. I just wanted a game of football.”

The Celtic matches were tough, of course, and Conn has little time for the play-acting and powder-puffery of football now. The modern player wouldn’t have lasted long in his games or even his training sessions: “You got kit on a Monday which was never washed all week, even if you’d trained in four mudbaths in succession. By the Friday the socks could be so caked they’d clunk when you hit them off the benches.” But the rivals in green and blue were great friends, sometimes faking the aggro for the theatre of it all. “Two guys jabbing fingers at each other could have been discussing where to go for a drink afterwards, for all the crowd knew.” Conn’s boozing buddies included Jimmy Johnstone and Dixie Deans. “The banter was terrific. Any player back then who claimed they didn’t enjoy Old Firm games must have been lying.”

Conn won only four against Celtic as a Ranger but two brought trophies. The win bonus for the League Cup was £500 and three years later the team got £750 each for the Scottish Cup triumph courtesy of Tom Forsyth’s piledriver from three and a half inches. “Has there ever been a better Old Firm match than that?” wonders Conn, who also scored. So what was the bonus for Cup Winners’ Cup immortality? “I’m not saying, but it got me a brand-new Cortina GT.” Conn didn’t expect to make the team for Dynamo Moscow. “I’d phoned home the night before and Dad told me he’d heard on the news that Andy Penman was in. When The Deedle read out my name at the pre-match meal I had to run off to be sick.”

That team was quickly broken up as Jock Wallace took charge. “Jock and I clashed. He said I wasn’t a midfield player and put me up front. Then he replaced me with Ally Scott.” Conn knew his number was up and Rangers cashed in. “Susan and I had just got married six weeks before. The Rangers team were at the wedding along with Kenny Dalglish and Marina. We’d bought a house in Kirkcaldy and gutted it. Then suddenly we were off to London.”

Waddell refused to do business with Tommy Docherty at Manchester United and so it was Spurs, only for Bill Nicholson to quit. Terry Neill was another who liked to see as much perspiration as inspiration from his midfield, maybe more, and Conn languished in the reserves until Pat Jennings and Cyril Knowles pleaded his case for a start. It came against Newcastle United, he scored a hat-trick and the fans right away hailed King Conn. “Born is the king of White Hart Lane,” they sang, following the abdication of Gilzean.

The hair got longer, the dribbles got longer and Spurs’ stay in the old First Division got longer, Conn becoming a trump card in the club’s relegation fight and even having the nerve to sit on the ball in the crucial game against Leeds. “We were three-nil up. Billy Bremner said: ‘You’ve just antagonised us.’ They scored two, but we hung on. Afterwards I went into their dressing-room to apologise.”

Free from the scrutiny of the Ibrox style police, the shirt billowed free and the socks dropped to the ankles. But he laughs at the idea his hairstyle was somehow iconic. “Well, I do remember a letter from a woman in the London Evening Standard: ‘He’s a nice footballer but the hair is quite the scruffiest I’ve seen.’” The Conns loved London and fell in with a psychedelic jazz-rock combo. “The Tony Evans Association. A cousin of mine was married to the main man. We’d go and see them play the Talk of the Town. Once on Susan’s birthday Tony took us to a swanky place called the 21 Club and he paid, thankfully. It was four weeks’ wages just for the prawns.” His flair-packed form brought him a couple of Scotland caps, unfortunately including the 5-1 thrashing by England at Wembley in 1975, but injury disrupted his Tottenham pomp. “For my medical the club doctor was on holiday and I was seen by his brother. The doc told me later I never should have passed.”

His career would wind down in Pittsburgh, his father’s beloved Hearts and Motherwell, but before then: sen-sation! “It kept the world talking, didn’t it?” he says of signing for Celtic that would bring him a couple of championship medals and another Scottish Cup, beating – who else? – Rangers in the final. Maybe he was naive, but he couldn’t believe all the fuss and bother.

“Religion-wise, I’m neither one thing or the other. I made a pure football decision to go to Celtic. I didn’t want to leave Rangers, don’t forget. Jock Wallace didn’t want me and I was playing for Spurs reserves when Jock Stein came to watch me. It was a no-brainer. He was the best, bar none. Who wouldn’t have wanted to play for Big Jock? He asked the players if they thought he should sign me and apparently they told him to go for it.”

Conn slurps the last of his coffee. The snow is heavier now and he must get back for the grandkids. “I don’t like talking about that time because there was a lot of hassle for my family and me.” More in hope, so that we might remember that tomorrow is only another game of football, I ask him if his bestriding of the great divide produced any funny moments.

“Oh aye, there were a few of them. Before leaving London I did an interview with a paper. I remember the last line: ‘And even his dog is called blue.’ That didn’t do me any favours but the name came from The High Chaparral. My old English sheepdog was a dead-ringer for the cowboy known as Blue. Nothing to do with Rangers.

“And then there was my first Old Firm game playing for Celtic. There was a mini-riot, a pitch invasion. The Rangers fans sang ‘Alfie’s a barrel, Alfie’s a barrel of you-know-what.’ The match finished 2-2, honours even, although I hit a post and the Celtic fans accused me of doing it deliberately. Sometimes you cannae please anyone.”