Stubbs, Alan

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Fullname: Alan Stubbs
aka: Stubbsy
Born: 6 October 1971
Birthplace: Kirkby, Merseyside, England
Height: 6ft 2in
Signed: 1 August 1996
Left: 5 July 2001
Position: Defender, Centre-half
Debut: […]
Internationals: none

Biog

Alan Stubbs arrived at Celtic Park in the summer of 1996 in a £3.5 million move from Bolton which made him the Hoops then record buy.

The capture of the highly rated centre-half was a significant coup for Celtic and manager Tommy Burns who moved quickly to secure the services of Stubbs from under the noses of several English sides including Arsenal.

The deal though was not without controversy and Celtic found themselves in disagreement with FIFA. Eventually the club were fined £41,000 for the use of an unlicensed agent during his transfer – brothers Ian and Neil Rioch. This became a hotly contested case and another of Fergus’ bees-in-the-bonnet.

The Merseyside-born defender had been a standout performer in the English First Division for a Bolton side that also included future Celtic favourite Alan Thompson.

Comfortable in possession and a fine passer of the ball Stubbs was regarded as an elegant centre-half who could also play the holding role in midfield. Hopes were high that his arrival would greatly improve the notoriously shaky Bhoys defence.

It took Stubbs some time to find his feet in Glasgow and inconsistency and niggling injuries meant his trophy-less debut season was far from the success many had hoped. Many even seemed to be writing him off in his first season and thinking the worst.

However the following season (1997/98) Wim Jansen, who had replaced the axed Burns, brought in Marc Rieper from West Ham and the Danish international defender brought out the best in Stubbs.

The pair immediately formed an impressive partnership and the duo played a significant role as Celtic took the League Cup and then – on the last day of the season – claimed the championship to stop Rangers from making it a record breaking 10 league titles in a row.

Stubbs even scored a last-gasp headed equaliser to claim a 1-1 draw and a well deserved point against Rangers in a rearranged game at Parkhead on November 19th – the original game having been postponed in the wake of the death of a member of the UK Royal family (Diana Spencer).

A career ending foot injury struck Rieper early into the next campaign, and both Stubbs and Celtic suffered as a result. Despite defensive partners – and indeed managers – changing regularly, Stubbs’ remained a solid and mostly impressive performer in the Hoops although Rangers had by now regained the upper hand.

Rumours that Stubbs was ready to return to England seemed to circulate regularly, with the whisper being that his wife could not settle away from her family on Merseyside. In truth the rumours and Stubbs’ apparent angling for a move did not go down well with the support who believed that Stubbs had not yet fully lived up to his lavish price tag (the media played it all up too).

All that was to be insignificant when in the summer of 1999 a routine drug test after the Scottish Cup final defeat to Rangers revealed Stubbs was suffering from testicular cancer.

With the full support of everyone connected with Celtic the big defender fought back not once, but twice from the illness, something all are very proud of.

His battle against cancer meant that naturally his appearances for Celtic were limited in his last couple of seasons with the club and he played little more than a cameo role in the treble winning 2000/01 campaign.

With his contract up in the summer of 2001 Everton moved in and Stubbs moved to Goodison to join the club he supported as a boy. He would later join Sunderland but briefly returned to Everton before a short spell at Derby. He retired in August 2008 at the age of 36 after suffering a serious knee injury.

Stubbs was undoubtedly a quality defender and he put in many impressive performances. His battle against testicular cancer meant the player was probably robbed of the opportunity to really stamp his mark on history of the club and in the hearts of fans.

As it was, many supporters believe that for a variety of reasons Celtic, apart from that one season alongside Rieper, never saw the best of Alan Stubbs. In total Stubbs started 139 games for the Hoops in five seasons, but maybe the truth is that the support could have seen an even better player than they did, the first team being hampered by the club’s predicaments.

It was a rough time in the early years when there was a desperation to win the league title which didn’t help, but in any case Stubbs played his part for the club and we wish him well.

He definitely had much fondness for the club:

“I fell in love with the ground, with the history and with the friendliness I encountered“.

Alan Stubbs went on to become a manager across various clubs in both Scotland & England, most notably at Hibernian…..

Playing Career

Player Pics

• Player Pics

Books

• Alan Stubbs – How Football Saved My Life (2013)

Quotes

“The thing about Celtic is that it’s a fantastic club, both when you’re there and when you’re not”
Alan Stubbs (2015)

Alan Stubbs caused a bit of a storm when he revealed in a podcast (Aug 2023) what a Scottish referee remarked to him an over a quarter of a century ago. Alan said that the referee, who he declined to mention to spare his blushes, told him that he said “while I’m refereeing you’ll never get a penalty against Rangers.”
Alan Stubbs (2023) (link)

Sturdy Alan Stubbs was vital cog in a green machine that blocked 10-in-a-row

Evening Times
Chris Jack31 May 2010

Celtic are set for a summer of major transfer business as they attempt to wrest the title back from Rangers.

Here, in the first of our lookback series on the Parkhead club’s big deals of the last two decades, we focus on ALAN STUBBS’ 1996 big-money move from Everton. The summer of 1996 proved to be the beginning of the end of an era at Celtic, but events that unfolded had a profound impact upon the Parkhead club.

In the shadow of Walter Smith and a Rangers side closing in on an eventual nine-in-a-row, Tommy Burns was preparing for what would be his final season in charge.

The decisions Burns made during that last summer at the helm did not help him break Rangers’ domination of the Scottish top flight, but one signing was to prove invaluable to successor Wim Jansen.

Attempting to fix a fragile defensive unit, Burns broke Celtic’s transfer record to lure Alan Stubbs from Bolton, beating off interest from a number of Premier League sides to secure the big Englishman.

The £4million acquisition was a shrewd move and one that was later to prove invaluable to the Parkhead side. “It was a good bit of business” said Stubbs’ former team-mate Malky Mackay.

“Celtic had him watched the year before he signed, Tommy had people going down to see Alan play and everyone was impressed by him. “Bolton were doing well at the time and Alan performed well in the big games.”

Mackay immediately struck a rapport with his fellow centre-half, helping Stubbs come to terms with the change of scenery and expectations that accompanied his move across the border.

Stubbs endured a difficult debut season in Scotland with injuries and inconsistent form summing up a campaign which again saw the Hoops end a season trophy-less.

But he earned respect from both sides of the Old Firm divide for his combative style and the way he battled testicular cancer during his Celtic sojourn. Mackay would only spend one full season sharing a dressing room with Stubbs before he joined Norwich City, but the Liverpudlian made a lasting impression.

“He was the same age as me so myself and a few of the other local boys took him about and played golf with him and stuff like that,” he said. “It can be lonely at a new club when you are young so we went out together and I think that helped him settle quicker.

“You have to immerse yourself in the club, especially somewhere like Celtic, and realise what you are buying into to and Alan did that.”

After finding his feet on the park and adjusting to life in Glasgow’s goldfish bowl, Stubbs was to play an integral part in preventing Rangers securing an unprecedented 10 league titles on the bounce.

His injury-time goal in a 1-1 draw with Walter Smith’s side in November, 1997, kept the Hoops in a title race that they would later go on to win, while the understanding formed with Marc Rieper also saw Celtic lift the League Cup in Win Jansen’s debut season.

“I thought at the time when he joined that it would be a good signing and that ended up being the case” Mackay said.

“He was one of the stalwarts of the team that Wim Jansen ended up winning the title with.

“He had a good range of passing, he had good feet but he would put his head in where it hurts.

“He was a leader on the park and a good talker and that is why he was worth £4m. He was an excellent servant for Celtic.”

Alan Stubbs – before, during and after Celtic

By: Laura Brannan on 27 Nov, 2013 10:04, source: http://www.celticfc.net/newsstory?item=4984

Best player you played alongside
Wayne Rooney. He’s got a fantastic football brain – you could ask him to play in any position and he would do well. He’s a natural at everything, he’s a special player. I played alongside him when he was 16 or 17, the earlier part of his career, and what he did at that age I’d never seen before. He shouldn’t have been doing that at that age, he was so far ahead of everyone. His football intelligence is on a different planet so no one else comes close. Henrik was also different but Wayne was special.

Toughest opponent
Probably Alan Shearer. He had a bit of everything. He was good in the air, good on the floor, he was strong, and he was a real handful to play against. I played against him about 10 times maybe, and they were always good battles. We always did okay against Newcastle at that time but he was a real handful. He scored against us as well and one of them was voted one of the best Premier League goals ever, it was 30-yard volley. It was an unbelievable goal and there’s nothing I could have done about it. It was one of these goals you could have put six goalkeepers in and they still wouldn’t have saved it.

Favourite game
My favourite fixture was the Celtic v Rangers games and my favourite game would be the 6-2 win. We were lucky because we had a really good team then, full of really good players. Any win against Rangers is good but to beat your closest rivals 6-2 is quite emphatic. They’re the scorelines you can’t write, to be three goals up after 10 minutes you have to pinch yourself to check that it’s real. When that happens you can get carried away and think you’re on easy street, and before you know it the other team are back in it, but we were always in control that day. It was a special occasion for the fans as well to own the bragging rights for a bit. And it was a fantastic goal by Henrik as well. His performances against Rangers was always pivotal, he was a great player and it was a great privilege to play with him.

Most disappointing game
It’s probably the 1-0 defeat to Rangers in the 1999 Scottish Cup final – that was most disappointing. To lose to your closest rivals in a cup final, it doesn’t get much worse than that. It was a hard one to stomach and I think in the game we were the better team, but then Rod Wallace scored to win the match 1-0 so it made it even worse. It’s also the last game of the season so there’s nothing you can do to put it right, there’s no game right after it to help you get it out of your system. You have all of summer to think about it. I’ve been fortunate to be on the other end and be the winner going into the summer but no one ever remembers the runners-up, do they?

Favourite away ground
That would be the Emirates, Arsenal’s ground. There’s probably two, though -the Emirates and the Etihad, Manchester City’s stadium. Both of them are new stadiums. When you walk into Arsenal’s there’s a feel of class to it, you get a sense of how the club is run and there’s a great atmosphere. Man City’s is similar. It was built for the Commonwealth Games when they were in Manchester and they were lucky to have a ready-made stadium to go into. To me a good football ground has identity. You go into some and they can be cold, quiet, and they don’t have any personality or history. But if you look at Celtic Park, when you walk in it’s intimidating. It’s got an identity and a ‘Wow’ factor, and that’s just with it empty. When it’s full then you’re talking about a proper football stadium.

Least favourite ground
My least favourite was probably East End Park, Dunfermline’s ground, before they had built the new stand. When I played there the dressing rooms were horrendous, it wasn’t necessarily the stadium that was bad. The dressing room was a little square box with 20 grown men getting changed, physios, kit men moving around, an open toilet in the middle of the room – it wasn’t great.

Proudest moment
I’ve got two from a football perspective. One was playing for Celtic and the other was playing for Everton, they’re definitely the proudest moments I’ve had in football. It’s a privilege to say I’ve played for both those clubs. I’m very honoured and proud to have been given those opportunities. I speak about them both with the same fondness. I was an Everton fan as a kid so that would probably edge it out as my favourite for a photo finish but there’s not much in it. Celtic are a special club with special fans and it was a fantastic five years I had there.

Biggest regret
I don’t have any regrets. I could easily say this was a regret or that was a regret, but I don’t. What happened, happened and everything happens for a reason. If I had a chance to go back and do it again I probably wouldn’t change anything.

Favourite goal scored
My favourite was the one against Rangers when I scored to equalise in the last minute at Celtic Park in 1997. We’d played quite well in the game but found ourselves 1-0 down, then managed to find an equaliser in the last couple of minutes. Because of the occasion and the relevance it actually felt like we’d won the game. It contributed to us winning the league that year as well so it was very important. I can’t really remember what it looked like but I think I hit it first time and curled it into the top corner. No,wait, I think that was my goal at Ibrox. It was a header in the 1-1 game.

Greatest goal witnessed
That’s a great question…oh I don’t know…I would probably have to say Diego Maradona’s goal against England. And no, not the Hand of God one! The one where he dribbled through, it was a fantastic goal and had a huge importance on the game, but obviously not great as an Englishman. It was a moment of great individual skill and composure as he went through the England team as if they weren’t there. He was the best player I’d ever seen but another Argentinean has taken over that mantel now, in Lionel Messi.

Tell us something we don’t know about your career
I was very close to signing for Liverpool at one point. I don’t know how that would have gone down with myself or my family. I don’t think a lot of people know that. It was before I left Bolton to come to Celtic, I think it was the year before. I don’t think it would necessarily have written off my chances of going to Everton because there have been players who have gone to both. There have also been a lot of Everton fans to have played for Liverpool – Steve McManaman, Michael Owen, Jamie Carragher – they were all Everton fans who played for Liverpool so it wasn’t unheard of.

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Glove party Former Celtic defender Alan Stubbs reveals the secrets behind ‘smell the glove’ and stopping Rangers ten-in-a-row
The ex-Hibs gaffer also revealed how close he was to leaving the Hoops to join the English Premier League the year before stopping Gers

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Alan Stubbs claims ref in Rangers clash with Celtic told ex Parkhead star he will ‘never’ get a penalty against Ibrox side

1 Sep 2023
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/sport/football/alan-stubbs-claims-ref-in-rangers-clash-with-celtic-told-ex-parkhead-star-he-will-never-get-a-penalty-against-ibrox-side/ar-AA1g3sln
Story by Matthew Fulton • 16h

Alan Stubbs claims he was told by a former referee during an Old Firm game that Celtic would ‘never get a penalty’ against Rangers while the official was on the field.

The former Hibs manager turned out for the Hoops over 100 times and was embroiled in more than a few heated derbies with with rivals Rangers. Yet on one occasion, the Englishman has revealed, he was told by the match official that his Hoops side would ‘never’ be awarded a spot-kick while he was in charge. It comes after the former defender believed Celts were denied a stonewall penalty during a game, but it was ultimately not given.

Stubbs told the No Tippy Tappy Football Show: “I had a situation, and this is going back to when I was playing for Celtic at Rangers. There was a certain referee there who was refereeing the Celtic and Rangers game, Old Firm game.

“We had a stonewall penalty which was not given and I’ve gone to the referee and I’m saying to him, ‘How on earth can you not be giving that?’ in probably much different language from what you’d say.

“He basically ran past me and said, ‘While I’m refereeing, you’ll never get a penalty against Rangers.”

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