Big Dunc talks about his disgraceful treatment by the SFA

Don't forget Paul McGowan, don't remember him getting jail or a 12 match ban.

"EX-St Mirren and Celtic footballer Paul McGowan SPARED jail after police assault"​


"It was McGowan's third such conviction for assaulting a police officer"

 
SFA ?

Go back to 1978 and how they shafted Willie Johnston who was banned and sent home in disgrace by the SFA from Argentina for using a banned substance.
"Asking himself why he didn't just sit out Scotland's opening game in the 1978 World Cup with hay fever instead of gulping down two Reactivan antihistamines before kick-off. "

"When they call me now I just say I'm on holiday' "​


 
I’ve just reached the bit where he is talking about his house getting broke into. Never knew the first time it was someone who actually live close by to him.
 
Ferguson was on probation for a previous assault, which was his 3rd assault charge.
1 of his previous 3 charges was headbutting a policeman.
He was jailed solely for that incident.
Ferguson clearly had issues.
Ferguson was treated badly by the media, the SFA and a lot of people in Scotland. He was targeted as a bit of a gallus guy who was really good at football and folk thought he needed pulled down a step or ten.

It’s also true that he didn’t help himself and had a string of assault charges to his name well before the McStay incident.

The sad truth of it is that Duncan Ferguson had to leave Scotland to be able to get the space to be a footballer. If he has stayed at Rangers then he would have been hounded throughout.
That transfer to Everton let him breathe.

Can you imagine what Ferguson and Gascoigne would have conjured up on & off the field together though?
 
Compare and contrast how Ferguson was vilified by the media and the SFA, against genuine toilet lickers like Griffiths and Lennon.

As @RabSpackman pointed out above - Ferguson simply had to take the oppurtunity to leave Scottish football when Everton came calling, his cards were marked the moment he signed for our club.

I don't know what help or support Rangers gave to him during his spell with our club, but I suspect they were relieved to recoup most of the money back on Ferguson & move on.
 
An absolute nothing incident with McStay aswell. Something you have seen a thousand times on a football pitch since it happened.
Has there ever be another incident that happened on the Pitch that resulted in a player in court I don’t think so,ffs McGowan has Police assaults and didn’t do time a complete travesty what happened to Duncan Ferguson I’m still ashamed the way Rangers left him out to dry .
 
There was an article on here years ago that it was a campaign by the Celtic supporting Procurator Fiscal and his Celtic supporting assistant , both of whom were at an Old Firm shortly afterwards when Grant really did headbutt someone.
It was supported by STV raising it every day for a week to make sure he did not get a fair trial. Delahunt fronted it , I think.
 
I could be wrong but I haven't heard or read anywhere of any other Scottish footballers or clubs being treated like Willie Woodburn and Duncan Ferguson by the SFA , other than Willie Johnston.
Big Lafferty , he was given such a lengthy ban only because of his connection and past with Rangers. Opus Dei in motion....
 
Just finished listening to the full thing. Excellent listen. You can tell Bellew holds Big Dunc in the same regard as we do Super Ally.
 
SFA ?

Go back to 1978 and how they shafted Willie Johnston who was banned and sent home in disgrace by the SFA from Argentina for using a banned substance.
"Asking himself why he didn't just sit out Scotland's opening game in the 1978 World Cup with hay fever instead of gulping down two Reactivan antihistamines before kick-off. "

"When they call me now I just say I'm on holiday' "​


Handy scapegoat after the Peru game.
 
Compare and contrast how Ferguson was vilified by the media and the SFA, against genuine toilet lickers like Griffiths and Lennon.

As @RabSpackman pointed out above - Ferguson simply had to take the oppurtunity to leave Scottish football when Everton came calling, his cards were marked the moment he signed for our club.

I don't know what help or support Rangers gave to him during his spell with our club, but I suspect they were relieved to recoup most of the money back on Ferguson & move on.
We signed him at the wrong time,hately was still at his peak but Murray fell hook line and sinker for Jim McLean saying “we won’t be selling him to Rangers” so he paid over the odds to get him
 
The sheriff who jailed him was a nasty piece of work. RC rangers hater from Aberdeen sandy Jessop I'm sure. He had already put h on probation for an assault in Dundee previously before we signed him. It was a cert he would jail him for any minor offence doing probation and SFA and Strathclyde police gave the rat the ideal opportunity. A nothing incident caused Ferguson the chance to fulfil his dreams at Ibrox.when you see what real scum get away with in Scottish courts it highlights the hatred of all things Rangers in this country. He should have been fined at the most.
 
Correct, that wank should've been done for simulation, went down as if hit by Tyson, when it was a fairly innocuous contact.

An absolute travesty and it still bothers me today that Rangers didn't do more to back our player.
An era of appeasement.........still lingers to this day with current authorities and who runs them.
 
Treatment of Colin Stein, Graeme Souness, Big Dunc ensured I would not open the curtains if Scotland were playing in my back garden.
I seem to recall not long after Big Dunc incident I saw a clip of a Hamilton Accies player ( playing at Firhill at the time) properly headbutting an opponent during the game. Don't recall a prosecution following it.
Am I right in thinking McStay didn't make an official complaint or give evidence at the trial.
 
I didn't know he played in two of the qualifiers for France 98! What was the story there? Why did he decide to come back after a few years out, and then go into self imposed exile again?

Might have been the 0-0 draw with Estonia which was held in Monaco due to Estonia forgetting to turn up to the original fixture in Tallinn.

Their keeper had the game of his life but the tartan army and the media blamed anyone with a link to Rangers for the result.
 
What is conveniently forgotten is, in the next coming weeks at Ibrox was the Junior Cup Final, live on TV for all to view.

In that Cup Final there was an actual headbutt between 2 of the players.

Was anything done about that?
Did Strathclyde Police (as it was at the time), or the PF get involved in that?

No, Big Dunc was hunted down by those in charge at the SFA, and was found guilty and banned even before the corrupt PF decided they wanted him charged.
Was it the Glenafton v Largs game?
 
Treatment of Colin Stein, Graeme Souness, Big Dunc ensured I would not open the curtains if Scotland were playing in my back garden.
I seem to recall not long after Big Dunc incident I saw a clip of a Hamilton Accies player ( playing at Firhill at the time) properly headbutting an opponent during the game. Don't recall a prosecution following it.
Am I right in thinking McStay didn't make an official complaint or give evidence at the trial.

See my post #18.

It was the Junior Cup Final held at Ibrox just a few weeks later.

It was also live on terrestrial TV on the afternoon, so was probably seen by a lot more than were at Ibrox for the Big Dunc incident.
Was it the Glenafton v Largs game?

Yes, just a few weeks later than Big Dunc's incident.
 
The way he was treated was a disgrace but for someone who was fairly young when he signed for Rangers, why do some Rangers fans still hold him in such high regard?

He played very few games for us due to injury and scored only a handful of goals. He was also a British record signing at the time I believe or close to it anyway.

Has the shameful treatment of him by the SFA clouded people's opinion of him through the years or does he hold a kind of cult status as a loveable rogue due to some of the stories about him such as beating up the burglars etc? I don't recall him ever saying a bad word against Rangers but also I don't ever remember him declaring any kind of support for us either.
 
The way he was treated was a disgrace but for someone who was fairly young when he signed for Rangers, why do some Rangers fans still hold him in such high regard?

He played very few games for us due to injury and scored only a handful of goals. He was also a British record signing at the time I believe or close to it anyway.

Has the shameful treatment of him by the SFA clouded people's opinion of him through the years or does he hold a kind of cult status as a loveable rogue due to some of the stories about him such as beating up the burglars etc? I don't recall him ever saying a bad word against Rangers but also I don't ever remember him declaring any kind of support for us either.

Do we hold him in high regard? Certainly not as a player for us, although it will always be one of those 'what ifs'.

We had to sign him when we did, but the timing simply didn't work. Any signs Hateley was on the decline were blown to pieces that season and we also had Ally. I don't think Smith was capable of keeping 3 strikers like that happy, never mind fitting them into a system that worked.

He was a good big player, and comes across as a decent guy, but his reputation down south is mostly derived from hard work and being a hardman. He was never a goalscorer and he went years never able to put a run of games together without breaking down.
 
I remember him coming back to play the rearranged game against Estonia ( they didn’t turn up for the first game)
It was played in Monaco if I remember correctly and ended 0-0 the scotland support were particularly nasty to a few players don’t know if that figured in with him deciding he’d had enough. I’m sure Ian Ferguson never played again after that game either.

Ferguson was caught on camera saying something like “don’t even clap them” towards the Scotland fans. Media of course made a massive deal of it
 
And by our 'justice' system.
Iirc, it was some St Aloysius educated PF John Paul McTimothy who brought the charges. An absolute travesty.

It was absolutely disgraceful the way he was treated. To serve time for tiny wee headbutt on a pitch. When guys are flying in trying to break peoples legs, grabbing each other by the throat.

McStay and SFA should utterly embarrassed and ashamed of themselves.

I can guarantee you if a Celtic player had done that to McStay we would not have heard a word about it. Red card is all that would've happened.

He was quite right never to play for Scotland again and be in the same area, lobby etc as the people who got him the jail and then tried to punish him again by getting him to serve a 12 game ban. Gutted he never done more for us, gutted he never got to do it for Scotland because he would've been a huge asset for us at that time.
The referee missed the incident so the SFA pursued Duncan for retrospective punishment. To be fair, McStay at first refused to appear before the SFA but he was apparently forced to when the SFA threatened to kick Raith Rovers out the cup.
 
Ferguson was on probation for a previous assault, which was his 3rd assault charge.
1 of his previous 3 charges was headbutting a policeman.
He was jailed solely for that incident.
Ferguson clearly had issues.
What about the mentally challenged at Dundee who has been found guilty of Police assault twice
Jail time…..,,Nil
 
The referee missed the incident so the SFA pursued Duncan for retrospective punishment. To be fair, McStay at first refused to appear before the SFA but he was apparently forced to when the SFA threatened to kick Raith Rovers out the cup.

Yes, it was a concerted effort by the SFA and the Glasgow PF.
An absolute disgrace and a travesty that he ended up serving gaol time.
Rangers should have gone to war with the SFA over this.
 
See my post #18.

It was the Junior Cup Final held at Ibrox just a few weeks later.

It was also live on terrestrial TV on the afternoon, so was probably seen by a lot more than were at Ibrox for the Big Dunc incident.


Yes, just a few weeks later than Big Dunc's incident.
Yes, seen that and recall my cousin telling me about the incident.
My memory is definitely a bald guy playing for Accies in front of main stand at Firhill properly 'throwing the head in'. I'll research it a bit when I get in from work.
 
Think I'm right in saying he banjoed a guy on crutches at a Taxi rank in Stirling.

However, what was glossed over was that the guy in question had been mouthing off and abusing Dunc's girlfriend for a good couple of minutes before he finally snapped.

That's Stirling and it's "Wee Town" mentality for you though. He was always a target, even before joining Rangers. I remember Stephen Hendry getting bams trying to pick a fight on the odd occasion he ventured into town.
He did (fwiw I know the guy on crutches) and while you are correct in the description of Stirling itself, Ferguson didn't help himself, whether in Stirling or elsewhere or whether at Rangers or United.

Also, with regard to the clip itself, Ferguson made Scotland appearances up to 1997 which was long after the SFA tried to ban him after his jail sentence. Being jailed for what happened on a football is clearly wrong but let's not kid ourselves, he was going there at some point.
 
Is that n
My recollection was the SFA issuing him with a multiple match ban BEFORE the court case.

I remember the talk of how this was outrageous as it potentially prejudiced the criminal trial.

A fucking disgrace what was done to him.
Is that not the rules covering Sub Judice?

What we have to remember is that we had a ratbag at the club, Whiskers, QC, one of the finest legal minds in the country, we were told, who allowed it to happen on his watch.
 
My recollection may be fading, but I seem to think the bastard SFA even tried to get the English FA to carry over big Dunc’s ban when he moved down south?

Might be miles off with that one but it is just floating around in my head for some reason.
 
I was far too young to really know or understand what had happened.

But for Big Dunc to go on to legendary status at Everton, he could've easily achieved that at Rangers, which was what he wanted I believe to begin with.

From what I've read, shocking how he was treated but no surprise really.
For all manner of reasons it just wasn't to be.

We all thought he was going to be the next Hateley, only for Hateley to produce in 93/94 the best individual season of his career. Hateley carried Rangers that season the way Laudrup would do the following season.

Then of course he was getting played out wide left in some matches, which was not for him.

And by the end of that season he was then embroiled in the farce with McStay.
 
I was in the main stand that day, it was right in front of me. As you say, a complete nothing incident.
I was in front row of east enclosure, directly opposite to the incident. Turned to the guy next to me, and said, " He nearly put the head on him."
 
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