Jim Bett - why did he turn his back on Rangers?

Talktalk said:
He signed for the sheep on the 6th June 85, we had just had our daughter and I came out the hospital after going through the birth for a whole 12 hrs and bought a paper and was gutted at the back page, while the Mrs lay in a bed with her feet up.
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Selfish cow.
 
muz73 said:
Jazzer is a year younger than me but I'm sure I played against him a couple of times in Hamilton Grammar v Earnock High school games.

Met him and his pal (possibly nicknamed Kerso?) at a house party in Earnock, Hamilton one night. I'm sure both of them were on S Forms with Dundee at the time

Probably because of this I always liked him at us but I did think he was a bit lazy.

Much better all round player when at Aberdeen and would have liked to have seen him under Souness.

WATP
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Your right mate both Jazza and Kerso (John Kerr)signed with Dundee he played in the team above me at Fir Park Boys Club.
 
Robocop1960 said:
Your right mate both Jazza and Kerso (John Kerr)signed with Dundee he played in the team above me at Fir Park Boys Club.
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Old thread I know but here's my input. I was in the same year as them at Earnock and in the same class as Kerr. At the time I rated Kerr a better player but that may have been partly down to friend/class loyalty so to speak. Last I spoke to Kerr back in the early 80's he was playing junior football and obviously didn't make it to the top like Jazza did.

I too can confirm they both signed an S form with Dundee. They were being payed it was either a fiver a week or a fiver a month. I can't remember which. But I feel it was a fiver a week which was a tidy sum for a 15 year old in 1975.

This made more of a difference to Jazza than it did to Kerr. Jazza came from a relatively poor family and prior to the Dundee thing he was always prettily shabbily dressed. Following it he was better dressed in fashionable clothing of the period.
 
Taki said:
He was out of contract in 1983, I'm sure.

IIRC, his wife never liked Glasgow. Seems strange that he then returned to Aberdeen a couple of years later but there you go. I remember reading something in the archives from around the time of the '83 Cup Final where she was bumping her gums about Glasgow being depressing.
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She wasn’t wrong in 83 I couldn’t wait to get away from it.
 
Slightly before my time as I wasnt even born when he signed but I recall my Dad telling me his wife didnt like Glasgow. Looks like she was fine with Aberdeen though, he did nearly a decade there.
 
As I said in a previous thread about a month ago,it was more do to with his wife as she hated life in Glasgow and hated him being a Rangers player.
 
Worthy_Candidate said:
Guys like Steve Nicol, Malpas, Wark and Nicholas sat on a bench respectfully such was the standard on the first 11.
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didn't he miss a sitter in a major game for scotland? seem to have a memory of my dad yelling at him to rattle a shot but instead he side footed and missed. I may be talking shite.
 
Jim Bett was an exceptional footballer, but he and his wife couldn't settle in the WoS.

Souness tried and failed to bring him back and he would've thrived in that side.

He was a players player rather than the flashy type, rarely gave the ball away.

I remember saying to my old boy that he must be better than Baxter, not long after he signed....he just laughed,as he did with all of my "new Baxter's".. until the Danish God arrived in 1994....that gave him something to think about.
 
Ubik said:
didn't he miss a sitter in a major game for scotland? seem to have a memory of my dad yelling at him to rattle a shot but instead he side footed and missed. I may be talking shite.
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Yep, against Uruguay in 1986.
 
Sandbear said:
I thought his wife wanted away from Scotland . No doubt Aberdeen sold move to him by telling him it was different up North. By the time we came in the second time they were probably settled and not wanting to move with young kids.
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To be fair(ish) to Bett, Aberdeen were the number one club in the country at the time he signed for them. They’d just won back-to-back titles and the Cup Winners Cup before that. Ferguson was their manager and the good times up there didn’t look like they were ending any time soon. You can’t really blame him for choosing them over a Rangers side that was still in the doldrums.

I was more miffed when Souness tried to sign him and he knocked us back. He’d grown into a much better player by then and I think would have been a real asset to us at that point.

It was his loss.
 
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Banjobear said:
No worse than Aberdeen surely????
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I lived in Aberdeen thro the 80's and you would often see the players and family out and about. They never got any hassle from anyone, free to go about their business. She wouldnt have got that in Glasgow, either Bears wanting to say hello or Tims hurling abuse.
 
JFK-1 said:
Old thread I know but here's my input. I was in the same year as them at Earnock and in the same class as Kerr. At the time I rated Kerr a better player but that may have been partly down to friend/class loyalty so to speak. Last I spoke to Kerr back in the early 80's he was playing junior football and obviously didn't make it to the top like Jazza did.

I too can confirm they both signed an S form with Dundee. They were being payed it was either a fiver a week or a fiver a month. I can't remember which. But I feel it was a fiver a week which was a tidy sum for a 15 year old in 1975.

This made more of a difference to Jazza than it did to Kerr. Jazza came from a relatively poor family and prior to the Dundee thing he was always prettily shabbily dressed. Following it he was better dressed in fashionable clothing of the period.
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Both played for Scotland schollboys under 16`s coached by Jimmy Maxwell deputy head at Earnock , John Kerr as you say was the higher rated of the two at that time but Jazza had so much natural ability - John Kerr died some years ago sadly
 
woodieblue said:
Both played for Scotland schollboys under 16`s coached by Jimmy Maxwell deputy head at Earnock , John Kerr as you say was the higher rated of the two at that time but Jazza had so much natural ability - John Kerr died some years ago sadly
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I remember the year they were both selected and played against England schoolboys at Wembley. Unfortunately that year there was some sort of TV strike or something along those lines which meant it wasn't televised or even recorded.

Jimmy Maxwell was our maths teacher and was rarely ever in the class during the maths period until one girls parents complained about it. A lot of us hated her for that.

I'm sad to hear Kerso died, I was unaware of that. I have been living in the US for over 9 years now so suspect he may have died since I left the country in March 2012. Thus never heard about it along the old school grapevine.

What I did hear along that grapevine concerning Jazza was that he left Rangers to get away from his alcoholic family. Everybody knew even when we were still at school that he had severe and poverty inducing alcoholism in his family.

It's why as I already mentioned he was so shabbily dressed until he signed that S form with Dundee.
 
Talktalk said:
He signed for the sheep on the 6th June 85, we had just had our daughter and I came out the hospital after going through the birth for a whole 12 hrs and bought a paper and was gutted at the back page, while the Mrs lay in a bed with her feet up.
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I know how you feel mate. Ive tried to explain to the wife but she doesnt understand. Its so unfair. While she was giving birth to our two daughters in a nice comfy bed I was up all night sitting in a chair. All we ask for is equality.
 
JFK-1 said:
I remember the year they were both selected and played against England schoolboys at Wembley. Unfortunately that year there was some sort of TV strike or something along those lines which meant it wasn't televised or even recorded.

Jimmy Maxwell was our maths teacher and was rarely ever in the class during the maths period until one girls parents complained about it. A lot of us hated her for that.

I'm sad to hear Kerso died, I was unaware of that. I have been living in the US for over 9 years now so suspect he may have died since I left the country in March 2012. Thus never heard about it along the old school grapevine.

What I did hear along that grapevine concerning Jazza was that he left Rangers to get away from his alcoholic family. Everybody knew even when we were still at school that he had severe and poverty inducing alcoholism in his family.

It's why as I already mentioned he was so shabbily dressed until he signed that S form with Dundee.
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Jimmy was football daft and would gladly talk the whole Maths period about football which didn`t help my Maths any !
 
Ubik said:
didn't he miss a sitter in a major game for scotland? seem to have a memory of my dad yelling at him to rattle a shot but instead he side footed and missed. I may be talking shite.
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Uruguay in the 1986 World Cup.

We needed to win the last group match to progress. Uruguay were down to 10 men in the first 5-10 mins.

We couldn’t make the break through with Nicol missing a sitter. Ended up nil nil & we were out on our arses...Again!
 
He had the chance to come back, but, he chose to go go to Aberdeen because he wanted to win more trophy’s. You know how that turned out for him as we went on to do 9IAR. :cool:
 
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JFK-1 said:
Do you mind me asking when you were there? I attended Earnock from 1972-76.
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Yes that sounds about right for me . I was from Hillhouse and played for Earnock with John Kerr Jazz Lawrence Halliday / Tom Meek / Graham Stewart / George Stewart / John Hart / Archie Thomas / Walter Stevens .......
 
Jim Bett, always reminds me the joke (which I cant remember properly) about the 3 players in Scottish football connected with the gambling trade, as far as I remember it was:
Name 3 player connected to gambling, Jim Bett, 2nd I cant remember then Mixu Put-a-line-on!
 
woodieblue said:
Yes that sounds about right for me . I was from Hillhouse and played for Earnock with John Kerr Jazz Lawrence Halliday / Tom Meek / Graham Stewart / George Stewart / John Hart / Archie Thomas / Walter Stevens .......
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All in the same year as me and jogging some old memories of nicknames. Wee Hal, Aiple Thomas, Watty Stevens etc.

Last I saw Watty was just a few years after school. Still in our teens or early 20's at most and his fitba' playing days were already far behind. He was obese in his late teens.
 
He was a good player for us in bad times. He was an unknown, as there wasn't the easy access to foreign football there is these days. A lot of folk had never heard of Lokeren.
Like others, my memory was that his wife didn't like Glasgow. Did he end up in Iceland when he stopped playing?
 
JFK-1 said:
All in the same year as me and jogging some old memories of nicknames. Wee Hal, Aiple Thomas, Watty Stevens etc.

Last I saw Watty was just a few years after school. Still in our teens or early 20's at most and his fitba' playing days were already far behind. He was obese in his late teens.
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Sounds like you were my year - Watty used to go on the Lariat bus (Hillhouse Rangers) -Its a supermarket now !
 
woodieblue said:
Sounds like you were my year - Watty used to go on the Lariat bus (Hillhouse Rangers) -Its a supermarket now !
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Narrowing it down, LOL. I was in 1P Romans in first year. We beat Jazza's class 2-1 in the final of a first year football tournament.

In that game he executed a two footed sliding tackle on me from behind. I flew up in the air and came back down to land on his still upward pointing boot.

I jumped up to say something like you f#%*#* b#*%#*#* but for the first and still only time in my life I was winded. Couldn't say a thing. Just gasping. Incidentally he scored their goal with a sublime free kick from about 25 yards.
 
Given the social position and the alcoholism threat to the next generations of his family it does seem wise to escape that problem .

hope they are doing well
 
I found some old programmes in the garage a few weeks ago and one of them was an Under 15s Scotland vs West Germany. John Kerr, James Bett in the squad ( some other “names” as well). There was also a Primary Penalty Kick Competition starting Scott McGarvey and Patrick Nevin.
 
JFK-1 said:
Narrowing it down, LOL. I was in 1P Romans in first year. We beat Jazza's class 2-1 in the final of a first year football tournament.

In that game he executed a two footed sliding tackle on me from behind. I flew up in the air and came back down to land on his still upward pointing boot.

I jumped up to say something like you f#%*#* b#*%#*#* but for the first and still only time in my life I was winded. Couldn't say a thing. Just gasping. Incidentally he scored their goal with a sublime free kick from about 25 yards.
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I was in 1P Romans but can`t recall the football tournament
 
ChildOfGod said:
Given the social position and the alcoholism threat to the next generations of his family it does seem wise to escape that problem .

hope they are doing well
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He had a close friend at Earnock he had been at primary school with called Hugh Brown who we all called something that would be spelled like Shooby. Shooby remained in contact with him and he was the one who told me Jazza left Rangers to get away from his family.

Not Glasgow per se which I don't think he even lived in. I used to see him shopping in Hamilton with his wife while playing with Rangers so likely lived in or close to Hamilton..
 
JFK-1 said:
While in first year in that class I sat with Peter Lightbody, tall red headed guy, who had been in my primary school class at Laighstonehall primary.
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I would never have remembered him but i can see him now - Laighstonehall Primary - James Kane ?
 
LOL 133 said:
I know how you feel mate. Ive tried to explain to the wife but she doesnt understand. Its so unfair. While she was giving birth to our two daughters in a nice comfy bed I was up all night sitting in a chair. All we ask for is equality.
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If you remember the weather in June 85 you will know it was roasting, I was working putting lead on a roof and had shorts on, my legs were like burnt chips and sore, did they give me any attention did they feck it was all her her her.
 
jnloyal said:
Was it not something to do with his missus not liking Glasgow or something along these lines. I though JB was one of our best players at the time.
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That's correct, she got her wish for a move to Sheepville and a lot nearer her homeland as she was homesick.


Same as Mikel Arteta only he left to go home to Spain and ended up in Merseyside
 
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