Jock Wallace's Tenure: 1983-86

Sir Alex probably would have been our manager if they had handled it correctly.Willie Waddell was running Rangers but the approach was made by John Paton and this made him uncomfortable,I also believe he spoke with Scot Symon to get behind the scenes info.
Ferguson more or less confirmed this in an RTV interview one time.
 
Sir Alex probably would have been our manager if they had handled it correctly.Willie Waddell was running Rangers but the approach was made by John Paton and this made him uncomfortable,I also believe he spoke with Scot Symon to get behind the scenes info.
He wanted waddell to ask him personally. I thought by the that time waddell was an honorary director and had no say in the running of the club?
 
Stunned when Jock left after sealing a 2nd treble in 3 years, ecstatic when he returned, absolutely delighted when Souness was brought in to replace him.

That's the game of football...will always be respectful of Jock Wallace, he was a remarkable Rangers man right up there with anyone in my 50+ years as a fan.
Was there not mysterious circumstances around his first departure
 
Jock Wallace signed striker Iain Ferguson from Dundee in 1984.
Graeme Souness signed midfielder Ian Ferguson from St Mirren in 1988.
Don’t think either were record fees tho mate. Ian is St Mirren biggest transfer relieved still
 
He wanted waddell to ask him personally. I thought by the that time waddell was an honorary director and had no say in the running of the club?
In Ferguson's book he says that he spoke to Scot Symon after he had been approached, and Symon warned him that he thought Waddell was running the club and if it wasn't him that approached him he should be careful.
 
That team in 86 was coming good; I think so anyway, from a distance. He asked for more time and didn't get it, but your post makes it clear he was not a failure in that second period.

Don't be ridiculous, mate. We were atrocious, and a distant fourth best in the Premier League. The team was poor, and the results were horrifyingly bad.
 
Jock's 2nd spell started promisingly and he had a reasonable 2nd season. 85-86 was the worst ever. We scraped into 5th in the league, dropped more points than we won and I don't think we won away from home from September /October.
 
I’ve always said if Ferguson had got the job instead of Jock, we’d have had another European trophy in our cupboard.
Only if he got financial backing and time. The fact he and McLean both turned the job down perhaps suggests the restrictions they would be working under were widely known. Jock Wallace perhaps let his heart rule his head by taking the job in almost impossible circumstances.
 
He left the nucleus of a good side. Youth was giving a chance under Big Jock and Souness benefitted from that. Durrant, Ferguson, Fleck and McPherson were important players in the 1986/87 title winning side.
Add £15000 signing Stuart Munro, Davie Cooper (a Jock Wallace signing from 1977) and Cammy Fraser and Ted McMinn who both performed well in the first half of 'that championship winning season.'
McCoist wasn't a Wallace signing but big Jock showed faith in Ally when he was struggling and Rangers reaped the rewards for years afterwards.
Still think a Souness type appointment was needed to galvanise the club and put us back on top but Big Jock laid the foundations for one of the most memorable title wins in our history.
 
I think he wanted Gordon Durie, John Brown and Levein for a combined total of £1.2m. The board wouldn't cough up.

Pretty ironic then when two of them eventually did end up at Ibrox.

The plus side? Well, the memories of the 1983/84 LCF will never leave. There was the emergence of Derek Ferguson and then Ian Durrant, the re-emergence almost immediately of Davie Cooper, who would eventually get lost again in the malaise.

However it is hard to forget the bad ju-ju, and there was a lot of it.

Aldo, statistically, even after all that has befallen us since, statistically 1985/86 remains the worst season in Rangers history. We lost more games than we actually won.

Jock Wallace was a true Ranger in every sense of the word, of that there will never be any doubt.
 
He left the nucleus of a good side. Youth was giving a chance under Big Jock and Souness benefitted from that. Durrant, Ferguson, Fleck and McPherson were important players in the 1986/87 title winning side.
Add £15000 signing Stuart Munro, Davie Cooper (a Jock Wallace signing from 1977) and Cammy Fraser and Ted McMinn who both performed well in the first half of 'that championship winning season.'
McCoist wasn't a Wallace signing but big Jock showed faith in Ally when he was struggling and Rangers reaped the rewards for years afterwards.
Still think a Souness type appointment was needed to galvanise the club and put us back on top but Big Jock laid the foundations for one of the most memorable title wins in our history.
Great post.
 
The signing of Dougie Bell told you we were shopping in the bargain bin at this time. A bit player with Aberdeen he was never going to turn the Rangers of 1985 into championship contenders.

I do remember big Jock saying in the press if he had been given the money Souness had got he would have delivered the title.
It wasn't called the Souness Revolution for nothing. Wallace as much as I love and value his contribution to Rangers and what a great man he was would not have been able to do what Souness did and attract that talent over the border.
 
What is forgotten about is that we had a ridiculously restrictive wage structure in place.we lost John McClelland over it and Davie Cooper we almost lost over it as well.rangers players were shocked to find out they were earning less money than the players at Aberdeen and with the win bonus structure Dundee Utd had in place their players were also being better paid.
That’s why the first thing david Holmes did was rip up the wage structure.without doing that their would be no souness
 
Shouldn’t be forgotten it’s jock who Ally McCoist credits with saving his rangers career.in ally’s words “jock turned me from a boy into a man”
 
That team in 86 was coming good; I think so anyway, from a distance. He asked for more time and didn't get it, but your post makes it clear he was not a failure in that second period.

We started really well that season then fell away horribly finishing 5th and only scraping a European place on the final day.

There was nothing to suggest it was all about to reach fruition.

Wallace was a great manager for us but he was past his best by then and football was moving on.

He would never have attracted players like Butcher, Woods, Wilkins, etc, or brought a more progressive continental mindset to training no matter how much money he’d been given.
 
He wasnt the same man in his second stint.
Sad fact is we were awful.
Thank him so much for the first time round though
While it wasn’t great we did win the league cup twice in a row and as someone who started going every week from the 82/83 season and never had seen us beat the yahoos,I had seen us beat them twice in the first six months of jocks return.
 
We started really well that season then fell away horribly finishing 5th and only scraping a European place on the final day.

There was nothing to suggest it was all about to reach fruition.

Wallace was a great manager for us but he was past his best by then and football was moving on.

He would never have attracted players like Butcher, Woods, Wilkins, etc, or brought a more progressive continental mindset to training no matter how much money he’d been given.
I can't argue with that; I think his legacy in that second term hasn't been appreciated though. Have we ever had a better crop of young players since then?
 
We started really well that season then fell away horribly finishing 5th and only scraping a European place on the final day.

There was nothing to suggest it was all about to reach fruition.

Wallace was a great manager for us but he was past his best by then and football was moving on.

He would never have attracted players like Butcher, Woods, Wilkins, etc, or brought a more progressive continental mindset to training no matter how much money he’d been given.
We started really well that season but the wheels came off around Xmas time and iirc jock had to go into hospital for appendicitis and was in the operating theater when we were getting gubbed 5-1 up at the sheep pen.
 
I can't argue with that; I think his legacy in that second term hasn't been appreciated though. Have we ever had a better crop of young players since then?
He had the courage to give Derek Ferguson and Iain Durrant their first start in a game v them together and they both ripped the yahoos apart in a 3-0 win,Durrant opening the scoring with his first goal v them,it would have been the wee mans second goal v them if he had been two inches taller when he came on as sub in the 1-1 draw at the piggery the previous season when we were down to nine men and the ball was fired across the six yard box Durrant was sliding in and missed the ball by inches to score the winner
 
He had the courage to give Derek Ferguson and Iain Durrant their first start in a game v them together and they both ripped the yahoos apart in a 3-0 win,Durrant opening the scoring with his first goal v them,it would have been the wee mans second goal v them if he had been two inches taller when he came on as sub in the 1-1 draw at the piggery the previous season when we were down to nine men and the ball was fired across the six yard box Durrant was sliding in and missed the ball by inches to score the winner
That's a definite characteristic of his managerial career, that he was courageous; especially in his playing young players and in his signings.
 
We started really well that season but the wheels came off around Xmas time and iirc jock had to go into hospital for appendicitis and was in the operating theater when we were getting gubbed 5-1 up at the sheep pen.

The 5-1 defeat at Pittodrie was the season before. ‘85/86 we were top of the league after the first 6 matches then lost back to back games against Dundee and Aberdeen at Ibrox and fell apart.

Wallace is to be credited for bringing through guys like Durrant, Fleck, Ferguson and Munro as well as helping turn McCoist into the country’s top striker, but he was never attracting top English talent to Scotland and training players until they puked on Gullane’s sand was unfruitful and outdated.

Souness, Holmes, Marlborough and their revolution happened at the right time.
 
The 5-1 defeat at Pittodrie was the season before. ‘85/86 we were top of the league after the first 6 matches then lost back to back games against Dundee and Aberdeen at Ibrox and fell apart.

Wallace is to be credited for bringing through guys like Durrant, Fleck, Ferguson and Munro as well as helping turn McCoist into the country’s top striker, but he was never attracting top English talent to Scotland and training players until they puked on Gullane’s sand was unfruitful and outdated.

Souness, Holmes, Marlborough and their revolution happened at the right time.
Munro at 25k from Alloa i think was a steal.
Munro and rod wallace must be in the top 3 for return on outlay over the past 40 years.
 
Yesterday I watched the BBC Scotland programme about the 85 Scottish Cup. Billy McNeil was interviewed and mentioned the Celtic defeat to Clyde and how when he was younger Celtic barely won anything until Stein came in and then dominated for over a decade
Aberdeen only really showed what they could do under Ferguson, and same with Dundee Utd under McLean. Both teams made it to the European Cup semi finals with Utd arguably being cheated a final appearance. The importance of a good manager cannot be underplayed.
Wallace returning was good for the heartstrings and he did initially give u boost, it was probably never going to give us the title we craved as much then as we do now with everything that appeared to be going on in the background at the club. There were some highs there and yes we should be grateful for Ally, Durrant and D Ferguson being bloodied. My formative years as a Rangers fan was under Jock 1st time around and the joy he brought was wonderful, but for me Jock Wallace 83 to 86 is the perfect example of why you should never go back as you will rarely be as successful the 2nd time around
 
Yesterday I watched the BBC Scotland programme about the 85 Scottish Cup. Billy McNeil was interviewed and mentioned the Celtic defeat to Clyde and how when he was younger Celtic barely won anything until Stein came in and then dominated for over a decade
Aberdeen only really showed what they could do under Ferguson, and same with Dundee Utd under McLean. Both teams made it to the European Cup semi finals with Utd arguably being cheated a final appearance. The importance of a good manager cannot be underplayed.
Wallace returning was good for the heartstrings and he did initially give u boost, it was probably never going to give us the title we craved as much then as we do now with everything that appeared to be going on in the background at the club. There were some highs there and yes we should be grateful for Ally, Durrant and D Ferguson being bloodied. My formative years as a Rangers fan was under Jock 1st time around and the joy he brought was wonderful, but for me Jock Wallace 83 to 86 is the perfect example of why you should never go back as you will rarely be as successful the 2nd time around
It's the most consistent factor in football, even today, the manager is the most significant person at a club.
 
Yesterday I watched the BBC Scotland programme about the 85 Scottish Cup. Billy McNeil was interviewed and mentioned the Celtic defeat to Clyde and how when he was younger Celtic barely won anything until Stein came in and then dominated for over a decade
Aberdeen only really showed what they could do under Ferguson, and same with Dundee Utd under McLean. Both teams made it to the European Cup semi finals with Utd arguably being cheated a final appearance. The importance of a good manager cannot be underplayed.
Wallace returning was good for the heartstrings and he did initially give u boost, it was probably never going to give us the title we craved as much then as we do now with everything that appeared to be going on in the background at the club. There were some highs there and yes we should be grateful for Ally, Durrant and D Ferguson being bloodied. My formative years as a Rangers fan was under Jock 1st time around and the joy he brought was wonderful, but for me Jock Wallace 83 to 86 is the perfect example of why you should never go back as you will rarely be as successful the 2nd time around
By the end of his second tenure attendances had diminished and a change was needed.
 
It couldn't have helped that Jock was quite clearly and publicly third choice for the job. I also think that at that time there were financial constraints on the club because it's only a couple of years later that Lawrence group were forced to sell David Murray because they were in trouble.
 
Yesterday I watched the BBC Scotland programme about the 85 Scottish Cup. Billy McNeil was interviewed and mentioned the Celtic defeat to Clyde and how when he was younger Celtic barely won anything until Stein came in and then dominated for over a decade
Aberdeen only really showed what they could do under Ferguson, and same with Dundee Utd under McLean. Both teams made it to the European Cup semi finals with Utd arguably being cheated a final appearance. The importance of a good manager cannot be underplayed.
Wallace returning was good for the heartstrings and he did initially give u boost, it was probably never going to give us the title we craved as much then as we do now with everything that appeared to be going on in the background at the club. There were some highs there and yes we should be grateful for Ally, Durrant and D Ferguson being bloodied. My formative years as a Rangers fan was under Jock 1st time around and the joy he brought was wonderful, but for me Jock Wallace 83 to 86 is the perfect example of why you should never go back as you will rarely be as successful the 2nd time around

Wallace’s first year back in charge was actually really encouraging.

From Nov ‘83 until Nov ‘84 we only lost twice in the league, once in each season, and won two League Cups, but we were never that consistent again.

It’s pretty clear when you look back on it impassively that the major factor in our failure to achieve greater success during his second spell is that Wallace himself wasn’t the manager he’d once been.
 
I had the pleasure of meeting Jock Wallace and could not speak more highly of him.I think he was a little bit unlucky in that he was up against two of the best managers Scotland has produced in Sir Alex and Jim McLean and celtic could still cause the odd problem.
Jocks teams relied a lot on fitness and what he called "character" and sometimes this wasn't enough against clever managers and let's face it both these teams had some superb players.
We suffered some bad defeats and crowds were down so it was inevitable change would come.
However I will be forever grateful for the treble winning teams he produced in the 70s and some of that character and will to win would have seen us win some trophies in the past couple of seasons.
 
Someone mentioned that they didn't recall the support shouting for Big Jock to go at any time. I should remind those among us of a similar age to me that 2 games into season 77/78 the 'fickle' in our support were chanting 'Wallace must go ' as we trailed 2-0 to the Hiv's second game into the season. As they say regards that season the rest is History!

Big Jock. An absolute gentleman. I met him as a teenager just before the 1976 Scottish Cup Final and asked for his autograph. He was talking to a couple at the time who suggested that he might get fed up of kids bothering him. He boomed back " The day they they stop asking is the day I'll be bothered" RIP Big Jock
 
Wallace’s first year back in charge was actually really encouraging.

From Nov ‘83 until Nov ‘84 we only lost twice in the league, once in each season, and won two League Cups, but we were never that consistent again.

It’s pretty clear when you look back on it impassively that the major factor in our failure to achieve greater success during his second spell is that Wallace himself wasn’t the manager he’d once been.
You have to factor in how good Aberdeen and Dundee Utd were in his second spell.throw in the yahoos and a resurgent hearts under doddie and sandy jardine.
 
You have to factor in how good Aberdeen and Dundee Utd were in his second spell.throw in the yahoos and a resurgent hearts under doddie and sandy jardine.

To be fair, Hearts one and only good season was during Wallace’s last. I suppose you could argue that it contributed to his demise - even they were doing what we couldn’t - but we hadn’t managed to put up any title challenge for two seasons before then.

I have wondered how it would have been had the whole Souness revolution happened three years earlier (putting aside the difference in age of TMB) when Ferguson and McLean were really in their pomp at Aberdeen and Dundee United.

Would he still have had instant success?

There was always something quite serendipitous about it happening when it did when Ferguson was obviously looking for a bigger challenge and McLean’s powers had begun to wane a little.
 
To be fair, Hearts one and only good season was during Wallace’s last. I suppose you could argue that it contributed to his demise - even they were doing what we couldn’t - but we hadn’t managed to put up any title challenge for two seasons before then.

I have wondered how it would have been had the whole Souness revolution happened three years earlier (putting aside the difference in age of TMB) when Ferguson and McLean were really in their pomp at Aberdeen and Dundee United.

Would he still have had instant success?

There was always something quite serendipitous about it happening when it did when Ferguson was obviously looking for a bigger challenge and McLean’s powers had begun to wane a little.
I wonder as well if Ferguson and McLean looked at the budgets they were going to get and thought it wasn’t enough to turn it around.like I said earlier first thing david Holmes did was rip up the wage structure.
 
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