From Easterhouse to Eindhoven

Bobby Russell joined Rangers straight from Junior football in 1977. He was part of the team that won the domestic treble in his very first season and went on to make 370 first-team appearances in all competitions, scoring 46 goals. After leaving Rangers, a decade later, he joined Motherwell, making a total of 152 appearances and scoring 18 times.

Bobby Russell had the world at his feet as a rising star with Glasgow's famous youth team, Possil YM, the same club that gave Kenny Dalglish his start in the game. An ill-fated move to Sunderland, however, had him questioning if he ever wanted to play the game again, until Possil's legendary coach, Bobby Dinnie, helped him get his life back on track. What happened next would be more believable if it had come out of the pages of Roy of the Rovers! Within two years of being told he wasn't big enough or good enough by Sunderland, Bobby worked his way back into football via a Glasgow pub team, a Juvenile team and, finally, Shettleston Juniors, where he played just one season, helping them to league and cup success. During that season, Bobby was scouted by his boyhood club, Glasgow Rangers and provisionally signed while still with Shettleston. The very next season he went straight into the Rangers first team and was a huge part of them winning the domestic treble of League, League Cup and Scottish Cup. Bobby went on to have a long and successful career at Rangers and Motherwell and, as you'll read in this book, was recognised by those he played with and was managed by as one of the game's good guys. Could it happen today? Of course not. It was remarkable it happened back then! This is Bobby Russell's unique story of a great football career that almost never happened!