Strachan taken aback by ignorance of autograph seeker

Published on Friday 5 October 2007 00:44

THE fall-out from Wednesday night's titanic and controversial Champions League clash between Celtic and AC Milan has not lapped at everyone's consciousness, something made clear by an afternoon spent at Kingsbarns for the first day of the Dunhill Links championship yesterday.

Gordon Strachan was among many well-kent faces congregating in Scotland's North-east, although the Celtic manager - who had a hip replacement operation earlier this year - was outside the ropes rather than within them. Johan Cruyff, the legendary Dutch player, was among the first to spot Strachan, who arrived at the course hand in hand with Dundonian wife Lesley. A quick wave was exchanged between them before Cruyff returned to the matter in hand along side his professional playing partner, Maarten Lafeber.

Strachan was then reminded that while his team's efforts against AC Milan were the talk of the steamie, there was one cranny where his current activities had failed to infiltrate. Not the east neuk of Fife, but the inside of one English autograph hunter's head. The gentleman in question approached Strachan, and after asking the Celtic manager for his signature sought to fill the subsequent silence with an enquiry that left even someone so quick-witted as Strachan taken aback. "So Gordon, what are you up to these days?" he asked, as if Strachan had spent the last two years inhabiting a place far from the public eye, rather than being the public face of one of the world's most popular clubs.

"I am the manager of Celtic," replied a somewhat startled Strachan, whose present activities were featuring on the back - and even front - of nearly every newspaper in the land yesterday. The affronted Strachan hurried on to the club house, leaving the fan in his wake ("I don't really follow Scottish football," he was heard to explain to chortling by-standers).

At least Strachan had a story with which to amuse his companions, who included Celtic's majority shareholder Dermot Desmond, playing yesterday with Robert Karlsson, and Dougray Scott, the actor currently best known for his part in Desperate Housewives.

It isn't hard to imagine what was discussed, with the finer points of Desmond's impressive round - he finished with an eagle - probably left for another time while memories of Dida's antics on Wednesday night remained so fresh in everyone's mind. The Hibernian-daft Scott, though, might have first chosen to harangue Strachan for his rather sour reaction to Hibs' victory over Celtic 12 days ago, when the Celtic manager pointedly failed to acknowledge the efforts of his team's opponents. "I am just going to have five minutes with Gordon," he said to his caddie.

After an hour's confab with his boss, Strachan re-emerged from the club house. Desmond, meanwhile, headed back to his hotel for some recuperation ahead of further strenuous challenges to come, both on the golf course and off it.