Interview: Stephen Craigan - Dreaming of Cup glory for Motherwell

Published on Saturday 14 May 2011 13:50

Craigan recalls Motherwell's 1991 cup-winning campaign and hopes hard graft will pay off with a win for history books

THERE was something deeply cathartic about discussing next Saturday's Scottish Cup final with Motherwell captain Stephen Craigan in the club's boardroom the other day, even as it forced us to confront the tragic. For it reminded us of football's power to bring people together and move them in the most humane way, after months when the game in this country has seemed a dumping ground for inhumanities to drive them apart. Inevitably, talk turned to the 1991 Scottish Cup final-winning team. And when it did, inevitably the 34-year-old turned to gaze at a huge photograph of those victorious players gleefully saluting supporters with their silverware spoils during an open-top bus parade. Transfixed for an instant, Craigan then articulated, while faltering and full of emotion, what all of us in the room were thinking about the beaming, boyish face of the late Phil O'Donnell seeming to fill far more than a corner of the frame.

"It is funny, when I used to see that picture, I used to see the cup and see all the boys celebrating but now the first thing I see when I look at it now is Phil. I think it is up somewhere else, I have seen it about... just to see his face again, he looks so young. You look at some of the guys in our team, who are so young and could have an opportunity, you know, his trademark name, Brave As A Lion, someone in our team could have an opportunity to...make a name for themselves like that."

O'Donnell acquired his trademark name from Ally McCoist's commentary of the midfielder's headed goal in the dramatic 4-3 extra-time success over Dundee United. The poignancy of the phrase for Craigan and all those at the Fir Park club can also be attributed to the fact it was written on the banner held up by Motherwell supporters to commemorate O'Donnell when the club played at Tynecastle in their first game following his death in the closing week of 2007. As the last person to speak to O'Donnell before he collapsed, Craigan must forever relive that day in his head; the fact he played with the midfielder for several years ramming home the pain of his terrible, untimely loss.

"It does, you know. We are looking at such a fresh-faced young man. I can't stop looking at that picture for some reason. When the cup final in 1991 is mentioned he is the first thing that comes into my mind. I know him probably better than the rest of the guys. Some of the guys in the team didn't know him so they don't have the same connection but for me to be able to think about him and talk about him like that it is nice. (Just the fact he is not here] is the reason he keeps coming back.

Twenty years is not a long time, so he would only have been 38, 39 now. It would be nice for me to emulate him, let's put it that way." Recent chats with Dougie Arnott, who led the line for the 1991 cup-winning team, have made Craigan keenly aware of the magical nature of memories that could be moulded were Motherwell to overcome Celtic in their first Hampden decider in the competition since their triumph two decades ago. Arnott is now bar manager of the club's Millennium Suite and doesn't seem to require much prompting to recall events in the last millennium that provided him with his one winners' medal in his career."I hadn't thought about it before I started talking to Dougie and he was actually getting excited talking about 1991," Craigan said. "He was telling me that they didn't know what they were letting themselves in for; had no idea. I thought 'we are still talking about this 20 years later'. That is the opportunity that we have, that in 2031 people could be saying 'remember winning the cup in 2011.

"We have a chance to make a great bit of history. We can feed off this for years, get another bit of success and do well'."

Arnott also alerted him to another aspect of the cup final experience. "I don't know whether I should say this but Dougie actually said to me: 'Have you got your bonus sorted out because we didn't realise until we went on the pitch we didn't'. I said to him, 'I hope we'll have ours sorted out before then'. Fortunately they got theirs."

Some would contend that every memorable moment Craigan experiences can be placed in the bonus category. Famously, the Glentoran product was initially ditched by Motherwell, and had to rebuild his career at a then lowly Partick Thistle. Brought back to Fir Park by Terry Butcher, his face didn't fit after his successor Mark McGhee left, as, for a brief and stormy first four months of the 2009-10 season, Jim Gannon took charge. Now, Craigan has carved out his place in Motherwell folklore as the Lanarkshire club's most-capped player with 52 appearance for Northern Ireland, and is about to become only the second player to lead them out at Hampden in a Scottish Cup final in 60 years, doing so after a rare goal set them up for an breeze of the 3-0 win over St Johnstone in the semi-final.

"I have always been a believer that the hard times make you the person you are. I left here at 22, 23 having played 20-odd games and went to Partick Thistle in the Second Division, and had no idea whether I was ever going to fulfil my ambition of playing in the top league and being a professional football player. It is moments like that when you have a little reality check, and is just straightens you up. You just keep going and I always have and kept just plodding away.

"These times are frustrating but I think in the long term they might have helped me. It gave me a little break - and I haven't had many breaks over five or six years in terms of summer football and playing internationals. Even though at the time I was desperate to play, when I look back now I think maybe it wasn't such a bad thing. I have never had any problems with managers not picking me. You just get on with your job and work a little bit harder."I haven't really had time to think about captaining the team in a final, but when it comes I'll enjoy it because the statistics would suggest it only happens at a club like Motherwell every 20 years, or even longer. It will be nice and I like to think that it is a little reward to myself. It is something money can't buy. But hard work can get you it, and dedication can get you it. It will be a nice moment - my family are over, my wife is Scottish so she will be there, the little one will probably be there, and loads of people back home will be thinking 'see that guy, he used to live round the corner from me'. I can think that I have made something of myself and have the opportunity to play in a cup final."