Aberdeen v Real Madrid 40 years on: John Hewitt opens up on that goal in Gothenburg and sharing a room with Neale Cooper

John Hewitt didn’t change. It’s just sometimes it felt like everyone around him did. It must be hard to spend the rest of your life being known for a single deed that happened as long ago as 1983.

John Hewitt (left) scores Aberdeen's most important-ever goal v Real Madrid in Gothenburg to win the European Cup Winners' Cup on this day in 1983

Of course, that is not strictly true in the case of Hewitt, who as well as scoring Aberdeen’s most important-ever goal – the winner against Real Madrid in the final of the European Cup Winners’ Cup – also scored the fastest goal in Scottish Cup history a year earlier, after just 9.6 seconds against Motherwell.

And then there was that quarter-final winner against Bayern Munich en route to Gothenburg, a game regarded by many as the greatest ever played at Pittodrie. To be in the right moment at the right time on three occasions, to have the skill to score three very different types of goal, must make one feel very blessed.

A fourth blessing arrived earlier this year when, having just turned 60, Hewitt survived what was described as a mild heart attack while at work.

John Hewitt had a habit of scoring significant goals - this one was the winner in the 3-2 victory over Bayern Munich to send Aberdeen into the semi-finals of the European Cup WInners' Cup in 1983

Yes, while at work. Hewitt is employed by an oil and gas company in his native Aberdeen. Even The Scorer of Aberdeen’s Most Important-Ever Goal, unarguably among the most celebrated goals in Scottish football history, must earn a crust.

It's very different now in the case of even average players who have reached nowhere near Hewitt's levels. It was notable that at a recent media event attended by a selection of Gothenburg Greats at Pittodrie, Hewitt needed to rush away to return to work. Lunch hour could only be stretched out so long.

He might argue an hour was long enough. Hewitt needed only 25 minutes on the pitch to write his name in history 40 years ago today. He replaced Eric Black, the talented young striker who scored Aberdeen's opening goal in the drenched Nya Ullevi stadium what felt like a long time earlier.

Real Madrid's Juanito equalised from the penalty spot after 14 minutes. Shortly after Hewitt made his entrance, referee Gianfranco Menegali blew the final whistle. Extra time loomed.

John Hewitt as he is now, aged 60. With the European Cup Winners' Cup at Pittodrie in March (Photo by Alan Harvey / SNS Group)

Desperate for some involvement and seeking to get up to the pace of the game, Hewitt drifted further and further back. Although it's a myth Alex Ferguson threatened to sub the sub, the manager didn't miss him from the sidelines.

"He wanted me to keep a length to the game,” recalls Hewitt. “But me just coming on, I wanted to get into the game as quickly as possible.”

All he could hear was Ferguson screaming at him to get back up the park.

“Eventually, I took heed of what he was saying and did it,” Hewitt continues. “But I was concerned about getting myself into the game. You’re coming on and you’re not properly warmed up either. You saw the night it was, it was very wet and cold. The pitch was like a swimming pool. So it was difficult conditions.

“He never threatened to take me off – but it’s fair to say I heard him! I was trying to ignore him but then I thought, I’d do what he was asking and move further forward.”

Smart thinking. He is already heading towards the Real Madrid goal when Peter Weir clips the ball up the touchline from what was almost the left-back position into the path of Mark McGhee, the striker who could put in a mean cross, and did, with Hewitt doing the rest by beating the slow-to-react goalkeeper, Agustin, to the ball and powering a textbook diving header into the corner of the net.

Photographs of the moment could be adverts for Adidas. That beautiful Aberdeen strip; three stripes down the shorts, three stripes down the arms and three stripes on the turn-downs at the top of the socks.

And then there’s the boots, Adidas of course – and the ball, an Adidas Tango, which Hewitt met so satisfyingly in the middle of his forehead. He should never have needed to work again.

“Gothenburg didn’t change my life,” he says. “As far as I’m concerned, it stayed the same. Obviously, I’m known as the player who scored the winning goal. But, it certainly hasn’t changed my life. I just got on with things normally. I kept playing until it was time for me to retire and then I started working like everybody else. Back in those days there wasn’t a lot of money in football. So it was basically a job.

“If we were playing with the same group of boys nowadays, achieving the same level of success, we’d all be millionaires. But back in the day, there wasn’t really money in football. It was a living and that was it. But it wasn’t so much about money – it was trying to achieve things. And we sure did that, winning leagues, Scottish Cups, League Cups, the Cup Winners' Cup and the Super Cup, which people tend to forget."

The European club rankings in April 1984 had Aberdeen in No. 1 place ahead of Liverpool, Manchester United, Hamburg and Juventus. "That was some achievement," says Hewitt.

Nothing stays the same, certainly not over 40 years. Aberdeen have flirted with relegation on occasion since while the current team chose a poor year to post one of the worst results in the club’s history against Darvel in the Scottish Cup.

Happily they have managed to get their act together as the latest major anniversary has hoved into view, with the surviving members of the 1983-era side reuniting for a gala dinner in Aberdeen tonight before being granted the freedom of the city tomorrow. Then they will attend Aberdeen v Hibs at Pittodrie on Saturday afternoon.

The target these days, and perhaps the limit of Aberdeen's ambitions, is simply finishing best of the rest behind the Old Firm. Hewitt was taking on the best there was in Europe. Not only this, but he was doing so alongside his pal, the late Neale Cooper.

"The night before the game Neale said to me ‘Johnny, can you imagine two Aberdeen loons and we’re away to play a European final against Real Madrid?’

"My fiancée-wife was out with me, but Neale didn’t have anyone with him then, so after the final he was shifted out of our room to somewhere else.

“We came through the ranks together. We knew each other from primary school days. We were at different schools, but we regularly played against each other, we knew each other well.

“We were ball boys at Pittodrie together. And then we were involved with the primary school and secondary school selects.

“Once we got to 14, 15,16, senior clubs were wanting us to sign. Both of us could’ve gone to numerous clubs – but we both ended up signing for our local team.” They would have been happy enough being local heroes. Instead, they became legends – dearly remembered in the case of Cooper, the youngest in the side and the first to die, five years ago at the age of just 54.

Mercifully, Hewitt is still with us but suffered a health scare at the start of this year. “You’re never prepared for things like that,” he says. “Obviously, I was very fortunate that it was caught before it could've been really serious.

“I’m fine now,” he adds. “I’ve had the stents and balloon put in. I’m getting on with my day-to-day life. I get to my work and look forward to the weekends and a game of golf with my old school pals.”

The modest head boy of Gothenburg likes nothing better than when he's simply being one of the boys.