The G-men are gone but not forgotten - Alan Gilzean and Jimmy Greaves were one of football's greatest duos; English FA beaks stopped them playing together at Dens

It seemed like fate when, shortly after hearing about the death of Jimmy Greaves, I found myself sitting next to Ian Gilzean in the press box at Tannadice during Sunday’s Dundee derby.

(Left to right) Cliff Jones, Alan Gilzean and Jimmy Greaves doing laps of White Hart Lane in January 1965. (Photo by J. R. Watkins/Daily Express/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

Gillie junior provides match statistics for Opta Data. Before concentrating on our respective duties, we spoke about the sad news regarding Greaves, who was always so full of admiration for Ian’s late father, Alan.

Although bedevilled by injuries Ian was a more than decent player in his own right. We recalled him leading the line for Dundee in a 1-0 win over Dundee United at Tannadice in September 1992.

His father, however, was something else. Ian knew it, fans knew it. Jimmy Greaves knew it. When choosing to write about the subject of his enigmatic former strike partner for his Sunday People column, Greaves, who died at the weekend aged 81, described Alan Gilzean as “possibly the best footballer I ever played with” and “a blood brother,” although he also revealed he hadn’t seen his old pal for over 40 years.

The Tottenham Hotspur team pose with the Trofeo Costa del Sol trophy - won in pre-season in Spain - in August 1965. Alan Gilzean is bottom left, Jimmy Greaves top right. (Photo by Victor Blackman/Express/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

“Few partnerships in English football can rival Greaves’s balanced blend with Alan Gilzean,” wrote football writer Henry Winter in 2015.

They have been reunited in the high stand now – Gillie doing Greavsie’s heading for him, Greavsie doing the running for both. That’s the way Gilzean said it tended to be when I spoke to him for a rare interview in The Scotsman in 2016.

He revealed he had recently met up with Greaves at a Spurs function and the bond felt as strong and as natural as it did in the 1960s, when they were dubbed the G-men and created havoc in opposition defences. They gelled instantly.

Gillie set up two goals for Greaves on his debut against Everton after arriving from Dundee in a £72,500 deal in late 1964. “We’ve got the G-men, Greaves and Gilzean/They’re the world’s best goalscoring machine,” became a well-known terracing chorus at the time.

Shortly after that overdue reunion with Gilzean, Greaves suffered a devastating stroke in 2015 which left him in a wheelchair. “You never know what is round the corner,” Gillie told me. Indeed, you don’t. Gilzean, just over two years older than Greaves and in much the better health at the time, was the first of the G-men to go, passing away in July 2018 just weeks after he was diagnosed with a brain tumour.

Greaves’ Twitter account tweeted: “Heart-breaking news today. The great Alan Gilzean passed away this morning. Sympathy to his family. He was a lovely man and obviously one of the all-time Spurs greats.”

One story has it that Greaves passed up an open goal opportunity in a game against Peterborough because he was too busy chatting to Gilzean. The Cockney geezer struck up a rare bond with the boy from Coupar Angus although they were not able to demonstrate their seeming telepathy to the Dundee fans when Spurs came north just months after Greaves was left out of England’s victorious World Cup final side in 1966.

A condition of the Gilzean sale was that the London team would play a friendly at Dens Park and they did so on a Monday night in October 1966. They arrived as league leaders following a 2-1 win over Manchester City three days earlier, with Gilzean getting both goals. The second – the winner – was a backheel set up by Greaves.

But Greaves was without his strike partner at Dens. Unbelievably, Gilzean was barred from playing on his return to Dens after being sent off for making an obscene remark to a linesman two weeks earlier against West Ham.

The English FA hit him with a fortnight suspension that included all matches, including friendlies in Scotland. Gillie watched from the main stand as Spurs won 3-2, Greaves scoring twice. Jim McLean struck one of Dundee’s goals.

When Gilzean reflected about Greaves to me in a pub, The George in Enfield, it already felt like he was providing an obituary for someone whose health problems suggested he would not have as many years left as proved the case.

If someone told me Gilzean, bright as a button despite years of heading heavy footballs, would be first to reach the penalty box in the sky I’d have been astonished.

“He is a super little guy,” Gillie told me. “Full of fun. Football was an entertainment for him, it was fun. Of all the people I have seen since, the only player I can compare him with is Messi - and Greavsie was faster."

After Greaves’ lavish praise for Gillie, the Scot was repaying the compliment. He described Greaves as his best striker partner although he had one weakness.

“He couldn’t header the ball, could he?!” he said. “I had to get up there and head them so he could run on to them. But what a super guy. We had laughs together. I was a hard trainer, but Greavsie did not have to train hard – he was just naturally fit. And lightning quick off the mark, over ten yards. And coolness under pressure in the box. So cool.

“I never saw him hit a rocket from 30 yards. He just rolled them into the net, in the corners, or walked round the keeper with the ball.”

“For me I have always been lucky with my partners – Greavsie, (Martin) Chivers and (at Dundee) Alan Cousin, who was the fittest guy I ever played with.

“I had three of the best, but you can’t get better than Greaves.” Gilzean was also blessed to play with Denis Law for Scotland on the way to scoring 12 goals in 22 international appearances.

“The question I get occasionally – I played with Denis Law and I played with Jimmy Greaves, who was the best player? In my opinion it is Greavsie,” concluded Gilzean. “That’s a shame because Denis is a Scot. I got on well with Denis, he is a great friend. But Greavsie – if you give a boy a ball and had to put a house on him scoring, it would be Greavsie.”

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