Paul Sturrock feels the love: Beloved entertainer on Jack Grealish comparison and Dundee United return

In any discussion about current players who are a throwback to a previous era, Jack Grealish is likely to feature. One of the Manchester City forward's antecedents is surely Paul Sturrock, the livewire Dundee United winger-cum-centre forward.

Dundee United's Paul Sturrock (left) takes the ball past Colin Jackson in their defeat by Rangers in the 1981 League Cup final

Who ought to be most flattered by the comparison is not who many might assume. “I’d never wear a headband!” says Sturrock, who’s on the line from Cornwall. True, but then he knew it wasn’t worth trying to get such an item past Jim McLean's austere gaze. Somehow, he did manage to get away with shirt flapping around outside his shorts and no stocking ties, something else he had in common with Grealish. It was a powerful and enduring look. Iconic, even.

In a way, Sturrock perhaps seems the most qualified of those appearing in a new Icons series from BBC Scotland (the likes of Steve Archibald, Rose Reilly and Charlie Nicholas also feature). However, he is quick to dismiss his own credentials in favour of McLean, for example. It comes down to a question of semantics.

"What's stronger?" asks Sturrock. "If legend is stronger than icon, then he (McLean) is a legend."

Paul Sturrock back at Tannadice before a game with St Johnstone in February with the Scottish league championship trophy won by Dundee United in 1983 (Photo by Mark Scates / SNS Group)

A similar programme on McLean would certainly be as entertaining although it might lack the warmth with which the talking heads recruited speak about Sturrock. He truly was the Scottish game's Beloved Entertainer. Fans of opposition teams and media personalities confess their admiration for him. KT Tunstall is also on board, although the former Dundee High School pupil narrates all the programmes in the series in a remarkable coup for BBC Scotland. It would not be a surprise if the singer-songwriter's favourite footballer happened to be Sturrock.

Even an opposition centre-half appears. In the case of Willie Miller, however, it was more about how much he loved kicking Sturrock. "He was crying out for it," smiles Miller at one point during the half-hour programme.

"They had a wee tactic," says Sturrock, with reference to Miller and Aberdeen centre-half partner Alex McLeish. "One would kick me and then the next time the other one would kick me!"

He knows it was a compliment. Still, one wonders if Sturrock, even now, appreciates just how good he was. Gary Lineker, a member of the Barcelona team beaten by Dundee United in the quarter-finals of the Uefa Cup in 1987, identified his worth. "Paul Sturrock was an excellent footballer," he says over footage of the player scoring against Dundee in 1980's League Cup final. "He'd probably have done quite well in Spain...but, we'll never know." There was a rumour Terry Venables had enquired about bringing Sturrock to the Nou Camp following Barcelona's European exit.

Sturrock simply shrugs on camera when this is put to him. "I was never going to get to move from Tannadice!" he says, truthfully.

In an interview with Scotland on Sunday, he reflects on seeing footage of himself playing again. Just how good he was appears to have been a belated realisation. "It took me a while to appreciate that," he says. "I don’t necessarily like to talk about it in public. I look at the players on the international scene I was competing against. I often think to myself 'I only got 20 caps'. But I only had 20 caps because we had about seven or eight really good strikers at the time, and Kenny Dalglish was still about, so that didn’t help!"

These 20 caps equate to about 80 now but the last of them was won as long ago as 1987. He played his last game for Dundee United two years later at the age of 32.

His bare shins had taken quite a hammering from opposition centre-halves, but it still feels criminally early. After a defeat to Hamilton Accies, Sturrock got two six-inch nails and hammered his boots into the boot-room wall. This fairly dramatic and irreversible act signalled that he knew it was all over. McLean had already invited him to begin coaching.

The programme is useful for reminding viewers about Sturrock’s successful second chapter as a manager, most of which was spent, largely very successfully, south of the Border. He does, though, occupy a very special place in St Johnstone's history. He won the First Division title there in 1997 after making the break from McLean four years earlier.

Sturrock was pleasantly surprised, after he was introduced at Tannadice before a game against St Johnstone in February, to hear cheers coming from all four stands. It was a bigger than normal turnout from home fans due to the match having been selected to mark 40 years since Sturrock and co won the Scottish title. But they couldn’t all be United supporters, surely?

“I forgot I was manager of St Johnstone!” he says. “When I came out onto the pitch there was this unbelievable roar. I was saying to myself, what was that all about? And then I remembered. It was the St Johnstone fans as well. Both sets of fans applauding.”

It’s comforting to know that Sturrock is feeling the love as he continues his battle with Parkinson’s disease. It was diagnosed back in 2000 but he only released the news publicly in 2008 during a second stint managing Plymouth Argyle. Meanwhile, surgery to have his gall bladder removed earlier this year knocked him "sideways”. He says he just needs to keep taking the tablets.

“It takes a while to get back on track with that, plus having Parkinson’s does not help. I just have to look after myself. That’s fine, I am back playing golf again and going fishing.”

He still attends Plymouth games and was delighted to see them win the League One title in the season just past and equally delighted they did so with 101 points. “I got 102 points!” he says with reference to the record haul when he led Plymouth to the Division Three title in 2001-02, one of six promotions he enjoyed with clubs in England. “Everything just clicked into place,” he says of managing down south, having walked away from Dundee United in 2000 due to the emotional toll.

He always pledged to return to Scotland for a managerial finale at one of the Angus teams but his condition demanded a reappraisal of these future plans, as did divorce from his wife, Barbara.

Now with partner Andrea, he did spend some time back at Dundee United as recently as 2018 when he was appointed the club’s chief scout in England. Shortly afterwards it was announced he had “accepted an invitation” from then manager Csaba Laszlo to join his coaching staff. It was a difficult scenario he acknowledges – one he would not have countenanced had he been manager.

Indeed, he walked out at Southampton in 2004 after just two games of the season because chairman Rupert Lowe was interfering.

“The manager (Laszlo) did not want me to be there,” he says. “At the end of the day you want to do something to help the team you support. But it was very difficult. Csaba made all the noises that he wanted me there but at the end of the day no one wants someone looking over them. All I wanted to do was help. There were things happening at the football club that needed organising and sorted out. At the end of the day, I realised I was never going to be able to change anything.”

It was a short-lived reunion but he did manage to seal a deal for striker Nicky Clark, who served United well. “I was trying to find some players for them. The boy Clark, for example. I talked to (his father) Sandy. He did OK. There were about two or three (others). But at the end of the day when you’re talking to Csaba, it’s hard for me to tell him to buy the boy Clark. He has to live by his own decisions. I would not have liked it to happen to me, put it that way.”

His current distance from Tannadice – around 550 miles or so – does not mean his first and only club as a player are out of mind. Far from it.

He cares too deeply and could not watch as their Premiership flame was snuffed out at the end of last season. He’s not a fan of changing managers as often as they have but is hopeful Jim Goodwin can lead United back into the Premiership at the first time of asking. Now 66, Sturrock hasn’t stuffed his own coaching badges into a drawer yet either.

“I am going to send out a memo to some of the amateur teams in the area and if anyone contacts me I will take training sessions,” he says. “I won’t be tied to one club. I am going to take training for a month or two or three sessions. That’s all in the pipeline. I tried to organise a team to come out of the village and could not get any players to play. They are all on computers and things.

“They’ve all been stuck in the house for three years during Covid,” he adds. “It’s affected the game at the grassroots level, definitely.”

Not wishing to compound the problem, but there's something everyone should be encouraged to sit and watch on a screen, including Grealish. The Sturrock episode is online now. Let yourself go back there.

Icons of Football: Paul Sturrock is available now on BBC iPlayer