Montford memories: Argentina here we come – then disaster for Scotland

SO MUCH has been said and written about the 1978 World Cup that I do not need to spell out the desperate disappointment of that flight home. I never shared the almost frantic optimism of the team's departure. I didn't like the Hampden send-off and in a long interview I did with Scotland manager Ally MacLeod as the players gathered in Glasgow I sensed that he hadn't quite done all his homework.

Iran had come through that intense Middle East group with a terrific record and indeed having qualified sent their Under-21 side to play the last qualifying match – and won.

Complacency seemed to have set in following the elation of qualification, because Scotland's preparations for the 1978 World Cup began before the team had earned a place at the event, with MacLeod gathering the nucleus of his Argentina campaigners to take part in a three-match tour of South America at the end of the previous season 1976-77.

The trip was regarded a successful tour, but it was the longest trip I'd ever been on, with the first stop in Santiago, the capital of Chile.

A 4-2 win against the hosts, a country we had never met in an international match, got us off to a good start, followed by a 1-1 draw against the following year's hosts, Argentina. Scotland should have won and might have done so had Willie Johnston not been sent off for what I described as a "trivial foul." Brazil, World Cup winners in 1958, 1962 and 1970, fielded a powerful side and I was impressed when I watched them train the day before the game. That night, privileged to be in the team bus heading for a floodlight training session, I got a close look at what was not really a "modern" stadium.

Three sides of the ground were open which you would expect in the South American sunshine, and the terraces covered a huge area, having held the World Cup record crowd when 199,854 crammed in to see Uruguay beat Brazil 2-1 in 1950.

Just as the Scots were winding up their training session I asked Alan Rough's deputy Bobby Clark if he would give me "just one shot" at a penalty kick. With a smile which suggested "you've no chance" he took his position and I managed to squeeze the ball inside his left-hand post – just before the floodlights went out.

Next day Scotland continued the good form they had shown in Chile and Argentina, but Brazil won the match 2-0. Talking to my opposite numbers among the TV reporters I sensed that they believed Brazil would win the following summer in Argentina but it was to be 1994 in Los Angeles before they lifted the trophy again.

A year later, Scotland returned with high hopes of qualifying from the group stages of the finals for the first time. Their opponents in the first match were Peru, who had some of the best dead-ball kickers in South America, including Teofilo Cubillas (who scored against us). But Ally preferred, he told me with great candour, to concentrate on the strengths of the team which had set Liverpool alight with that unforgettable win over Wales earlier in the year. No doubt some of you remember the elation of the occasion, and television replays of Kenny Dalglish's glorious clinching goal capture my own excitement: "Argentina, here we come!"

The 1-1 draw with Iran and the 3-1 defeat from Peru, both games in the lovely town of Cordoba, meant the predictable anti-climax of the 3-2 win over Holland in Mendoza, even although Archie Gemmill's goal has since been voted 'Scotland's greatest ever goal'. Some of the reaction at home to Scotland's failure lay somewhere between hysterical and ludicrous. Ally MacLeod and the players knew they had let everyone down, but were simply victims of our own expectations.

The homecoming could not have been more different from the warmth accorded to the much under-rated Willie Ormond and his squad of 1974 who didn't qualify for the knock-out stages because they didn't score enough goals against Zaire.

With the scribe's greatest gift of hindsight, I'd say the Ormond squad were as talented as any Scottish team I've had the honour of describing in action since the Fifties. They did so well because they were such a balanced team and for all his quiet style, Willie Ormond knew how to motivate his players. He had a particularly strong bond – however unlikely it might seem – with his captain Billy Bremner – fiery when Ormond was calm, passionate when his boss was laid back, but both united by the one thing which makes good teams great teams – an uncompromising will to win. How sad to think that they are both gone.

The match against Czechoslovakia, which took us to the World Cup finals for the first time in 16 years, is in my top three or four favourite games as a commentator, along with the Wales v Scotland game at Anfield in 1977 and the 1960 European Cup final at Hampden. If my commentary was passionate, it was because the night meant so much for Scottish football. Although the promise was never quite fulfilled, it was memorable ... Joe Jordan "the young substitute" scoring a dramatic winning goal, "disaster for Scotland" when the Czechs scored first – repeated in Argentina when Iran equalised – and "come on Denis" and "watch your back Billy". I would not hide the fact that I was a passionate Scotland supporter. I'm told that people remember these clips because they are so fond of them, and that is something that never occurs to you at the time. Television is very much about the moment, but when you are present at a historic event, you find yourself being beamed back into people's livingroom's for the rest of your life.

I'm often asked if Argentina 1978 was my lowest ebb as a commentator. Not by a long way. Having to describe England beating Scotland 9-3 at Wembley in 1961 was, well ... I can't talk about it.