SCREAMING girls waving tartan - so you might think this is a boy band flying into Glasgow. But it is in fact the Scotland team arriving back from the World Cup in 1974 when Scotland was at its hard luck best. The only team ever to be eliminated from a World Cup final without losing a match. We had drawn against Brazil and Yugoslavia and beaten Zaire, but our goal difference wasn't good enough.
Even hard-bitten football writers such as The Herald's Ian Archer wrote that they had wept after the final whistle.
Two days later there were over 6000 fans, possibly even 10,000 in one estimate, at Glasgow Airport to praise the returning team, with the players climbing on to the roof of the team bus to wave back. Hard-pressed police officers push at the barriers to keep the crowd back. Other fans lined the route to Glasgow, and there were a further 2000 at George Square in front of the hotel where the team was headed.
Even captain Billy Bremner averred that Scotland had been good enough to go all the way to the actual final if they had been allowed to continue.
They don't say that nowadays.
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