DID your dad ever turn around to a guy at a football match to warn him about his bad language?

Mine did. All the time. And I was the reason sweary man had to bite his tongue, which was embarrassing.

It always went something along the lines of: “Hey Jimmy (which everyone was called), watch your language…the wean.” Dad would then point at the wee guy with three hats, six jumpers and a pair of wellies on. My mother was fearful I would catch pneumonia. In April.

And they always shut up. The big boy did not run away. He did as he was told and, more often than not, even apologised. It was sort of impressive.

My dad was and is a proper bloke. Back then he looked a cross between Danny McGrain, which is a good thing, and Peter Sutcliffe, which isn’t. Not to be messed with was big Jim, who isn’t big but had a presence about him which made shouty football fans all over Scotland in the early 1980s stop calling the referee a ‘******* *****.’

The thing is, the old man swore all the time in front of me, usually at the television when Maggie Thatcher came on to talk about closing factories or when Scotland conceded a soft goal from a corner.

Both happened a lot back in those days.

These telling offs was how it was done back then, at least in certain parts of the ground. If swearing at a football match offended then the East Enclosure at Ibrox, Celtic Park’s Jungle, the shed at Tynecastle or Aberdeen’s Beach End probably wasn’t for you.

However, if you went posh and sat down – which everyone could do at Pittodrie before you get all pedantic – then it was okay to ask the bam beside you to speak properly. There was a line in the sand.

As I am not a proper bloke, I would never dare today ask anyone to stop using foul language in front of my kids for three reasons. I like a cuss word myself, I don’t have any children and the gentleman who let slip the ‘F bomb’ would either laugh in my face or punch it. I’m not sure which would be worse.

We were Celtic Park regulars. My mates were Rangers fans and I went with them to games. Same, too, Motherwell, Love Street and a couple of hundred at the old and sadly missed Douglas Park.

Hand on heart, the worst behaviour, for me, in the 1980’s and beyond, was the vile and shameful abuse of black players. That always disgusted me far more than the Provo and Billy Boys stuff which I felt then as a kid, and to an extent now, as pantomime nonsense sung by folk who have no idea what they are signing and in real life – away from the football – wouldn’t be ruled by such opinions.

The most offensive song was about Davie Dods, Dundee United’s excellent centre-forward who was blessed with an eye for goal but whose looks were pleasant on the eye.

There was an afternoon when Andy Ritchie, the greatest Morton player of all time, was given a hell of a time, the accusation being that onanism played a large part of his daily life. I was intrigued.

“Dad, what are they singing?”

“Andy Ritchie, you’re a chancer, you’re a chancer.” I heartily joined in with my grandfather looking on in wonder at how we got out of that one.

It’s all pretty tame looking back. I can’t remember being at a game when anything was thrown onto the pitch but it must have happened. There were no flares, pitch invasions, and the songs, while not for everyone, were rated 15 at worst.

That’s not the case now. The songs are far viler, with lyrics of people being killed or dying. Their crime? To be associated with another team. Seats are broken, young men in dark clothing act as if the law doesn’t apply to them, making the watching experience not especially great. Especially at away games.

Sunday’s scenes at Rugby Park were depressing. The coin thrown and “orange *******” shout at Kris Boyd a disgrace. This season a linesman’s head has been cut open, black players putting up with racist crap, some stuff added to songbooks which sane people would find repugnant.

There is a breed of young football fan, from across all our clubs, who shame and embarrass their fellow supporter with what the say and do.

Anything is fair game to have song about them – Nacho Novo, the Lisbon Lions, Ian Durrant, the Ibrox disaster, child abuse victims, the guy who drives the Rangers bus and, worst of all, Jay Beattie, the young Celtic fan who has Down Syndrome.

This is the 2019 version of a dad asking someone to mind their language in front of the wean. Except these people won’t be told what to do. They easily could turn nasty.

I’ve watched them giving their fellow fans a hard time because they happen to be sitting in a seat where they want to be. It’s all about them and they are never in the wrong.

And the only ones who have real control are the clubs themselves actually doing something about the worst from within their own support.

If they aren’t up to it, I have a suggestion My dad might be nearing 75 but is willing to get back to the football and kick some arse. It’s what a few of them could be doing with.