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Fullname: John McNamee
aka: John Mac, John MacNamee
Born: 11 June 1941
Died: 28 November 2024
Birthplace: Coatbridge, Lanarkshire.
Signed: 13 Aug 1960 (from Bellshill Athletic)
Left: 17 Apr 1964 (to Hibs)
Position: Centre Half
Debut: Celtic 2-0 Hibernian, League, 18 Feb 1961
Internationals: none
Biog
“Big Bad John [McNamee] was afraid of no one and took no prisoners!”
Celtic Great Tommy Gemmell
John McNamee signed for Celtic, turning down Man Utd and Notts Forest, and was one of the first signings (if not the first) by Jock Stein (albeit in his reserve team coaching stint)
John McNamee began his senior career with Celtic, playing in a 2-0 win over Hibs in February 1961, taking the place of an ill Billy McNeill.
He was apparently a very tough player, with even Tommy Gemmell stating that “It didn’t matter too much to John if a rival player ended up in Row E along with the ball… anyone managing to get past him might discover they had left a part of their anatomy behind them!”
He later became a regular playing ahead of Paddy Crerand who was in the bad books due to the Ne’erday game of 1963. It paid off early with a 5-1 win over Aberdeen in the first match (“New boys go goal crazy” was the headline), and with the exception of a 6-0 thumping by Kilmarnock, Celtic had an excellent second half of the season in the league. Albeit he wasn’t in the side for that thumping by Kilmarnock, so on paper at least proved his value to the first team.
He even had a burst of goals in March 1963, with a single goal in each of the victories against Hearts, Queen of the South and Raith Rovers.
John McNamee went on to play in the 1963 Scottish Cup final defeat (initial match drawn & then the replay defeat) by Rangers which despite the loss was a good start to gain experience and gain a foothold in the first team. In the run to the final, he was called ‘the enforcer‘ [of the defence] in a 1-0 victory over St Mirren.
However, things went wrong when he was sent home early from a tour of Ireland following that he had broken a curfew the night before a match (albeit a friendly). In one reserve match he was booked for the surprising fact that he was arguing with his own team’s goalkeeper, the irrepressible Frank Haffey.
He was mostly cut out in season 1963/64, with John Clark taking over his regular place, and the rest as they say is history. So sadly he wasn’t to make it at Celtic, but in fairness this was a dire time to be at Celtic with many good players underperforming, badly coached and very seriously on the verge of leaving.
One point to add is that Celtic great & Lisbon Lisbon Tommy Gemmell is scathing about John McNamee, claiming that he repeatedly called Tommy Gemmell an ‘Orange bastard’, although does go on to state that his colleague Ian Young got similar from him BUT saw it as a joke. Ian Young (a very pious practicing protestant) in his own autobiography countered that he never got abuse anything was banter and got on well with all.
Post-Celtic
He was signed up by Jock Stein to play for Hibernian in April 1964, where he would form a strong defensive partnership with all-time Hibernian great & future Celtic player Pat Stanton. But then Jock Stein himself moved in the opposite direction back to Celtic early in the next year and didn’t take John McNamee back with him. In fairness, John McNamee would have had to compete against Billy McNeill & John Clark for first team places which would have been a task too far for any footballer.
In later years, John McNamee was quoted as saying:
“Jock Stein left for Celtic shortly after signing me and you can’t help but wonder what Hibs might have achieved had he not gone to Parkhead. We all believe we’d have won the league that season but you could understand why he went to Celtic, they’d brought him back from Wales as a player and it was always his ambition to manage them.“
It was a cruel twist of fate for John McNamee, and he’ll never know what might have happened if he’d stayed at Celtic and Jock Stein had returned to Celtic having not taken him to Hibs, or maybe if Jock Stein had simply not left Hibs having taken John McNamee over. Prior to Jock Stein’s arrival at Celtic as manager, Celtic had been underachieving for a long time, and under Jimmy McGrory, the coaching staff were practically impotent as the board meddled with the first side. Morale was low.
Celtic had become a poor place for an aspiring young player, and John McNamee’s story was sadly not a unique one at the club. So leaving for Hibs was not actually a bad decision, but it was just poor luck that Jock Stein moved the other way not long after. Possibly at this point in his career, he may have felt himself to be jinxed.
Luck and good fortune finally came John McNamee’s way when he signed for Newcastle United in December 1966, going on to be part of their team that won the Inter-cities Fairs Cup in 1969. In the semi-final, Newcastle faced Rangers and John McNamee warmed up at Ibrox wearing his Celtic shirt. He explained:
“I was just winding them up, but football had a sense of humour and no one accused me of inciting the crowd.”
So despite losing out on playing for Celtic in a glorious period, he managed to gain glory with Newcastle Utd. John McNamee is still a very fondly remembered player in Newcastle’s history, and is the first Celt to have won a medal in that European club competition (the Inter-Cities Fair Cup is seen as a predecessor to the UEFA Cup).
After leaving Newcastle in 1971, he played for Blackburn Rovers (where he was said to have brought ‘self-respect and steel to the team‘), Hartlepool United, Lancaster City and Workington before retiring in 1976.
He became a postman in the Lake District, but his bruising battles on the park took their toll and severe arthritis forced him into retirement.
John McNamee in later life lived in Cumbria. In 2017, he was diagnosed with Alzhiemers, and passed away after a long life in 2024.
Playing Career
| APPEARANCES | LEAGUE | SCOTTISH CUP | LEAGUE CUP | EUROPE | TOTAL |
| 1959-64 | 27 | 7 | 2 | 0 | 38 |
| Goals: | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 3 |
| Club |
From |
To |
Appearances |
Goals |
| Celtic | 1960 | 1964 | 27 | 2 |
| Hibernian | 1964 | 1967 | 77 | 4 |
| Newcastle Utd. | 1967 | 1972 | 117 | 8 |
| Blackburn Rov. | 1972 | 1973 | 56 | 9 |
| Hartlepool Utd | 1973 | 1974 | 2 | 0 |
| Lancaster City | 1974 | 1975 | ? | ? |
| Workington | 1975 | 1976 | 2 | 0 |
| Totals |
1975 |
1976 |
281 |
23 |
Honours with Celtic
none
Pictures
Articles
Where are they now? –
Football
Sun, The (London, England)
October 19, 1998
Author: Trevor Clements
THERE is a piece of Toon Army folklore that sums up the footballing philosophy of soccer’s original bad boy – John MacNamee.
It was 1970 and Chelsea brought their team of fancy dans to a freezing cold, rain-lashed St James’ Park.
Minutes into the game Alan Birchenall, the Blues’ flowing-maned striker, began a mazy run just a few yards in from the right flank.
MacNamee called to his full-back to swap places and unceremoniousy kicked Birchenall on to the cinder track.
He leaned over his prone victim and bellowed: “And if you come back into this half again, son, you’ll get the FULL treatment.”
Birchenall took up a somewhat deep centre-forward role. Just in front of his back four.
Big John Mac, who remains one of Newcastle’s favourite sons, is perplexed by the outcry at today’s onfield problems.
He was revelling in the villain’s role when Hartson, Ince, Di Canio and the like were still breaking their Tonka toys.
Softer
MacNamee said: “There have always been players at each others’ throats.
“It went on, but it went unseen and unreported. Football has become softer, not tougher.”
To illustrate the point MacNamee recalls a fierce battle with Stoke City’s tough centre-forward John Ritchie.
Mac added: “John and I always had a pitched battle and this day he caught me with an elbow and cut my mouth open.
“I had eight stitches in the wound but came back on for another crack at him.
“It was so niggly, the referee kept blowing up to separate us until John called him to one side and said ‘Will you leave us alone, we’re trying to enjoy ourselves.”‘ MacNamee signed for Celtic in 1958, as a 17-year-old who had been spotted playing in Glasgow by Jock Stein.
He became a first-team regular and was on the losing side in the 1963 Scottish Cup Final when Rangers beat Celtic 3-0.
Stein moved to Hibs the following year and took MacNamee with him for Pounds 17,500 – the only player the ex-Scotland boss ever signed twice. Soon after England won the World Cup, Joe Harvey paid Pounds 27,500 to take him to St James’ and in 1969 MacNamee and the Magpies enjoyed their finest hour when Newcastle won the old Fairs Cup – today’s UEFA Cup.
In the semi-final, Newcastle faced Rangers and MacNamee warmed up at Ibrox wearing his Celtic shirt. He explained: “I was just winding them up, but football had a sense of humour and no one accused me of inciting the crowd.”
He said: “I loved turning out in the black and white stripe. The Newcastle fans were out of this world and they really took to me because they knew I gave 100 per cent.”
MacNamee ended his playing career with Blackburn Rovers, enjoying similar adoration at Ewood Park before calling it a day in 1974.
After a brief managerial career, an ill-fated six months at Division Four Workington and a spell coaching at Carlisle United, John quit soccer.
He became a postman in the Lake District, but his bruising battles on the park took their toll and severe arthritis forced him into retirement.
Now 57, widower MacNamee is a doting grandad, looking after seven-month-old Catlin Rose when his son John – one of four children – is at work.
He joked: “I love pushing her pram – it stops me needing a zimmer frame.
Emotional ER return for old boy McNamee
Published Date: 15 November 2008
FORMER Hibs star John McNamee has paid his first visit to Easter Road since leaving for Newcastle United more than 40 years ago.
The uncompromising centre-half, now 67 and living in Cumbria, was greeted by former team-mates Peter Cormack and John Fraser as he arrived for the SPL clash with Inverness Caledonian Thistle.
And he was immediately struck by the remarkable transformation of the ground, most noticeably the disappearance of the double-tiered terracing which once faced the tunnel and Easter Road’s famous slope.
McNamee, signed by Jock Stein from Celtic, went on to play for Newcastle United where he won the Inter-Cities Fairs Cup, the forerunner of the UEFA Cup, and settled in the Lake District after his playing career came to an end. Today he said: “I’ve never really had the chance to come back. My wife died in 1983 so I always had to be there for our children.
“But I’ve a good friend, Gordon Clark, who lives in Stirling, a lifelong Hibs fan, who has always been asking me to come up. When I signed for Hibs I used to get Gordon tickets for matches and even gave him a lift through from the west. I thoroughly enjoyed my day, meeting up with Peter and John again and reminiscing about the good old days. I also had the chance to have a chat with Eddie Turnbull and Lawrie Reilly.
“Jock Stein left for Celtic shortly after signing me and you can’t help but wonder what Hibs might have achieved had he not gone to Parkhead. We all believe we’d have won the league that season but you could understand why he went to Celtic, they’d brought him back from Wales as a player and it was always his ambition to manage them.
“I couldn’t get over how the ground has changed, it’s a tremendous stadium now and will be even better when the new East Stand is built. It was also a surprise to see the slope gone, it was a great psychological thing for us and, to be honest, it looked as if today’s team could have done with shooting down it last weekend.
“That was the big disappointment of the day, that the team didn’t play well and were beaten.” McNamee returned home promising to make an early return to Easter Road, although his next big reunion will be Newcastle marking the 40th anniversary of winning the Fairs Cup when they beat Ujpest Dozsa.
He said: “I had five terrific years with Newcastle, there were quite a few Scots in the side including Jim Scott, who had also come from Hibs, and Gordon Marshall.”
- Last Updated: 15 November 2008 11:13 AM
- Source: Edinburgh Evening News
Recalling Newcastle United’s former ‘hard man’ centre-half John McNamee
As John McNamee, 74, is forced from his Cumbrian home by flooding, we recall his career at Newcastle United
https://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/news/history/recalling-newcastle-uniteds-former-hard-10580868
ByDavid Morton
15:30, 10 DEC 2015Updated15:50, 10 DEC 2015
The Chronicle was saddened this week to report on the situation of former Newcastle United centre-half John McNamee.
For the second time John, now 74, has been a victim of the dramatic flooding which has badly affected Cumbria and forced many people from their homes.
For most United fans in 2015, McNamee’s time at St James’ Park will have come before their own, but his name resounds loudly down the decades from that golden era of Fairs Cup success.
Signed by manager Joe Harvey in December 1966 to help plug relegation-threatened United’s defence, the burley stopper sits alongside the likes of David Batty and Brian Kilcline as one of the genuine “hard men” to pull on the black and white shirt.
Not the most skilfully gifted of footballers, McNamee’s hard-as-nail qualities earned him a trial with Manchester United as a youngster, before he began his senior career with Celtic in 1959, then moved to Hibernian in 1964.
The Scot’s Toon debut came at White Hart Lane on New Year’s Eve with Jimmy Greaves running riot, and Spurs running out 4-0 winners.
Better was to follow in the second half of the season and a string of wins in March and April helped United finish a dizzying 20th in the First Division, avoiding relegation by four points.
The following season – 1967-68 – saw McNamee’s muscle help United to 10th in the league, and famously secure qualification for Europe.
Along the way, John endeared himself to the 1960s Toon Army, by netting a late equaliser in a 3-3 against Sunderland at Roker Park and swinging in celebration on the crossbar in front of the enraged Fulwell End.
As the Magpies, to the amazement of many, took Europe by storm, John McNamee was part of the squad which finally lifted silver in Budapest.
His greatest moment during the campaign surely came in the semi-final first leg at Ibrox in front of 75,000 baying fans where he kept out his old Glasgow adversaries, Rangers, on the way to a priceless 0-0 draw.
McNamee’s final game for United came in May 1971 at Coventry City’s Highfield Road.
After Newcastle, the stopper turned out for Blackburn Rovers, Morton and Hartlepool, before he briefly managed Workington and coached at Carlisle.
In later years, settling in Cockermouth in the Lake District, John worked a postman before a serious accident forced him to retire in 1988.
Newcastle United hero John McNamee dies aged 83 as tributes paid to ‘a giant of a man’
https://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/newcastle-united-hero-john-mcnamee-30471434
The defender was part of the 1969 Fairs Cup winning side and earned plenty of plaudits in a colourful career
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Sport
ByJohn Gibson
12:58, 28 NOV 2024Updated13:33, 28 NOV 2024
John McNamee
John McNamee (Image: Supplied picture. Free to use)
Big John McNamee was the frightening enforcer in Newcastle United’s European Fairs Cup days but cruelly during recent years a series of crippling setbacks had reduced him to a shell of his former self.
However the courage and fight he showed when a cult hero on Tyneside never left him throughout a lengthy stay in a Cumbria care home. May he now rest in the peace denied him after dying aged 83.
McNamee was a hulk of a man with a fiercesome reputation which went before him casting a long shadow of doubt over opponents. A true Celt, a warrior, a mixture of Mel Gibson’s Braveheart, Desperate Dan and the Incredible Hulk, the stories of his footballing prowess are part of folklore.
It was said that he could bend crowbars between his teeth and certainly when he strode across Hadrian’s Wall to join United it was a journey of necessity. He was hounded out of Scotland because of constant disciplinary run-ins with referees!
McNamee went on to iconic status not just as a frightening centre-half who tackled like the crack of doom but as a European Fairs Cup winner in 1969. It was the highlight of a colourful career.
I’ve known John since the day he signed for Newcastle back in December of 1966, a transfer that helped save the club from relegation and paved the way for the Magpies only ever European trophy clinched in Budapest, ironically, on his 28th birthday.
No less a figure than Sir Alex Ferguson, a teak tough character himself, revealed why McNamee had to get out of every town back home. It followed a clash during a reserve game between St Johnstone and Celtic.
As a centre-forward Fergie was in the direct firing line of a Celtic back line known collectively as the Big Bad Johns – John ‘The Gorilla’ Kurilla, John Cushley, and John McNamee.
“The most legendary of these three frighteners [at Celtic] was McNamee,” Ferguson recalled in his autobiography. “It was probably unwise to become warlike with him but we had to be dragged apart by team-mates. John threatened to kill me and, heartened by the proximity of so many players and the referee, I told him I would be around at the end. I thought no more about it until as I was combing my hair after being in the bath one of the groundstaff told me somebody was waiting for me.
“Assuming it was a friend I stuck my head round the door. I nearly fainted when I saw McNamee standing there. Now I wasn’t a coward by any means but this was a monster and a little common sense was in order.
“So I went back to combing my hair and waited for the noise of the Celtic coach pulling out. The best of three falls with a monster was not a good idea!”
John was the only player the legendary Jock Stein felt was good enough to sign twice – firstly in 1958 as an apprentice at Celtic and again immediately upon becoming manager of Hibernian.
McNamee holds the record of a double first having played in the very first European game of any sort at Celtic Park and the first ever European match at St James Park. Those two occasions completed a unique set – he was the only footballer to have performed for three different teams (Celtic, Hibernian and Newcastle) in the old Fairs Cup.
Perhaps the key moment of his time on Tyneside – he made 132 appearances scoring eight goals – came in the semi-final of the Fairs Cup against Glasgow Rangers at Ibrox.
When Dave Elliott collapsed in the street for a second time having had an epileptic fit Joe Harvey decided he would not risk his traumatised room-mate Ollie Burton and turned instead to Big John. A diehard Celt facing Rangers at Ibrox!
If that was not explosive enough McNamee promptly poured petrol on the flames telling the Scottish Press that he could play their international centre-forward Colin Stein on one leg. Recipe for disaster . . . except Newcastle kept a clean sheet in a draw before 70,000 fanatics that nicely set up the second leg and a cup final. No shrinking violet our man.
I had long worked with Big John not just during his playing days at Newcastle but afterwards on talk-ins across the area.
He was a joy to listen to, a fund of gloriously irreverent and downright hilarious reminiscences, yet behind the facade of a fun guy was a life of terrible tragedy.
Having lost his dear wife Rose aged only 41 he was left to bring up four kids on his own putting them through university despite a lack of money. He became a postman in Cockermouth to give him more time with the family only for his Royal Mail van to be involved in a head on collision which left him with serious neck and back injuries. Then his son Darren died unexpectedly in Australia.
Crippled by old football injuries which put him on sticks, John went on to lose all his goods and shackles when floods decimated the area where he lived. Not once but twice.
Worse followed. McNamee was originally diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease which robbed him of so many treasured memories and warm public appreciation many years ago and things continued to go steadily downhill. It was later confirmed he had CTE and had also developed Parkinson’s Disease. He ended up confined to a wheelchair hardly able to speak.
No man deserves such constant horrific fortune but John McNamee battled on until the very end. A giant of a man in every way.