Ally Dawson Has Passed Away

[ian1964 10,514]

 

[Scott7 5,395]

Never found wanting for lack of effort. Captain for a time?

[CammyF 7,045]

RIP Ally - thoughts and prayers with his family and friends. 

[onevision 1,473]

So sad....terrific full back and class as captain.

[Bill 13,717]

Shocking news, 63 is no age to leave us. Ally Dawson was one of those people who played for us through one of our leanest periods, yet emerged with his reputation fully intact. I always felt he would have been one of Rangers' legends with a better team around him. So sorry to hear of his passing.

[RANGERRAB 3,358]

Very sad news indeed. Seem to recall he’d a head injury or something and was sadly never the same player again after it. 
Met him a couple of times. True Rangers man

RIP Ally Dawson ☹️

[compo 6,327]

Always a sad day when one of our own passes away RIP Ally .

[Uilleam 5,568]

Obituary — Ally Dawson: A Rangers lionheart who loved the game

Ewing Grahame

Tuesday July 27 2021, 12.01am, The Times

 

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/obituary-ally-dawson-a-rangers-lionheart-who-loved-the-game-v565wmnds

 

Ally Dawson, the former Rangers and Scotland full back, died at the age of 63 yesterday, after a long illness. A two-footed player who could be used with confidence on either flank, Dawson was unfortunate to captain the club during the nine-year spell between 1978 and 1987 when they failed to win the league title, although he enjoyed more success in cup competitions.

 

He was signed as a 16-year-old straight from Johnstone High School early in 1975 and manager Jock Wallace gave him a first-team debut in Canada during a world tour the club undertook that summer. He took his competitive bow the following season in awkward circumstances. Defending a 1-0 lead from the first leg of their League Cup quarter-final against Queen of the South at Ibrox, Dawson played for the full 120 minutes as Wallace’s side needed extra time to claim the 2-2 draw which took them into the semi-finals.

Rangers would go on to win the treble that season but Dawson, faced with tough competition from the likes of Sandy Jardine, Alex Miller and Alex Forsyth, would not establish himself in the starting XI until the 1978-79 campaign, when he made 36 appearances in all competitions and won the first of his six medals as Rangers claimed the Scottish Cup and League Cup in John Greig’s first season as manager.

The following year he was part of the team which lost the Scottish Cup final to Celtic after extra time, an occasion which was marred by both sets of supporters fighting on the pitch at the end of the match. “My parents were at the game,” he said years afterwards. “It was the last game my mum, Elizabeth, saw live. It put her off the rest of it.”

That same summer he fractured his skull while on another tour of Canada but the lionhearted Dawson was soon back in action.

 

He reached the high point of his Rangers career the following season, when he captained a Davie Cooper-inspired side to a 4-1 win over Dundee United in the 1981 Scottish Cup final replay. He would go on to win three more League Cups with the club, the last against Celtic in 1986 under Graeme Souness.

His ability to fill in at centre back helped to prolong his Ibrox career and he was unlucky to play in an era when Scotland were particularly well served in the full-back department. Nevertheless, he was selected five times by Jock Stein between 1980 and 1983.

 

He played 316 times for Rangers, scoring eight goals, before joining Blackburn Rovers for £25,000 in 1987. He then had a spell in Ireland at Limerick and returned to Scotland with Airdrieonians before becoming player-manager of Maltese club St Andrews.

 

Dawson later spent three years in charge of Hamilton Academical, guiding the Lanarkshire club to the Third Division title in 2000-01. He also managed the Scotland team at the 2016 Homeless World Cup in Glasgow.

 

His family said in a statement: “It is with much sadness that we announce the passing of our beloved Ally Dawson following a long battle with illness. To us, Ally was a loving husband, father, son and brother but we know he meant a lot to so many others. We will remember the impact he had on our family with affection, inspired by the courage with which he fought his illness and the way he lived his life and grateful that Ally spent his final days with those he loved and who loved him.”

 

A modest, engaging individual who loved watching and talking about football, he was a regular at Ibrox in his later years. Rangers — who inducted Dawson into their Hall of Fame in 2011 —paid a tribute to him on their official website. “The thoughts of the directors, staff and players of Rangers are today with the family and friends of Ally.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Frankie 8,200]

Just before my time but a sad loss...

[alexscottislegend 2,122]

I remember him well too. Maybe not what we now call a superstar, but a good reliable professional. Hope his early demise was nothing to do with his head injury.