SPFL ace on the collapse of ‘life-changing’ Celtic transfer
However, an injury to Aberdeen’s No.1 at the time threw an almighty spanner in the works, as Scott Bain joined Celtic from Hibernian instead.
“At one point everything was agreed, it was done,” the 36-year-old told Open Goal. “I think me and the missus played a game of ‘let’s see what we could have bought’ after.
“It would have been life-changing, it was a four-year deal. It was a chance to go and win trophies.
“It starts probably three or four days before the window shuts. I remember Hinchy, the goalie coach at the time because he was pally with Stevie Woods.
“The morning of training he said ‘Celtic are going to come in for you with a bid’… ‘F*** off, no they’re not.’But then obviously it happened. My agent had said all along ‘they’re going to get there with the fee’. It was just playing a bit of hardball with Motherwell for the fee but we knew they would get there.Then when they finally did, Motherwell were signing the boy Freddie Woodman on loan from Newcastle. Freddie was getting ready to come up and Joe Lewis got injured at Aberdeen training that day, this was the day before the window shut.
“Aberdeen come in for him [Woodman] and he picks Aberdeen over Motherwell. I’m in the office with Stephen Robinson and Alan Burrows and Robbo is like ‘you can’t sell him, I’m resigning if you sell him’.
“Listen, we got to a cup final but in the league, we weren’t doing great, we certainly weren’t safe from relegation. Robbo’s point was ‘Trevor is my number one, we can’t sell him’. The window was shut that night.In my mind, it was all done. We played Hibs that night, I came out and had a few missed calls and I knew something was up. Scott Bain was supposed to be on the bench against us for Hibs but they pulled him out and he signed for Celtic because mine had fallen through.
Be the first to comment