Dundee travel to Gayfield to take on Arbroath in their second pre season friendly and so we take a look at a player who has played for both clubs, Colin McNab
McNab was a playmaking right-half who was considered a beautifully constructive wing-half with a tremendous determination and tenacity. Consistency was also a feature of his career because in almost a decade in Dark Blue he only failed to make less than 30 appearances in three of his ten years with Dundee and he earned six Scotland full caps and four Scottish League caps.
Born in Portobello, Edinburgh on April 6th 1902 Colin Duncan McNab started his football career with Junior side Musselburgh Bruntonians with whom he won the Scottish Junior Cup in 1923 after defeating Arniston 2-0 in the Final.
He joined Dundee a year later in the summer of 1924 and made his debut at Aberdeen in a 0-0 draw on October 18th in front of 18,000.
Having broken into the side, McNab made 21 appearances in his debut season and in March played in both Scottish Cup semi-final ties against Hamilton Academical. After a 1-1 draw at Dens in the days before semis were played on neutral grounds, The Dee progressed to the Final with a 2-0 win in the replay at Easter Road but there was to be no Hampden appearance for the youngster.
McNab played four times on the ‘Road to Hampden’ but for the Final against Celtic on April 11th, skipper Jock Ross had recovered from injury to lead out the side and McNab was the one left out of the big day which The Celts won 2-1.
The following season Colin firmly established himself in the side and made 33 appearances including playing in the first top flight derby against Dundee United in a 0-0 draw at Dens on November 21st 1925. He also played in the return fixture at Tannadice in January which The Dee won 1-0 and the following year was on the score sheet when the Dark Blues beat United 7-2 in the first round of the Forfarshire Cup at Dens.
McNab would score again against United in a 4-3 Forfarshire Cup 1st round win in October 1928 and in total would play in five derby wins.
By the end of the Roaring Twenties McNab was a stalwart in the team alongside Marsh, Brown, Gilmour and Campbell and had already made four appearances for the Scottish League. In October 1930 two of two of those, McNab and Gilmore were rewarded with their consistent performances with a call up to the full Scotland team.
After six years at Dens Colin earned the first of his six Scotland caps in a 1-1 draw with Wales in a British International Championship match but the draw was seen as a disappointing result. Due to a club v country wrangle south of the border this was the start of a spell in which Scotland fielded an ‘All-Tartan XI’ but the draw with Wales was considered a disaster at the time because the Welsh had limited themselves to picking players from Welsh clubs only.
Wholesale changes where made for the next Scotland match in Belfast and McNab and Gilmour were amongst the casualties. While Gilmour was never capped again, the battling McNab was recalled for the match against England a year later.
Colin played well in a famous 2-0 win over the ‘Auld Enemy’ at Hampden and along with team mate Jimmy Robertson was chosen for Scotland’s European tour party in May 1931. Without any Rangers, Celtic or Motherwell players both Robertson and McNab featured against Austria (a 5-0 defeat in Vienna) and Italy (a 3-0 defeat in Rome) while McNab also played in the 3-2 win over Switzerland in Geneva.
In May 1932 McNab made his sixth and final Scotland appearance against England at Wembley where the depleted ‘All Tartan Troops’ were unlucky to go down 3-0. It did however make Colin Dundee’s most capped player to that point.
McNab continued to play for Dundee for another two seasons and after 293 appearances and 21 goals he transferred to Arbroath. Colin captained the Red Litchies for a couple of years before retiring from the game but went into business in the town and after the Second World War was a member of Arbroath committee from 1945 to 1955.
It was twenty years before Billy Steel beat Colin’s record of caps as a Dundee player and he died on November 25th 1970. He was a mainstay of the Dundee team and popular with the support and wore the dark blue of Dundee and Scotland with distinction.
Honours at Dundee:
Scotland full caps: 6
Scottish League caps: 4
Appearances, Goals:
League: 263, 17 goals
Scottish Cup: 30, 4 goals
