Peter McCloy (born 26 November 1946) is a Scottish retired

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

goalkeeper who played for

Motherwell Motherwell ( sco, Mitherwall, gd, Tobar na Màthar) is a town and former burgh in North Lanarkshire, Scotland, United Kingdom, south east of Glasgow. It has a population of around 32,120. Historically in the parish of Dalziel and part of Lanarks ...

and

Rangers A Ranger is typically someone in a military/paramilitary or law enforcement role specializing in patrolling a given territory, called “ranging”. The term most often refers to: * Park ranger or forest ranger, a person charged with protecting and ...

. He was a member of the team which won the European Cup Winners Cup in

1972 Within the context of Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) it was the longest year ever, as two leap seconds were added during this 366-day year, an event which has not since been repeated. (If its start and end are defined using Solar time, me ...

, and was Rangers' first-choice goalkeeper for most of his 16-year spell at the club despite competition from players such as

Gerhardt Neef Gerhard "Gerry" Neef (30 October 1946 – 23 February 2010), often known as Gerhardt Neef, was a German professional footballer who played as a goalkeeper. Career Although Neef was taken to Scotland initially by Eddie Turnbull, manager of Aberde ...

, Stewart Kennedy and Jim Stewart.

Career

McCloy joined

from Crosshill Thistle on his 17th birthday in 1963 and made his senior debut the following year. He stayed at Fir Park for six seasons before joining

in a player exchange deal in 1970, with Bobby Watson and

Brian Heron Brian Heron (born 19 June 1948) is a Scottish former footballer, who played in the Scottish Football League for Rangers, Motherwell and Dumbarton, and in the Football League for Oxford United and Scunthorpe United Scunthorpe United Football ...

moving in the opposite direction. At Ibrox he was nicknamed "The Girvan Lighthouse", due to his birthplace and the fact he stood tall. He played under three different Rangers managers:

Willie Waddell William Waddell (7 March 1921 – 14 October 1992) was a professional football player and manager. His only club in a 16-year career as a player in the outside right position (interrupted by World War II) was Rangers which yielded six major w ...

, Jock Wallace (in both of his spells as manager), and John Greig. He won multiple honours in his Rangers career: two Scottish League titles, four Scottish League Cups, four Scottish Cups and Rangers' only ever European trophy, the

1971–72 European Cup Winners' Cup The 1971–72 season of the European Cup Winners' Cup football club tournament was won by Rangers, who defeated Dynamo Moscow in the final. Preliminary round First leg ---- Second leg ''4–4 on aggregate; Austria Wien won on away goals ...

. He was one of only five players who featured in every match of the latter campaign, alongside Sandy Jardine, Willie Mathieson, Alex MacDonald and Colin Stein. He made 545 appearances in all competitions for Rangers, and played for Scotland on four occasions. After retiring as a player in 1986, McCloy went into coaching, firstly during

Graeme Souness Graeme James Souness (; born 6 May 1953) is a Scottish former professional football player and manager, and current TV pundit. A midfielder, Souness was the captain of the successful Liverpool team of the early 1980s, player-manager of Ranger ...

' spell as Rangers manager, until 1988. He went on to work with a number of clubs and goalkeepers including Andy Goram and Jim Leighton. He was on the bench for Hearts for both legs of their

1988–89 UEFA Cup The 1988–89 UEFA Cup was won by Napoli over Stuttgart. It was the fourth season that English clubs were banned from European competitions. The English league clubs who otherwise would have qualified were Manchester United and Luton Town. Rom ...

tie against

Bayern Munich Fußball-Club Bayern München e. V. (FCB, ), also known as FC Bayern (), Bayern Munich, or simply Bayern, is a German professional sports club based in Munich, Bavaria. It is best known for its professional men's football team, which pla ...

Personal life

His father

Jimmy Jimmy may refer to: Arts and entertainment Film and television * ''Jimmy'' (2008 film), a 2008 Hindi thriller directed by Raj N. Sippy * ''Jimmy'' (1979 film), a 1979 Indian Malayalam film directed by Melattoor Ravi Varma * ''Jimmy'' (2013 f ...

was also a footballer and a goalkeeper. In retirement, he worked at Turnberry Golf Resort.

References

External links

* * Living people Association football goalkeepers Association football coaches Scottish footballers Scotland international footballers Motherwell F.C. players Rangers F.C. players Rangers F.C. non-playing staff People from Girvan 1946 births Scottish Football League players Scottish Football League representative players Heart of Midlothian F.C. players Footballers from South Ayrshire {{Scotland-footy-goalkeeper-stub