John Archie MacKenzie (also spelled McKenzie; 4 September 1925 – 5 July 2017) was a Scottish

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby le ...

who spent most of his career with

Partick Thistle Partick Thistle Football Club are a professional association football, football club from Glasgow, Scotland. Despite their name, the club are based at Firhill Stadium in the Maryhill area of the city, and have not played in Partick since 1908. ...

, where he was known as the "Firhill Flyer".

Career

Club

outside right Forwards (also known as attackers) are Glossary of association football terms#O, outfield positions in an association football team who play the furthest up the pitch and are therefore most responsible for scoring Goal (sport)#Association footbal ...

, he joined Partick Thistle from Petershill in 1944 and played most of the next 16 years with the

Maryhill Maryhill ( gd, Cnoc Màiri) is an area of the City of Glasgow in Scotland. Maryhill is a former burgh. Maryhill stretches over along Maryhill Road. The far north west of the area is served by Maryhill railway station. History Hew Hill, t ...

club. He played for Bournemouth & Boscombe Athletic during the 1947-48 season whilst on military service in

Dorset Dorset ( ; archaically: Dorsetshire , ) is a county in South West England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the unitary authority areas of Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole and Dorset (unitary authority), Dors ...

but became a first-team regular upon his return to Partick Thistle. During his career he helped the ''Jags'' side to three

Scottish League Cup The Scottish League Cup (also known as the Viaplay Cup for sponsorship reasons) is a football competition open to all Scottish Professional Football League (SPFL) clubs. First held in 1946–47, it is the oldest national League Cup in existen ...

finals in

1953 Events January * January 6 – The Asian Socialist Conference opens in Rangoon, Burma. * January 12 – Estonian émigrés found a Estonian government-in-exile, government-in-exile in Oslo. * January 14 ** Marshal Josip Broz Tito i ...

1956 Events January * January 1 – The Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, Anglo-Egyptian Condominium ends in Sudan. * January 8 – Operation Auca: Five U.S. evangelical Christian Missionary, missionaries, Nate Saint, Roger Youderian, Ed McCully, Jim ...

and

1958 Events January * January 1 – The European Economic Community (EEC) comes into being. * January 3 – The West Indies Federation is formed. * January 4 ** Edmund Hillary's Commonwealth Trans-Antarctic Expedition completes the third ...

, but they lost on each occasion. MacKenzie briefly left Partick in March 1958, when he signed for

Fulham Fulham () is an area of the London Borough of Hammersmith & Fulham in West London, England, southwest of Charing Cross. It lies on the north bank of the River Thames, bordering Hammersmith, Kensington and Chelsea. The area faces Wandsworth ...

for £1,000, but he returned three months later. He left the club for good in 1960, going on to play for

Dumbarton Dumbarton (; also sco, Dumbairton; ) is a town in West Dunbartonshire, Scotland, on the north bank of the River Clyde where the River Leven flows into the Clyde estuary. In 2006, it had an estimated population of 19,990. Dumbarton was the ca ...

and

Derry City Derry, officially Londonderry (), is the second-largest city in Northern Ireland and the fifth-largest city on the island of Ireland. The name ''Derry'' is an anglicisation of the Old Irish name (modern Irish: ) meaning 'oak grove'. The ...

, where he won his only medal in the 1964

Irish Cup The Irish Football Association Challenge Cup, commonly referred to as the Irish Cup (currently known as the Samuel Gelston's Whiskey Irish Cup for sponsorship purposes) is the primary football knock-out cup competition in Northern Ireland. Ina ...

. He was briefly a trainer with

Third Lanark Third Lanark Athletic Club was a Scottish football club based in Glasgow. Founded in 1872 as an offshoot of the 3rd Lanarkshire Rifle Volunteers, the club was a founder member of the Scottish Football Association (SFA) in 1872 and the Scottish ...

, joining in January 1967, but the club folded later that year.

International

MacKenzie was

capped In sport, a cap is a player's appearance in a game at international level. The term dates from the practice in the United Kingdom of awarding a cap to every player in an international match of rugby football and association football. In the ea ...

nine times by the Scotland national team, and was part of the squad which travelled to Switzerland for the

1954 FIFA World Cup The 1954 FIFA World Cup was the fifth edition of the FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial international football tournament for senior men's national teams of the nations affiliated to FIFA. It was held in Switzerland from 16 June to 4 July. Switzerla ...

. He scored his only international goal in a 1–1 draw with

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and t ...

in May 1954. The highlight of his international career was arguably against

Hungary Hungary ( hu, Magyarország ) is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning of the Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and southeast, Serbia to the south, Croatia a ...

– the number one rated team in the world at the time – on 8 December 1954; during the game MacKenzie repeatedly beat his opponent

Mihály Lantos Mihály Lantos (born ''Mihály Lendenmayer'', 29 September 1928 – 31 December 1989) was a Hungarian football player and manager. He played as a defender, spending the majority of his career at MTK Hungária FC. During the 1950s he was also ...

, and afterwards

Ferenc Puskás Ferenc Puskás (, ; born Ferenc Purczeld; 1 April 1927 – 17 November 2006) was a Hungarian football player and manager, widely regarded as one of the greatest players of all time and the sport's first international superstar. A forward, ...

complimented him, stating that he had "never seen wing play of such a high standard".

Personal life

MacKenzie is, to date, the only native

Gaelic Gaelic is an adjective that means "pertaining to the Gaels". As a noun it refers to the group of languages spoken by the Gaels, or to any one of the languages individually. Gaelic languages are spoken in Ireland, Scotland, the Isle of Man, and Ca ...

-speaker to have played for Scotland, although others may have had knowledge of the language ( Peter Campbell and

Moses McNeil Moses McNeil (29 October 1855 – 9 April 1938) was a Scottish footballer who was one of the founding members of Rangers Football Club. He played as an outside forward. Club career McNeil, along with fellow founding members Peter McNeil (his ...

, who founded Rangers, and

Andy McCombie Andrew McCombie (30 June 1876 – 28 March 1952) was a Scottish international footballer who played at right back for North East England rival clubs Sunderland and Newcastle United. He won the Football League championship with both clubs, and ...

). MacKenzie also represented the

Scottish League The Scottish Football League (SFL) was a league featuring professional and semi-professional association football, football clubs mostly from Scotland.One club, Berwick Rangers F.C., Berwick Rangers, is based in the town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, wh ...

. He died in July 2017, aged 91.

References

External links