There’s an account on X that regularly posts images from seemingly unlikely football transfers that actually happened. Most of the posts are fairly benign, and if you have your finger on the pulse when it comes to the game, they don’t really register as being all that surprising, despite the general thrust of the account. However, occasionally there is a post that really does make you go, ‘wow.’ Recently, one such post appeared that concerned the transfer of Jamie Stevenson from Scottish club Alloa Athletic to La Liga residents Real Mallorca.

Midfielder Stevenson was released by Aberdeen as a youngster, and dropped down the Scottish pyramid to join Alloa. After making just two first team appearances, Stevenson was spotted playing a game with his uncle on the Spanish island by a scout from Real Mallorca, who promptly organised a trial for the Scottish youngster. He impressed the scout so much that he was offered a three-year contract. He scored on his debut for Real Mallorca’s reserve team where he became a regular. However, he failed to break into the first team and sought a move, though the Spanish side – who were keen to retain his services – insisted in his release that he could only return to his former club Alloa, which he did.

Stevenson’s improbable move to Real Mallorca got me thinking about a transfer proposal involving another Scottish club that – if it had gone through – would have been the most incredible signing in the history of the game.

When Johan Cruyff initially retired as a player in 1978 aged 31 following Barcelona’s Copa del Rey triumph where they beat Las Palmas 3-1, most would have thought that he would have been financially secure and ready to make a move into coaching and management. And that would have been the case had Cruyff not lost millions in a pig farming venture that was based on bad, potentially fraudulent advice. And so within a year, Cruyff dusted down his boots and signed a lucrative deal to play for the Los Angeles Aztecs in the NASL.

Cruyff spent a solitary season with the Aztecs but was named the NASL Player of the Year, perhaps quite predictably so. After his spell on the American west coast had concluded, Cruyff was very much in demand, from other NASL clubs and from further afield including Flamengo of Brazil who put together a multi-million dollar package in a bid to tempt the Dutch superstar to South America. However, one of the proposals that was put to Cruyff came from perhaps the most unlikely of places.
The 1979/80 season was a good one for Dumbarton. They started their Scottish Division One campaign brightly, their attack spearheaded by a young Graeme Sharp who would finish the season as the club’s top scorer, and by Christmas, the Sons were top and looking like a good bet for promotion to the Scottish Premier Division. However, following a New Year wobble, manager Davie Wilson was sacked, his final game in charge being a 4-1 defeat to Arbroath. John Cushley took the reins as caretaker manager, and after winning their final three fixtures, Dumbarton finished the season in fourth place.

Dumbarton chairman Bob Robertson had ambitions to take Dumbarton into the Scottish Premier Division, and was frustrated by the club’s near miss. As part of his plan to take the Sons into the Scottish top flight, Robertson appointed Sean Fallon as the club’s new manager. Fallon was a former Irish international full-back who made his name with Celtic, and after being forced into early retirement through injury, he became assistant manager to Jock Stein, playing a key role in the club’s success during the late 1960s and early 1970s. He left Parkhead in 1975, shortly after a spell as caretaker manager when Stein was hurt in a near-fatal car accident.

Robertson believed that one of the things holding Dumbarton back was relatively low attendances; despite challenging for promotion, their average gate the previous season had been around the 1,500 mark. The subsequent lack of atmosphere at home games had Robertson wondering about how to address this. And so following discussions with Sean Fallon, and with Dumbarton lying in eighth place in the Scottish First Division, they hatched an ambitious and improbable plan to lure one of the game’s superstars to Boghead Park.