And when you are done looking at this site for the Scots input on football world-wide, here are two more.
For those who literally want to trace on the ground the local development of Scots and Scottish football in our own and other countries there is the newly available and ever-expanding site of:
The Scots Football Historians' Group
And on Scottish sports history in general but inevitably including fitba', see Andy Mitchell's inestimable:
The story, or as you might agree after reading this, the myth is that the centre-back began with Arsenal in 1925 with the change in the off-side rule and the arrival at the club that same year of Herbert Chapman with the then recruitment to it by him of Diasporan-Scot, Charlie Murray Buchan. It was Charlie, on observation of the new regulation in operation, who is said to have suggested to Chapman that the centre-half drop back from in-line or slightly back from the half-backs, the "stopper-pivot", to in-line or slightly in front of the full-backs and also that he, at six feet one in height and a former international centre-forward, for England, but at thirty-four perhaps fancying a little less running about, be the one to fill the new role. But, frankly, neither was taken up. Chapman made Buchan battle up-front for another three seasons and, as to centre-half, he persisted with what he had inherited, Jack Butler, in today's terms a "central, deep-lying midfielder" i.e. an English/Welsh-style centre-half, but a good height at 5ft 11ins so already adapt enough with the head. In fact what he did do was, first, to try his inherited full-backs for a year, then change them, then change them again, change them once more and, in consecutive seasons still, twice more and, second, in 1926 bring in a six foot tall, twenty-one year-old, Welsh half-back, Herbie Roberts, and not play him.
And this is the crux of the debunking of the myth, or at least part, the Arsenal part of it. In 1926-27 Herbie Roberts made just two first team starts. In 1927-28 its was three. Meanwhile, the Gunners fielded a more or less permanent half-back line of Bob John on the left, Alf Baker on the right and Jack Butler between them with the link to the forwards being the Scot, Billy Blyth, the notional inside-left cum left-half. In fact Chapman played it, a 2-3-1-3, as he had learned at Spurs and repeated at Northampton, Leeds City and Huddersfield. The result was that from 1925-6 Arsenal finished second, eleventh and tenth consecutively. In part that may have been due to reconstruction of the team in the full-backs and the forwards. In part too the team was in 1927-8 simply shipping too many goals, 86, and not scoring enough, 82, the former being relegation level. But to Chapman's credit he acted or rather reacted by going defensive.
The following season, 1928-9, Roberts started half the games, twenty-four, in a 3-2-1-4 he not as centre-half but centre-back. And it worked to an extent. Arsenal conceded only 72 goals but still finished tenth once more because now only 77 goals were scored, a problem Chapman identified as, because he was already well into his thirties, Billy Blyth's legs going. In 1928-29 could only manage half the season. And once again Chapman reacted. He recruited Alex James.
The only problem was that, whilst James played seventy-five percent of the games in 1929-30 and Roberts sixty percent Chapman still persisted with running essentially two formations side-by-side and whilst goals conceded fell to the lowest bar one in the division, goals-scored remained unmoved, his team(s) simply lost too many games, seventeen in all, and finished worse off still at fourteenth. But they did win the Cup and that must, on the face it, been a turning-point, albeit Roberts was not in the side. In 1930-31 Roberts, James and the ever-dependable Bob John, perhaps the forgotten hero throughout Chapman's tenure, all made forty-three starts. Only Tom Parker and Cliff Bastin played more with forty-four and forty-five respectively. Moreover, finally the centre-back and therefore W:M, actually M:W, was properly in place. Arsenal let in only fifty-nine goals, the fewest in the division, and scored one hundred and twenty-seven, only topped by one team and by one, runners-up, Aston Villa.
Thus from this point it seems to have been "catenaccio, bring it on" and so it sadly would in time prove but there is still, I suggest, a second element to the debunking, one that pre-dates 1929 but is glossed over. Post-Great War in the pre-eminent international, Scotland versus England, the two teams played different systems. For the former the full-backs were wide and marked the opposing wingers, the centre-half was what we today might be called the play-maker in a 2-2-1-2-3 and the centre-forward was robust, mobile of average height for the time, or in the case of Hughie Gallacher well under, and good on the ground. In the case of the latter the full-backs were narrow and marked the opposing inside-forwards, the centre-half, the "stopper-pivot", was between the half-backs and more defensive in a 2-3-5 and to start with the centre-forward and more variable in height. In 1923 a certain Charlie Buchan had been over six feet. The following game Frank Roberts was only five foot six and in the one after that Ted Harper was 5 foot 10 1/2. But then in 1927 came Dixie Dean, 5 ft 10 ins but not far off 13 stone and a handful.
In fact Dean on paper should not have been a problem. Did not Scotland by then have Neilly Gibson at centre-half and he happened to be 6ft 2ins ? But when it came to it, paper is not pitch, that was not the case. In the 1927 Scotland-England encounter Dean scored twice, once to equalise, once to win away. Moreover, England also played Jack Hill as their centre-half, and although early in the second half he was injured and had to play on the wing, his place taken by Sid Bishop, himself a good size for those day too at 5 ft 10 1/2 and, incidentally, half-Scots. Scotland was essentially beaten by 10 1/2 men and it rankled.
However, this game was not the first Burnley's Hill had played for his country or against Scotland. The previous year he had been there too and, standing at 6ft 3 ins literally head and shoulders above everyone else on the pitch, it was for a purpose - to stand in the goal area and use his height to head away the supply of crosses from the Scottish wingers, on that day Troup on one side and Jackson on the other. He was a centre-back, presumably at club and now for country. And England were to employ the same tactic not just the next year but the following one too with Hill replaced by almost 6 foot Thomas Wilson. But Scotland also changed tack. For that game in 1928 Gibson was moved to right-half and installed in his place was Bury's Tommy Bradshaw for his one and only international start. In part it was counter Dean. Bradshaw was over thirteen stone. He was also 6 ft 2 ins, so in theory more than enough of a physical presence to counter the Everton man on the ground and aerially. He was a stopper, a centre-back stopper, certainly for club and now also country at a time when Chapman was still havering with his. And it worked a 1-5 Wembley Wizards treat. Indeed, who is not to say that in fact it and not the Arsenal man's guile cum innovation was the catalyst for his tactical plunge beginning the following season. Timing suggests it might have been. In other words perhaps Chapman did not instigate the M:W but had it by Burnley, Bury, England, Scotland, others and, if he were there, the evidence of his own eyes, thrust upon him.