Sir Alex Ferguson once said that Peter Weir was the final piece in his jigsaw when he signed the flying winger for a record transfer fee in Scotland and the self-confessed Dons fan was only too happy to sign for his boyhood heroes.

As a youngster, Peter was playing amateur football before he got his chance at Neilston Juniors.

“I remember it well, playing amateur football and following Aberdeen when I was 16 or 17. I wasn’t playing too much football and then all of a sudden I got the chance to play with Neilston Juniors. I had a year there and thoroughly enjoyed it.

“I played a cup tie against Benburb and there was a St. Mirren scout watching me. They invited me down to Love Street to chat and guess who the manager was? Alex Ferguson! When you see the career he went on to have, it’s quite amazing that he signed me twice.

“I played two trials with St.Mirren, the first one at Tannadice. Dundee United were a tough, tough team. I did ok, Fergie was at the game, as well as Davie Provan, the ex-Rangers left-back who was the assistant there. They asked me out for a second trial and I could not believe where it was – at Pittodrie, quite amazing!

“Again, it was against a very good team. I remember back then it used to take you four or five hours to get to Aberdeen as there were no motorways, so it was a long journey up. Thankfully, I did quite well and after the game they asked me to sign for St. Mirren.

“I left Neilston after a year, thanked them very much and started at St Mirren part-time. I worked on a golf course at that time and I was 20 years old. Within a month, Alex Ferguson had left the club and Jim Clunie came in as manager. Jim soon asked me to go full-time and I had a decision to make, either keep working on the golf course or take a gamble and go full-time. The wages were certainly not what they are today, but I was single at the time, I was still staying in Barrhead with my mother, she looked after me, so obviously I decided to take the gamble.

“I was only there two or three years. I played in the reserves in the first year, I made my debut at Ibrox after four weeks at St. Mirren, and then players came back from suspension and injury and I dropped down to learn my apprenticeship and play in the reserves. I was in and out of the team in the first year or so, starting on the bench then starting games and doing very well in the reserves, so I knew my chance would come.”

After a short time with the Saints, Peter got the kind of call he could only have dreamed of.

“Within maybe three years, I got a phone call one night from Ricky McFarlane who was by now the St. Mirren manager, explaining that the club needed the money and would I be interested in going to Aberdeen?

“It was a total, total shock as I hadn’t played a lot of games for St. Mirren, but obviously Sir Alex and Archie Knox had been watching me, which I didn’t know anything about. I decided that I must take the gamble. I was just married then, with a six-month-old kid and I lived in Eaglesham and I thought, I am going to go to my boyhood heroes, who I supported for a number of years! It was the best decision that I ever made in my life.”

One of the nights that Dons fans will forever associate Peter with is the fantastic night at Pittodrie when they knocked out the holders of the UEFA Cup, Ipswich Town. Peter had a fantastic match, scoring two goals in a 3-1 win.

“It was a great night and I will never forget it, not that there’s any chance of that with the amount of people that remind me! It was a great night for me personally, but I was never that kind of player who thought it was all about me!

“I was a winger that set up a lot of goals, I wanted to win on a Saturday and a Wednesday, that was more important to me than Peter Weir scoring two goals or Peter Weir doing this or that. Of course, you always wanted to improve and play well but the most important thing that I believed in was winning games.

“Yes people say it was my best individual game, but I look at my six years at Pittodrie and apart from the full year I was out injured when I had the fifth metatarsal injury, all of the days at Pittodrie were brilliant”. 

A year later, en route to the Scottish Cup final, the Dons faced the club that Peter had only just left, St. Mirren.

“They were all still good pals of mine. I missed the Saturday game at Parkhead, I had the flu, and I remember Fergie and Archie bringing me in, I was just recovering, and they gave me a real hard session, telling me they wanted to play me in the replay. As it worked out, I scored the winning goal with my right foot through Billy Thomson’s legs. I don’t think the Aberdeen fans were worried how it went in as long as they got to the final!

“It was sad in a way that I was shaking hands with the St. Mirren players after the game at Dens Park. I was honest and genuine about it, as they were all good pals and helped me and there I was putting them out of the cup in the semi-final, but it turned out to be such an important win for the team, especially as we went on and won the cup that year.”

After winning the Scottish Cup, the Dons went on that never to be forgotten European adventure.

“At St. Mirren, I played in a couple of UEFA Cup ties, I played against the great Saint Etienne side, but I never thought that when I went up to Aberdeen, we were going to win European trophies. It just didn’t come into your head at that time.

“Obviously we had a great run in Europe and winning all the Scottish Cups and League titles, it was just a great time. We had fantastic days and nights beating these teams like Bayern Munich, Real Madrid and Hamburg in the Super Cup. That one was something special for me as my boy was born during the game, which I didn’t know anything about at the time.

“I had left at five o’clock to go and meet up with the lads and have our pre-match meal and then after we had beaten Hamburg in the second leg, the old club secretary, Ian Taggart, jumped over the dugouts to tell me that my wife had given birth. She was still in the kitchen when I left home and then her waters had burst. Fortunately, all my family were up from the Glasgow area and drove her straight to the hospital in Aberdeen. I didn’t know till half past nine that my wife and I had a son called Stuart, which is was quite remarkable! Obviously it made winning the Super Cup that night extra, extra special.

“1983 was a fantastic, fantastic year! People do say, what was the best year of your life. Obviously signing for Aberdeen was something special but even so, in footballing terms, it was certainly 1983, when you think of May in Gothenburg, the teams we had beaten in the Cup Winners’ Cup and then to round it off in December, my son being born on that night we won the Super Cup against a great Hamburg side. It was just fantastic. Great memories, something that I always reflect on and always talk about, it’s still a great feeling.”

After such a great time at Pittodrie, it was sad, if inevitable, when the man who had such a massive influence on Aberdeen Football club, and so many of the players, left to go to Manchester United.

“For all the players there, we had good times and bad times because Fergie was Fergie, it was win at all cost. It was great when we were winning, which was most weeks, but when you were not playing well, Fergie let you know and that was hard at the time. But as you grow older and look back, it was done for a reason, and the reason was to make you a better person and to make you a better player and for Aberdeen to be successful.

“It was a shock when he left but at the same time he deserved it because he had spent around seven years at the club and won everything. He always wanted to go and manage a club in England and to get the Manchester United job was wonderful for him and Archie. For Aberdeen it was disappointing but you move on to the next stage.”

It was not only Fergie that moved on but some of the Gothenburg greats too. Sadly the time had come for Peter to move on too after Ian Porterfield came in to take the Dons job.

“Ian Porterfield came in, he was a decent enough person but he just didn’t particularly like me. He brought in Gary Hackett, Tom Jones, Peter Nicholas and Keith Edwards and changed the team, which was entirely up to him.

“I was still fit enough and liked playing, I didn’t like being in the reserves. Late in 1986/87 when Graeme Souness’s team came up, he said to me the week before that I would be playing against them but at one o’ clock when the team was read out, he put me on the bench and then he didn’t use me.

“I couldn’t believe that. It was 1-1 with ten minutes to go, Rangers needing a point to win the league and me being the kind of player that could come on and change a game.

“I woke up the next day and decided that my time was up at Pittodrie, which was sad but at the same time, two or three had moved on and things had broken up a bit. It was time for me to move on and play in the first team elsewhere, rather than be in and out of the team because a manager didn’t particularly rate me.”

Peter was recognised at International level during his time at Pittodrie when he was capped by the legendary Jock Stein.

“That was great! Again that started when I was at St. Mirren. I’d just played a few games and then the great Jock Stein, he capped me when I was still playing for the Paisley club. I think I was capped two or three times when I was at St. Mirren and then when I moved to Aberdeen, the next year or two, I managed to play two or three times for Scotland.

“I was never really happy with my performances at that level. It was a great, great thrill and something I never thought that I would do, especially when I had only been in the professional game two or three years. Maybe it came too quick for me.

“You can look back now and want to do things differently, maybe I could have been a bit more confident when I played for Scotland. But they are still great memories and it’s great that I played six times for my country. It’s something that I thought would never, ever happen to me, so it is brilliant looking back.”

Peter not only played for and supported the Dons, he worked for the club for many years. As head of the AFC Youth Academy’s Glasgow Centre he helped bring through the likes of Nicky Low, Declan McManus, Craig Storie and Daniel Harvie. The grassroots part of the game is something that he is really passionate about.

“I had nine or ten years as the head of the Glasgow Centre, working with Neil Simpson and some great people. I worked with the coaches and scouts in Aberdeen and Glasgow and we did well getting certain players through.

“But now the academies are hoovering up all the young boys, there are kids in there from the ages of six, seven, eight right up to the age of 20, so you can imagine the amount of players that are involved at all levels with clubs all over Scotland. Unfortunately, the boys clubs in Britain, Scotland especially, are not the same standard as when I was playing because all the big clubs have got all the best young boys.

“The Glasgow Centre came to an end three years ago. George Yule and I both had a meeting and we both realised that there weren’t enough good enough players to sign for Aberdeen in Glasgow because of the other academies in the area. So I shook hands with George and moved on. I had a great time as it was something I loved, and I wish I was still working with Aberdeen as I enjoyed every minute of it.”

Looking back on his career as he turned 60 this year, Peter clearly enjoyed his time in football at the Dons and every club he has played or worked for.

“It’s quite amazing where the time goes! I remember my parents, and older people and friends used to say “Enjoy life just now because it flies by!”

“At least I can say I had wonderful, wonderful times at the clubs I was at, not only Aberdeen but three or four other clubs. I was always treated well, I always gave what I could and to play for Scotland and to win the trophies I won at club level and to have a lovely family and good friends that have never changed, what more can you want? I would like to say thanks to everybody I have worked with.

“Aberdeen are a brilliant club. I’m fortunate to I have supported them and played for them and then I worked ten years with the AFC Youth Academy down in Glasgow. I still go to the games and I still support them when I can. I have been to a few games this year, down in the west and I go to Pittodrie now and then. I will always keep looking out for their results.”