The Thistle Archive

In BBC’s 'Cult Heroes' series a few years ago, 48% of Thistle supporters that took part voted Denis McQuade as Thistle's all time cult hero. There are certainly few, if any, Thistle players that engender as much affection as Denis McQuade did and still does. And that affection is a result of more than just having played over 300 times for Partick Thistle. It’s more about the way that McQuade played the game.

McQuade's route to Firhill was traditional enough. Stepping up from the junior ranks, in his case St Rochs, is now something of a rarity. In McQuade's day though that was very much the norm. If that was traditional, then very little else about Denis McQuade was. The man who would one day become known as "The Enigma of Firhill", at one stage was studying for the priesthood. The church's loss was very much Partick Thistle's gain. He was also considered as something of an intellectual, by no means normal in a football club's dressing room. Alan Rough in his autobiography can remember McQuade replying to a half-time tirade administered in his direction by then boss Bertie Auld in somewhat untypical fashion. As Auld cursed and raved over the role McQuade was playing in the team Denis piped up, “Well, Mr Auld, I thought that my raison d'etre was to be the catalyst for our attacking forays, so what do you think is wrong about my modus operandi?”

Whether that story is apocryphal in nature or not is largely irrelevant as it helps create the image of a player who was, to say the least, just that bit different from other footballers. The stories of him beating six players before falling on his backside when faced with an open goal are legend. McQuade's playing career at Firhill though would span the best part of ten years during which he would clock up well in excess of 300 appearances. Clearly there was much more to Denis McQuade than unpredictable talent. He made his debut on the Firhill stage at a time when Partick Thistle were at a fairly low ebb. He sat on the bench as barely 1,000 people turned out to watch an already relegated Thistle side slide to yet another defeat, this time 1-2 against Morton in April 1970. Even at this low point in the club's history there were signs of better times to come. Also making his debut that night was Alan Rough. Less than two years later both would play a major part in Thistle's 1971 League Cup triumph.

Before then though, the team had the small matter of hauling themselves out of the Second Division. McQuade played no small part in helping them to do just that. In his first full season at Firhill he made 43 first team appearances and scored 15 times. Not had for a winger and a total bettered by only Frank Coulston and Jimmy Bone. There was even better to follow the next season when McQuade was once again a virtual ever present in the Thistle team playing in over 40 games. His goal tally was reduced slightly to eleven but included in those eleven goals were some really important ones. It was two that helped see off Falkirk in the League Cup semi-final and it was Denis who scored Thistle's third goal during the 4-1 win against Celtic in the final. He also scored all three of the Thistle goals in a 3-1 home win against Dundee United just a few weeks after the team lifted the League Cup.

To complete a memorable season for McQuade he was capped for the Scottish League against the English League, scoring one of the Scots goals in a 3-2 defeat at Middlesbrough. That came just a couple of months after he represented Scotland at under 23 level in a match against Wales, with McQuade coming on as a second half substitute. However, despite being named in a number of squads and accompanying Scotland to the Independence Cup in Brazil in the summer of 1972 he was never given the opportunity to display his unique talents at full international level. For both Denis McQuade and Partick Thistle, topping the achievements of season 1971-1972 would prove to be an impossible task. McQuade's Thistle career though didn't end at the completion of that season. Quite the reverse, for he would continue to entertain and, it must be said, exasperate the Thistle fans for many years to come. The good far outweighed the bad. He would in another three seasons top the 40-appearance mark and in season 1974-75 he helped himself to 15 goals including his second Thistle hat-trick when he bagged three against Hearts in September 1974.

All good things must come to an end and McQuade's Partick Thistle career reached that point in the early stages of the 1978-79 season. His final appearance in a Thistle jersey came against Hearts in an Anglo-Scottish Cup-tie in August 1978. A few weeks later he became a Hearts player when he and John Craig moved to Tynecastle with Donald Park moving to Firhill in exchange. He didn't quite make an immediate impact at his new club - his first game as a Hearts player was against Thistle - but he didn't have to wait too long before doing so. He scored his first Hearts goal in only his second game and in his first Edinburgh derby fixture in November he scored the winner in a 2-1 victory. Despite McQuade's contribution of four goals, Hearts were relegated at the end of his only season at Tynecastle. The next season he once again teamed up with Davie McParland, the man who led Thistle to the League Cup win in 1971, who was now manager at Hamilton Accies, before retiring at the end of the 1979-80 season. Outside football McQuade made a successful career in IT working in Bermuda and Australia, and back in Scotland Denis is frequent and popular visitor to Firhill.

1971 - SFL SECOND DIVISION

1971 - LEAGUE CUP

1972 - JULY CUP

1976 - SFL FIRST DIVISION