Put TB's name above the door at Lennoxtown

May 18 2008 Gordon Waddell

IN the transient world of newspapers you start pretty much every day with a blank page. Today's headlines, tomorrow's chip wrappers.

Your inbox gets cleaned out ready for a fresh kick-off.

But I never wipe mine out completely. There's always one email I keep locked at the top. It came from Tommy Burns in September 2002. The week after Celtic had lost to Basel in the Champions League qualifiers.

Its content was as as tute, thoughtful, heartfelt, realistic and forward-thinking as you would expect from the man. If Peter Lawwell is interested in reading it I would show him in a minute.

Because as soon as he saw it he would realise there's only one fitting tribute Celtic could pay to their lost legend.

And that's to name their Lennoxtown academy and training ground after him.

He wanted it built a decade ago, never stopped pushing for it. That's what the email was about. Wanting to reinvest their wealth in youth and churning out player after quality player.

It was Tommy's past - the way he came through the ranks and fulfilled his own dreams - but it was also his vision. He talked about his frustration over the money wasted on the likes of Eyal Berkovic and Rafael Scheidt.

With the £10-12million flushed down the pan on those two he could have put in place a facility that would have lasted Celtic a lifetime.

The fact it was finally built and he was around to see it and work in it would have thrilled him.

Now the right thing to do is acknowledge the fact that Tommy's name deserves to sit above the doorway, a lasting reminder of a true Celtic man, a true football man.

When Tommy was starting his fight against cancer afresh I harked back to an interview we had done in Krakow two summers ago.

He was just back in the dugout, having won Round One. And for the best part of an hour we spoke about values, about family, about football's place in life. It would never be only a game to him but it would never be the same either.

He had found perspective where he once had tunnel vision. And he said: "I just try to make the environment I live in a little better for everyone round about me."

I'm sure anyone who shared a dressing-room with the guy will testify to that.

Sharing a table with him for the guys in our business was always an honour and usually an education.

Even when the game was lousy to him he never fell out of love with it. Like the day he was bumped from the Celtic job by Fergus McCann. He heard about it on the radio on his way into Parkhead.

McCann then asked him to leave by the side door to "avoid a scene". But Tommy quite rightly walked out the front door with head held high.

Same as when the SFA shamefully didn't even phone him in the wake of Walter Smith's departure from the Scotland job 16 months ago.

He dealt with all these things the way he dealt with life. Dignified, graceful.

At times like this some people will question their faith, question why the worst things sometimes happen to the best people. Tommy wouldn't have.

He would have found answers rather than questions from his belief.

The world is a poorer place today without him. Heaven's XI is a good man better off.