EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW: 'I was clinically dead on the pitch before the people who came on saved my life,' says former Hamilton star Ross McCabe. 'But it didn't stop me wanting to play football again.'

So, what happens after you die? This existential question is answered simply in the case of Ross McCabe. You play Junior football.

‘I was saved on the park after a cardiac arrest and I was desperate to get back. I went on to play more than 400 games,’ he says, taking a sip of his coffee in a Glasgow shopping centre.

This is all stated in tones normally reserved for banal observations about the weather. The McCabe story thus needs some elaboration. On Saturday, September 9, 2006, McCabe, then 18, was playing for Hamilton Academical against Clyde.

‘I remember it all very clearly,’ he says. ‘I slide-tackled Dougie Imrie and he tried to jump over me and kicked my neck. A complete accident. I can remember him standing over me complaining about my challenge. I remember then waking up in the ambulance.

‘I thought I was winded when I was lying on the park,’ says McCabe. ‘I tried to get up and then was out of it. I was in cardiac arrest for four minutes. They told me I was clinically dead because my heart stopped. People ask me: “How did it feel?”. It is strange. I can’t remember any great pain beyond the impact. But the people who came on saved my life. That simple.’

The time between tackle and ambulance was critical. Players immediately realised there was something desperately wrong. There were anguished shouts towards the touchline. There were pieces of good fortune that prevented the ultimate tragedy. One of the Clyde officials was a cardiologist. Physios at both clubs could use a defibrillator and there was one available. And it was a senior match.

Despite his ordeal, McCabe went on to play Junior football, most notably for Petershill

McCabe (No 9) leaps up to score winner for Petershill in Scottish Junior Cup tie with Lochee

‘If it had been a reserve match who knows what might have happened? Would there have been a defibrillator handy, would the people at pitchside have known how to react? Who knows?’ says McCabe.

An ambulance drove on to the pitch at New Douglas Park and took the player to Hairmyres Hospital in East Kilbride and then Wishaw General. He recovered quickly.

McCabe is now 36. His football days have ended. But he spent 18 years playing Junior football, most successfully at Petershill and Pollok, before retiring last month. But how and why did he come back after such a traumatic afternoon? ‘I took a wee bit of time out,’ he says. ‘I had to be fitted with a pacemaker but when that was done I knew I wanted to play again. It is all I ever did.’

McCabe was brought up in Greenfield, Shettleston, where he still stays with his partner, Sarah Jane, and his children Carter, 10, and Sophie, 14.

‘It was the usual stuff then of everyone playing football in the streets, a huge game in the scheme on a Sunday,’ he says. ‘I can’t remember doing much else as a kid other than playing football. All we needed was a ball.’

He was scouted by Hearts and trained with them for four or five years before being released at 16. ‘I was devastated. I thought it was the end of the world.’

There was redemption when he signed for Hamilton before that fateful day in September 2006. ‘There were some good players at Accies,’ he says, referencing James McArthur, who went on to play in the Premier League and for Scotland, and James McCarthy, who also played at the highest level in England and for the Republic of Ireland.

‘Billy Reid, the manager, went on to be an assistant at Chelsea,’ he says.

His heart stopped twice during Accies-Clyde match but he was back playing two years later

Does McCabe ever reflect on how his career might have progressed if there had not been an accident? ‘No, not really,’ he says. ‘My mum sometimes does wonder about what might have been but I always say there are no guarantees and my career could have gone down rather than up.’

He is quietly philosophical about life as befits one who has survived such a trauma. ‘I died, right. So I am quite laidback. Nothing really bothers me. I try to be a nice person. Just get on with life,’ he says.

His job involves delivering furniture. ‘People say it can be tough and tiring but it’s all right. If I have one regret, it is that I should have had a back-up plan for not making it in football. I should have got a trade or gone to college. But I can’t complain. I have a good life with my partner and my children.’ 

McCabe is almost the stereotype for a Junior centre-half. He is tall, with a shaven head and a lean and hungry look. His off-field personality belies that threatening appearance.

‘I was quickly back at it when I signed for Petershill,’ he says of his comeback. ‘My mate played there and I signed. I was aggressive, that was my game. I never took a step back. Nothing fazed me. At first, I was a wee bit apprehensive but, after that, I just got on with it.’

His career was speckled with cups but it was deeply marked by the respect offered him by players and officials. He was influential as a captain. ‘I was loud and physical on the park, but not off it. I think that on the park for me it was all about winning, so you push yourself in every way. You try to bring your team mates along with you. I tried always to show every one of them respect, no matter their age.’

The end in a playing sense came last month.

‘I decided to pack it in because my pacemaker needs replaced. There is a wee wire loose and by the time I get it out, have another one fitted and then recover, well, I’ll be 37. So it’s a decent time to stop. But I will miss the dressing room. I know that. It is a special place. You can’t explain it, really, but that will be a blow. I feel it a wee bit already.’

He frankly does not know how his competitive spirit will be sated. ‘I will go back to running after I recover from the operations but just to keep myself fit. I won’t go into coaching as I tried it a few years ago and it wasn’t my thing. I will go to games, though.

‘I will head up to the Peasy or go to see mates play. I am a Celtic man but I go to both Celtic and Rangers. My son wants to go to Celtic but occasionally I take my daughter, who is a Rangers supporter, to Ibrox. I get slaughtered on the group chats for that.’

He admits having chats with both children about what happened at New Douglas Park but believes they have not taken it all in. ‘I only think about it now and again,’ he says. ‘I suppose it has come into my mind more now that I am getting this operation and deciding to pack in playing.’

So how does he reflect on it all? ‘In terms of life? I suppose I just believe that if you want to do something, then just do it. Don’t let life pass you by.’

And on football? ‘I had some great times. I was on the bench at a Scottish Junior Cup final with Pollok and I scored the penalty that won Petershill promotion in 2022. I suppose those are highlights, but I made tons of friends.’

He made his mark on and off the pitch, particularly at Petershill where he won affection and respect in his three spells in Springburn.

McCabe remains resolutely humble. ‘I don’t know if I had a wonderful career,’ he says.

He is wrong. It was wonderful. But miraculous may be a more fitting term.