The wife of Dundee FC legend Billy Pirie has paid tribute to her husband following his death at the age of 75.
Billy died at Brechin’s Stracathro Hospital on Sunday evening after a battle with dementia.
Wife Lynda and sons Stephen and Richard arrived at the hospital around 10 minutes too late to say their final goodbyes after receiving a call to say his condition had suddenly deteriorated.
Lynda told The Courier: “We got a call to say Billy had got worse.
“We thought he was being transferred to Ninewells and we were preparing to go there.
“However, the hospital got back in touch to say he was very poorly and would be staying at Stracathro so we headed there but sadly he passed away before we arrived.
“We’re all still in shock because, at the end, his death was so sudden.
“We knew he was becoming more ill but this has taken us by surprise.”
Lynda says there will be a post mortem into her husband’s death because he passed away suddenly.
Billy ‘lived for football’
Recalling her husband’s long career in football, Lynda says he lived for the game.
She said: “He loved football but Billy was also working hard to provide for me and our family.”
The couple met in Aberdeen when Lynda was a 15-year-old office junior and Billy was a 17-year-old serving his time with Charles Alexander Transport.
The couple would have been married for 55 years come October.
She said: “We were just like any other couple.
“We loved to go dancing and Billy’s favourite band was The Drifters.
“He said he wanted them played at his funeral so we will do that.
“His song for me was My Girl by The Temptations. He would sing that for me.”
Football took Billy to South Africa
Billy was flourishing in the junior football ranks when he met Lynda.
And she recalled how he began his professional career playing in South Africa.
He returned to Scotland and the couple married, but he contracted tuberculosis (TB), ending his plans to return to football in South Africa.
Billy went on to play for Highland League side Huntly and then Arbroath before a move to his home club, Aberdeen.
But his finest days in football came after he joined Dundee FC in the 1970s.
In four years at Dens Park, he scored 106 goals in 138 appearances.
He scored 44 goals in his first season with the club – a feat yet to be bettered by any player since.
He also played for several years in Australia.
Billy was inducted into the Dundee FC Hall of Fame in 2016.
Dundee FC historian Kenny Ross has paid his own tribute to Billy.
He said: “Billy’s record speaks for itself as a prolific goal getter not just in Dundee’s history but also in Scottish Football history and his 44-goal haul in his first season with Dundee has yet to be bettered by any player who has followed.
“Goals king Billy more than deserved to be inducted into the club’s Hall of Fame with a Legends Award.
“The thoughts of everyone at Dundee Football Club are with Billy’s friends and family at this very sad time.”
Billy and Lynda lived in Montrose.
Last year Lynda spoke to The Courier about her anger after Billy was allowed to wander off from an Arbroath care home where he had gone for respite care.
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