Milne Jimmy Image 3 Preston North End 1937

Description

Dundee born wing half Jimmy Milne began his football career with junior club Lochee West Station in 1928, and signed for Scottish League Dundee United in August 1930. He made his Scottish League debut that August against Alloa Athletic and immediately established himself as a first team regular at Tannadice, scoring 7 times in 82 appearances over the next two seasons before he signed for Second Division Preston North End in April 1932. He had only made two appearances by the year end, but from January 1933 he was a regular in the Preston first eleven, and missed only 4 games in 1933-34 as Preston gained promotion to the First Division as Second Division runners up.

In 1937 he was part of the Preston team that reached the FA Cup Final where they were beaten 3-1 by Sunderland at Wembley. Preston went one better the following year when they won the 1938 FA Cup Final but unfortunately for Milne he missed the game as he had broken his collarbone a week earlier in a collision with Arsenal’s Alf Kirchen. He did however play in their FA Charity Shield defeat to Arsenal that September. Milne’s League career was cut short by the advent of the Second World War, by when he had scored 11 times in 257 appearances for Preston and he retired from playing before the end of the conflict.

In 1946 he became player-manager of Wigan Athletic for a season. He also managed Morecambe from 1947 to 1948 and coached Doncaster Rovers before returning to Preston North End as a trainer in 1949. Milne later  served the club as manager from April 1961 to November 1967, taking them to the 1964 FA Cup Final, where they lost to West Ham United, in a season they finished 3rd in the Second Division, narrowly missing out on promotion.

Jimmy is the father of England international Gordon Milne, who also played for Preston, as well as Liverpool and  Blackpool, and was also the manager of Coventry City and Leicester City.

NB In the photograph he is pictured with Preston’s Frank Gallimore.