John Robertson, Scottish legend of Nottingham Forest, died at 72.

John Robertson, legendary midfielder for Scotland and especially for two-time Champions Cup winner Nottingham Forest in 1978-1979 and 1979-1980, died yesterday in Glasgow at the age of 72 after a long illness. Standing 1.74 tall, Forest’s legendary coach Brian Clough dubbed him the “Picasso of soccer” because of his accuracy of the’last pass to the strikers, while his compatriot Bill Shankly, coach of rivals Liverpool, said he crossed with the precision of a billiards player.

Born Jan. 20, 1953, in Uddingston, a town in south-central Scotland suburb of Glasgow, he grew up in the local Drumchapel Amateurs club, a hotbed of other champions such as Andy Gray, Archie Gemmill, and David Moyes. In 1970 he switched to Nottingham Forest and made his First Division debut at age 17 on October 10 of that year against Blackpool. At that time the team was in big trouble and relegated the next year, but in 1975 Brian Clough arrived, who wanted to keep Robertson, who was considered to be leaving.

It was the winning move: Forest returned to the top flight the following season and in 1977-1978, as newly promoted, even won the English title. Thus began Nottingham Forest’s remarkable two-year epic in the Champions Cup: two wins in two finals won 1-0, in 1979 against Malmoe and in 1980 against Hamburg. On both occasions Robertson had a hand in it: in the first it was he who served the assist to Trevor Francis for the winning goal, in the second it was he himself who scored the decisive goal.

Robertson in Nottingham also won two English League Cups (1978 and 1979), a Charity Shield (1978, 5-0 to Ipswich Town) and a European Super Cup (1979, double challenge, 1-0 and 1-1, against Barcelona). With the Scotland national team he toitalized between 1978 and 1983 28 appearances and 8 goals, winning the 1981 Inter-British Tournament in which one of his penalties was decisive in beating England at Wembley. He was a true penalty kick specialist: 60 scored out of 62 attempted!”

In 1986 he left playing soccer and Nottingham Forest, where he had returned for one season after a two-year spell at Derby County and in which he totaled between all competitions 514 appearances and 95 goals. In 1990 he became assistant to former Northern Ireland clubmate Martin O’Neill, whom he followed as his second, until 2010, on the benches of Wycombe, Norwich City, Leicester City, Celtic, and Aston Villa.