Norman Mair

Norman G.R. Mair is a sports journalist and a former Scottish international rugby union and cricket player.^[1] He later became a journalist for The Scotsman on rugby and golf.,^[2] and also wrote for Rugby World His daughter is Suzi Mair, who presents STV News at Six.

Mair has always been outspoken in his opinions. In the early fifties, for example, criticising the large number of new caps in each game in 1953 and 1954, he said that he consider the "inhabitants of lunatic asylums... had a fair grievance while the S.R.U. selectors walked around free and uncertified."^[3]

He was capped for Scotland in 1951-37,^[1] and played for Edinburgh University RFC.^[1]

He also played for the Scotland national cricket team.^[1]

Sports journalism

Bill McLaren rates Mair as one of the best rugby journalists that Scotland has produced:

"I always have had a high regard for the coverage by Norman Mair, formerly of the Scotsman

"Norman never was persona grata with all members of the Scottish Rugby Union because he wrote what he felt and had the ear of some very influential people in the game. There have been times when I have had to read one of Norman's sentences two or three times over in order to get the gist, but he has been one of the most perceptive of analysts and his articles have been both enlightening and enjoyable - especially the little humorous stories that were so often his punchlines."^[4]

Writing of the Australian player Mark Ella, he once said: "Ella has hands so adhesive that when he fumbled a ball against Scotland (in 1984) you would not have been surprised to see those Australians of the appropriate religious persuasion cross themselves"^[5]

Mair's favourite player of all time is G.P.S. MacPherson

Selected publications

• Mair, Norman, 1994, Muirfield, Mainstream Publishing
• John Rutherford and Roy Laidlaw with Norman Mair, Rugby Partnership: Stanley Paul, 1988. ISBN 0-09-172703-0

References

• Bath, Richard (ed.) The Scotland Rugby Miscellany (Vision Sports Publishing Ltd, 2007 ISBN 1905326246)
• McLaren, Bill Talking of Rugby (1991, Stanley Paul, London ISBN 0 09 173875 X)
• Massie, Allan A Portrait of Scottish Rugby (Polygon, Edinburgh; ISBN 0 904919 84 6)

1. ^ ^{a b c d} Bath, p105
2. ^ McLaren, p88
3. ^ Massie, p54
4. ^ McLaren, p94
5. ^ Ella, Mark & Smith, Terry (1987) Path to Victory, ABC Books, p54

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