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"I just know this fellow can be
another Jackie Milburn to the supporters"
His entertainment value was worth a bomb to United. With a brash and cavalier personality he became a huge crowd puller. Outside Tyneside fans loved to hate him, but at St. James' Park all that could be heard was the Geordie roar of 'Supermac! Supermac!'. He could do nothing wrong. The football career of Malcolm Macdonald started on the terraces of Craven Cottage where he watched his Fulham idols, in particular England schemer Johnny Hayes. Macdonald was born in 1950 not far from the ground and played football at school, good enough for both the London and Home Counties junior select team. At 16, the Macdonald family moved to the rural setting of Sussex, to Malcolm's disgust, but his football education didn't stop. As keen as ever he took a long bus journey to play on a regular basis for Knowle Park, a prominent junior club in the Sevenoaks area. In South London he first met up with Harry Haslam, the name to put Macdonald firmly on the road to stardom. He was invited to Tonbridge and signed for the non-league side in 1967. Haslam moved to Fulham a couple of years later and Mac followed him to his favourite club without hesitation. However, in his first season with the Cottagers, playing initially at left-back, the Londoners were relegated and the young Macdonald often found it hard to claim a place. he had graduated into the Football League scene, but yet to fully make his mark. In July 1969 he moved to Luton Town for a £17,500 fee and to Fulham's loss he quickly developed into a devastating goalscorer and flamboyant character, with at times outrageous self confidence. Luton won promotion from the Third Division with Macdonald the spearhead, scoring sensational goals - goals to shortly send the Gallowgate terraces crazy. Many a time he powered his way through packed defences with a blistering turn of speed, ending with a whiplash shot and the ball bulging the net. He was a matchwinner in every sense of the word.
Joe Harvey said at the time, "I just know this fellow can be another Jackie Milburn to the supporters". He was so right. On his St. James' Park debut Malcolm scored a tremendous three goal burst against Liverpool. Tyneside had a new hero. It had been the most dramatic home appearance since Len Shackleton's sensational double hat-trick back in 1946. Ivor Broadis described his three goals in The Journal, the first an equalising penalty, "Macdonald lashed the spot-kick into the roof of the net". The second, to put United in front, "there was tremendous quality in the way Macdonald made something out of nothing, dragging a short pass from a challenge to make position and hit a rocket-like cross shot past Clemence with very little to aim at". And the third, "Clark, Hibbitt and Tudor paved the way for Macdonald's third.....again with his left foot across Clemence". That was not all, he also cleared off the line and near the end, going for a fourth, clashed with the 'keeper and was carried off, legs bent and groggy to a hero's exit. It was 'Roy of the Rovers' stuff. From that moment the supporters adored him. He became perhaps the Hughie Gallacher of the Seventies, frequenting expensive restaurants and night-clubs. he drank champagne and smoked fat cigars. he opened his own trendy boutique and was always immaculately dressed.
Lee's sale of Supermac to Arsenal before the start of the 1976/77 season was a massive blow to Tyneside's fans. Controversy raged for months after, and even still does to this day. 121 goals had come by way of Macdonald, a goal every other game. It took the club many years before they found a player with such charisma. At Highbury, Macdonald continued scoring goals - 29 in his first season - and he reached another Wembley Cup final. His record was just as good for the Gunners, 57 in 108 games, although he never reached the pinnacle of crowd adulation achieved on Tyneside. Not long after the 1978/79 season was under way, injury sidelined his talent. A knee injury, not for the first time, troubled him and after a spell recuperating with Swedish club, Djurgarden, he was forced to quit. Not wishing to stay out of the game for long however, Macdonald returned to Craven Cottage and took over commercial activities for Fulham in 1979. Later he became a thoughtful, articulate team manager and director, building a good Fulham eleven out of nothing. Due to problems out of football, he left the game altogether and settled in Hampshire, although he later had a short period back in the north, running a pub in Berwick. Macdonald had an equally brief spell back in football in charge of Huddersfield Town, but slipped out of the game to concentrate on business interests in the south. Albert Stubbins, himself a great Number 9 noted, "Macdonald was the last of the old fashioned centre-forwards". He was a devastating all round striker, making up for a lack of pure skills with pace and the ability to hit the ball with either foot with awesome power. In the air too he was dangerous, although he wasn't a six footer and, as an added bonus, he possessed a dangerous long throw. Most importantly, Malcolm had a one track mind - for goal - and as his autobiography title noted, he was, "Never Afraid To Miss". Certainly the north east hasn't seen a figure like Mac since and, as with Hughie Gallacher before, will probably not see one quite like him again. Perhaps George Mulhall, Bolton's assistant manager summed up Macdonald's influence on football. He said after witnessing a typical display destroy his side, "He's not Supermac. He is Superman!"
Other Honours [ JACKIE
MILBURN | JOE HARVEY | BOBBY MONCUR
| MALCOLM MacDONALD ] |
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They called
him Supermac! The Seventies belonged to Malcolm Macdonald, no-one else could touch him in
the goalscoring stakes and on Tyneside crowds flocked to see his exciting one way to goal
approach, banging the ball into the net from all distances and angles. Days like the
thrilling performance at Highfield Road, Coventry in 1972 when he netted a stunning
hat-trick. the first a right foot blaster off the crossbar, the next a scintillating
effort with his left foot from an acute angle, and to round off a trio for the
connoisseur, a diving header that left the keeper stranded. 
In Division Three he got 27 goals, then up a grade smacked in
another 30 and prompted Joe Harvey to risk a record fee for the stocky Londoner to replace
the Davies-Robson partnership. United paid out £180,000 - then the second biggest cash
transfer in the British game - on the eve of the 1971 FA Cup Final - for the 21 year-old
and Mac took the north east by storm. Arriving for his press-call in a chauffeur driven
Rolls Royce, it was typical of his show-biz approach to the game he played. Sceptics said
he would be an enormous flop, "He hasn't played in the First Division" and
"He's too left-sided" they claimed. Macdonald made them eat their words in no
uncertain terms. 
Goals and more
goals followed. He was picked for England's Under 23 side and then for the full eleven in
1973, going on to win 14 caps including an epic evening at Wembley when he netted five
goals against Cyprus. United's 1974 FA Cup run allowed the wider football audience to see
Macdonald's magic at first hand. He scored in every round bar the final and another trip
to Wembley followed in 1976. But his days at Gallowgate were drawing to a close due to a
clash with manager Gordon Lee. Macdonald said, "I loved Newcastle until Lee took
over". He left Tyneside the way he arrived - in style - by a private jet.