William Pollock McLaren was a Scottish rugby union commentator, teacher, journalist and one time rugby player.
16 Facts About Bill McLaren
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Bill McLaren was born in Hawick, Roxburghshire, in 1923, to a knitwear salesman from Loch Lomond-side who had moved down to the area.
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Bill McLaren served with the Royal Artillery in Italy during the Second World War, including the Battle of Monte Cassino.
4.
Bill McLaren was used as a forward spotter, and on one occasion was confronted by a mound of 1,500 corpses in an Italian churchyard, an unpleasant experience which never left him.
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Bill McLaren played in a Scotland trial in 1947 and was on the verge of a full international cap before contracting tuberculosis.
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Bill McLaren spent 19 months in a sanatorium in East Fortune in East Lothian, where he was given the experimental antibiotic streptomycin, which saved his life; of the five patients given the drug, only two survived.
7.
Bill McLaren studied Physical Education in Aberdeen, and went on to teach PE in different schools throughout Scotland right through to 1987.
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Tony Stanger 8.
Bill McLaren coached several Hawick youngsters who went on to play for Scotland, including Jim Renwick, Colin Deans and Tony Stanger.
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Bill McLaren was one of many post-war commentators who progressed from commentating on BBC Radio to BBC Television during the infancy of television broadcasting in the UK.
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Bill McLaren was awarded an MBE in 1992, an OBE in 1995 and a CBE in the 2003 honours list.
11.
Bill McLaren featured as a commentator on the video games Jonah Lomu Rugby and EA Rugby 2001, and did voice work for Telewest Communications.
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Bill McLaren had particularly endeared himself to his many Welsh admirers with his comment "They will be singing in the valleys tonight".
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In later life, Bill McLaren contracted Alzheimer's; he had been renowned for his excellent memory.
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Bill McLaren died on 19 January 2010 at the age of 86 in his home town of Hawick.
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On 11 March 2010, thousands of people attended a memorial celebration of Bill McLaren's life held at Murrayfield Stadium in the week leading up to that year's Calcutta Cup match which was played at the stadium.
16.
Bill McLaren was named among the inaugural members of the Scottish Rugby Hall of Fame in 2010 and inducted into the World Rugby Hall of Fame during Rugby World Cup 2015.