George Adams (footballer, born 1950)

George Adams (born 1 July 1950) is a Scottish football player and coach.

While he was a player, Adams was Alex Ferguson's first signing as a manager, moving to East Stirlingshire from Alloa Athletic in 1974.[1] His playing career was disrupted by injury, and he became a manager in the Highland Football League at a young age.[1]

Adams later worked for Alex Ferguson as a youth coach at Aberdeen.[1] He was later credited by Rangers chairman John McClelland for his role in developing many of the players who achieved great success with Aberdeen during the 1980s.[2] Adams subsequently worked in youth development for Celtic and Motherwell.[3]

Adams left Motherwell in 2003 to become director of youth football at Rangers.[2] He left Rangers in September 2005 after being offered a different post as part of a restructuring exercise at the club.[4] Adams blamed a personality clash with chief executive Martin Bain as the reason for his departure.[4]

Later in 2005, Adams joined Ross County as director of football.[4] In 2007, Adams appointed his son (Derek Adams) as Ross County manager.[5] The father and son pairing guided Ross County to the 2010 Scottish Cup final, recording upset victories over Hibernian and Celtic en route.[3] The pairing were split when Adams left Ross County to become assistant manager to Colin Calderwood at Hibernian,[1] but were reunited again when Derek Adams returned as Ross County manager in 2011. Both father and son were sacked by Ross County in August 2014.[6]