Photograph: rangers.co.uk
Today, December 29th marks five years since one of Maccabi Tel Aviv’s greats, Avi Cohen passed away in a tragic accident. Ally McCoist, one of Scotland’s greatest players was Cohen’s teammate during their time together at Rangers and the former striker remembered Cohen fondly in an exclusive interview with the Official Website:
What comes into your mind when you hear the name Avi Cohen:
אימג’בנק – GettyImages (אימג'בנק – GettyImages)
“The first thing I think of is his smile. He had the most wonderful smile. When he first came up to Rangers we had some real quality players and Avi had played with Liverpool. He had the ability to play with the best on the pitch and I can always
remember that he was a wonderful human being off of the pitch with a wonderful family. He used to throw his head back and laugh with a wonderful, wonderful smile that lit up the entire room. I’m so surprised it’s already been five years since he passed. We were all so very sad after the accident. I can’t believe it’s been five years.”
Blending in as a foreign player:
“He was a top football player and he had such a wonderful sense of humor. He really was great. At that time Rangers had Graeme Souness who was helping transform Scottish football but you could put Avi Cohen on par with any of the great players we signed. For me his greatest strength was that he was a terrific human being.”
Avi Cohen as a professional player:
“He was 100% committed and he was such a wonderful character. I can only remember seeing him get angry twice eand those times were on the football pitch. He was disappointed in the commitmnt shown by one or two of his teammates and he wanted to let them know it. That sums him up as well. It wasn’t in his character to be aggressive 
or angry but if someone needed a reminder or a message to be told that they weren’t doing enough or working hard enough, Avi would certainly tell them. All of a sudden there was a jump in the quality of the players we had been used to and we began to see international players like Woods and then Avi Cohen followed by Bonni Ginzburg. All of these guys were top quality when it came to playing professional football and doing their job.”
If there was one thing you could’ve said to Avi before he passed away what would it be:
“I’d thank him for lighting up the dressing room and lighting up the workplace. He was an absolute top, top human being and a pleasure to work with, I’d thank him for that.”
