A freak accident at St Mirren might have cost him his life so his progress to being a key player adored by fans is remarkable
This article is part of the Guardian’s Euro 2020 Experts’ Network, a cooperation between some of the best media organisations from the 24 countries who qualified. theguardian.com is running previews from two countries each day in the run-up to the tournament kicking off on 11 June.
The testimony of John McGinn himself emphasises how it really could have been oh so desperately different. This is no tired
Football cliche. “It went into the leg seven centimetres,” McGinn said. “I went to see the surgeon who told me I was fortunate still to be alive. It was a millimetre away from the femoral artery so I would have bled out in a minute.”