It was the decade where football took its first faint steps towards professionalism.

Players chased a greater financial return, Waverley rose from the paddocks, colour television beamed into our living rooms for the first time and the game endured through a turbulent decade.

The ‘Sensational Seventies, as they would become known, proved a tantalising, yet ultimately unfulfilled period for Collingwood.

It was bookended by heartbreaking Grand Final losses to Carlton. The first came when the Magpies lost from what had previously been considered an unlosable situation; the second when Collingwood almost pinched the premiership in the dying moments of a dour struggle.

Through it all, the goings on at Collingwood – and at Victoria Park - was like a soap opera you couldn’t switch off, and the audience was spellbound.

For those who lived through it, it was a period they will never forget and it produced heroes and characters alike forever etched into our consciousness.

For those who didn’t,Collingwood Forever will transport you back in time each week this season for a blast from the ‘70s past, profiling a player who made an impact for one reason or another.

Given Andrew Ireland's extraordinary almost four decades of service to football administration in Queensland and New South Wales, it's easy to forget how important he was to Collingwood as a footballer across a whirlwind six seasons.

Originally recruited as a key forward, he was one of the Magpies’ most reliable yet attacking defenders of his era, spanning 1975 to 1980.

Cruelly, like so many of his teammates, Ireland was denied the premiership medal he worked so hard to attain. But across four Grand Finals (three losses and a draw), he gave it everything he had, being among his team’s best players in most of them.

Then, at only 27, he walked away from an on-field career that was at its peak, to help shape the destiny of two non-traditional football states, which often brought him into conflict with his former club.

Ireland’s life may well have taken a different pathway had his family remained in the city of his birth – London. He lived in England for the first four years of his life before his parents chose to move halfway across the world to Melbourne, Australia in 1957 - just a year after the city hosted the Olympic Games.

Ireland would begin his football journey with Preston Swimmers - where one of his football contemporaries, Fitzroy's Garry Wilson, also played - before progressing to Ivanhoe Amateurs, which had long been a breeding ground for Collingwood footballers.

Considered a late developer, he build a solid record in the VAFA, establishing himself as one of the competition's most productive forwards.

Playing at centre half-forward, Ireland represented the VAFA in 1973 and '74, and was an All-Australian in both seasons. Long after he retired, he would win selection in Ivanhoe's Team of the Century.

Such was his form that he was approached by Collingwood to join the club in 1975. Off the back of some strong preseason form, the 22-year-old was chosen for his first VFL game, against South Melbourne - in Round 1, 1975 - though his debut was overshadowed by a highly-touted teammate also playing his maiden match.

Phil Carman garnered most of the pre-game publicly, though The Age said of Ireland: "(he) is at centre-half-forward, after showing outstanding form in the practice matches." He shared the same forward line as Carman that day, and while he had 11 disposals (all kicks), Ireland could only manage one behind on the scoreboard.

The following week he kicked four behinds before finally slotting through his first goal in his third VFL match.

Ireland's best haul of goals came in his 11th game, when he booted three goals against Melbourne - the team he barracked for as a kid - in Round 11.

He would recall years later he looked into a possible move to play with the Demons, but his good form prevented it.

He would tell The Age: "I hated Collingwood, though once I settled down, I loved my time there."

Standing at 191cm, and weighing 81kg, Ireland was afforded plenty of game time in his first season, kicking 17 goals from his 21 games, winning the club's best first-year player award.

Incredibly, he would only kick 12 more goals for the rest of his career, as a move to the backline in his second season became the making of him as a player.

Ireland made the move in 1976, and while his role at half-back took some adjusting to, it came to suit his attacking ways, unflappable demeanour, fine field kicking and strong marking ability.

He played 11 games in 1976, but took his game to a new level the following season.

One observer said he was "capable of taking a good mark and is an excellent kick ... perhaps a little loose in defence, but (he) still attacks downfield at all times."

New coach Tom Hafey transformed Collingwood in 1977, and Ireland relished the new outlook and revamped game style.

The cool-headed, composed half back played a role in Collingwood's successful rebirth in 1977, but just as he appeared to be enjoying the club's change in fortunes, it looked to have ended for him.

He suffered what appeared to be a season-ending injury, with the Canberra Times saying after Collingwood's Round 8 win over St Kilda: "Half back Andrew Ireland is expected to be out for the season after taking a bad fall and breaking his left arm."

As the Magpies' 1977 juggernaut rolled on, Ireland never gave up the dream of returning for the finals.

In the end, he was able to resume in the VFL a fortnight before the end of the home-and-away season, proving his fitness at the right time of the season.

He made an immediate impact in his Round 21 return against South Melbourne, with The Age detailing his “impressive return".

Collingwood won its way into the 1977 Grand Final with a second-semi-final win over Hawthorn, even if they lost Carman to a needless suspension for striking Michael Tuck.

Ireland suffered a hamstring twice at training in Grand Final week, though the club doctor told him he could have a painkilling injection, as "you've only got to get through one game."

That wasn't to be the case.

After Collingwood led the premiership playoff by what looked like an insurmountable 27 points at the last change, North Melbourne wrested the lead back and seemed set to end the Magpies' dreams.

Ireland would later lament one last term passage when waited for a loose ball from Bill Picken rather than make a dive for it, allowing Wayne Schimmelbusch to start a passage that ended in a behind.

“That contest was in my mind for ages,” he would tell the Herald Sun. “You think about all the little things you could've done that might've saved a score.”

Still, there was plenty to play out, and in an extraordinary finale, Collingwood forward 'Twiggy' Dunne levelled the scores late as the frantic final seconds ticked down.

In one late drive forward, North Melbourne's Stan Alves drove the ball forward to two unmanned teammates before a desperate Ireland emerged from nowhere to drag down the most important mark of his career, over Arnold Briedis.

Without it, the Kangaroos might have scored.

Instead, Ireland’s wobbly clearing kick ended up in the arms of Shane Bond, who tore down the wing, bouncing the ball frantically as the game ended in only the second draw in Grand Final history.

Ireland's hamstring would now have to get through another game, though he would say later the emotional exhaustion was more telling than the physical one. 

"To me it was more the mental thing,” he would say. “All your effort's going in to the weekend. Then all of a sudden you're thinking, 'Shit, we've gotta go back and do it again'."

The defender would be named as one of Collingwood's best players in the drawn game and also the replay a week later, which Collingwood lost by 27 points.

That Grand Final heartache wouldn't end there for Ireland, who would also go on to play in two more losing Grand Finals for the Magpies in 1979 and 1980.

Still, that 1977 loss was "the hardest to take ... "For a long time you agonise if every little thing you did on the day could have made the difference between winning and losing.”

“Make no mistake, you're scarred by these defeats."

His good form in 1978 was rewarded with a state game for Victoria against Tasmania.

Ireland was among Collingwood's better players in the five-point Grand Final loss to Carlton in 1979, while his final game in black and white came a year later, in 1980, when Richmond thrashed the Magpies by what was then a record 81 points.

He was working in an off-field role with the Magpies in the latter part of his playing career, but an offer to move to Queensland as the local league's state director of coaching was too good to refuse, and he called quits on his Collingwood playing career after 110 games.

Moving to Queensland in 1981, he started a career in football administration that lasted longer than he could ever have imagined.

He did, thankfully, have some success when he played in a premiership with Mayne in the QAFL – under former Kangaroos Mick Nolan – in 1982.

He went on to become chief executive of the Brisbane Bears – and later the Brisbane Lions - and was there for their historic first AFL premiership in 2001.

Later, he moved to the Sydney Swans as a football operations manager, playing a role in the club’s drought-breaking first flag in 72 years – in 2005 - before going on to become the club's CEO for many years, including during their 2012 triumph.

Those successes in administration – as good as they were - didn't quite make up for those near-misses in black and white. But Ireland’s remarkable contribution to the game – first as a player (even if too briefly) and as an administrator (for almost four decades) will never be forgotten.

Andrew Ireland when he was CEO of the Sydney Swans (AFL Photos)