Sports Personality of the Year: Sir Kenny Dalglish wins Lifetime Achievement award
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Sports Personality of the Year 2023: Lifetime Achievement winner Sir Kenny Dalglish
Celtic, Liverpool and Scotland legend Sir Kenny Dalglish was honoured with the Lifetime Achievement award at BBC Sports Personality of the Year.
The 72-year-old won eight league titles and three European Cups as a player and manager at Anfield after joining the club from the Bhoys in 1977.
Dalglish, who also led Blackburn to the title, is Scotland's most-capped male player and joint record goalscorer.
"I'll treasure this dearly," Dalglish said as he accepted the award.
"All we did in football was to try and make people happy and the best way to make them happy was to get results.
"Fortunately we managed to do that a few times and if they enjoyed us winning it's only a fraction of the enjoyment we got from the support they gave us."
Glasgow-born Dalglish began his career at Celtic, where he won four Scottish league titles before Liverpool paid a then British record transfer fee of £440,000 to sign him.
In his first season with the Merseyside club he scored 31 goals, including the only goal in the 1978 European Cup final against Bruges at Wembley.
He would go on to win a further two European Cups and five league titles before becoming player-manager at the age of 35 in May 1985.
"To go from the dressing room to the manager's office, I wasn't always the most comfortable, but I had fantastic support from senior people at Liverpool," Dalglish said.
"The most comfortable place for me as a player was in the dressing room. I missed the dressing room, but you've got to move on in your life and that is what destiny was telling me, move on."
Liverpool won a domestic Double in Dalglish's first season as player-manager at Liverpool
Despite his unease, Dalglish thrived in the role as Liverpool claimed their first domestic league and cup Double in 1986, and two more league titles before he announced his shock resignation in February 1991.
Dalglish was the club's manager at the time of the Hillsborough disaster in 1989. Ninety-seven Liverpool fans died as a result of a crush during an FA Cup semi-final against Nottingham Forest at Sheffield Wednesday's Hillsborough stadium.
The Scot ensured the club was represented at the fans' funerals and, along with his wife Marina, helped support bereaved families.
In a biopic about Dalglish's life, Marina and their daughter Kelly spoke about the impact of the Hillsborough disaster on him, and how it eventually led to his resignation.
After leaving Liverpool, where he had ended his playing career with 515 appearances and 172 goals, Dalglish took charge at Blackburn Rovers and guided the club to the Premiership title in 1995.
Short spells at Newcastle United and back at Celtic followed and, after an 11-year break from management, he returned to Liverpool in 2011 to lead them to League Cup success in 2012 - the club's first trophy in six years. He was sacked three months later after an eighth-place Premier League finish.
Speaking about Liverpool, where he is known as 'King Kenny', Dalglish said: "The football club means everything to ourselves as a family.
"Glasgow and Liverpool are very similar. Obviously, they have shipyards with two teams in the city. But for me, the people were fantastic as well. They've got a real sense of humour and they take time to talk to you."
On the international stage, Dalglish played 102 times for Scotland, scoring 30 goals.
Fellow football legends Sir Alex Ferguson, George Best, Sir Bobby Charlton and Pele have previously won the Lifetime Achievement award.
In 2022, the award was won by Jamaica's eight-time Olympic gold medal-winning sprinter Usain Bolt.
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