Scot Gemmill during his time with Everton. He also played for Nottingham Forest and was capped 27 times for Scotland. Clive Brunskill / Getty Images

Scot Gemmill during his time with Everton. He also played for Nottingham Forest and was capped 27 times for Scotland. Clive Brunskill / Getty Images

Scot Gemmill's football travels have brought him into contact with the most famous names in the British game.

The late Brian Clough, the call-a-spade-a-spade club manager, had a big part in launching Gemmill's career. Gemmill also rubbed shoulders with Roy Keane and Wayne Rooney, among others.

The name that looms largest, though, is that of his father, Archie Gemmill, an integral part of the great Derby County and Nottingham Forest sides and a much-loved Scottish midfielder.

There are parallels in the father's and son's careers - for one, they are among the elite band of Scottish footballers who went to World Cup finals, although their experiences once there were vastly different.

The similarities certainly don't extend to physical appearance, however.

Archie had a famously old-looking head, due to a prematurely lost hairline.

His midfielder son, now 35, cuts a schoolboy-like figure. A crop of collar-length hair sits atop a slight frame, and the look is completed by sagging socks if you catch him training at North Harbour Stadium with the Knights.

But with 400-plus games for Nottingham Forest and Everton and 27 for Scotland, Gemmill is the senior pro in the new-look Knights squad.

With a charming humility, Gemmill took a quick trip down memory lane for the Herald, and had a peep at his venture into the Hyundai A-League.

Your father's career meant you were raised in England, yet you were born in his home town of Paisley in Scotland.

I'm proud of feeling Scottish. Dad sent my mother home for my birth. My [younger] sister was born in England, though, the only member of our family who was.

Did having a famous Dad help your career?

When your father is famous from day one in your life, it seems completely normal. It was definitely a help. I would not be a footballer if my dad hadn't been Archie Gemmill. At 15 or 16, when decisions are made about young footballers becoming professionals, I was physically immature and nowhere near good enough. I was only given the chance as an apprentice at Nottingham Forest because my surname was Gemmill, because of the friendship between Brian Clough and my father. Mr Clough had watched me grow up. He was apparently in our house trying to sign Dad for Derby County while my mother was heavily pregnant with me.