Not everyone has a favourite Alex Miller football memory – but I do. It is from the afternoon of Saturday August 8, 1980, with two minutes to go at Celtic Park, with the Old Firm locked at 1-1. Miller received a throw-in from Willie Johnston and cracked a bending left-footer from 22 yards past an astonished Pat Bonner in the Celtic goal for the winner.

In fact the goal ought not to have happened at all. In those dying moments Johnston had been intending a long throw into the Celtic box, but Davie Provan came and stood about a foot in front of the Rangers winger, to thwart his attempt at forward spring. So Johnston merely despatched an angled throw to Miller at the edge of the Celtic box, from whence his missile was unleashed.

“That wasn’t the best goal of my career,” Miller, now 66, told me yesterday, which was a surprise. I mean, he wasn’t exactly brimming with them. “I scored one from about 35 yards against Kilmarnock, and another against Motherwell which used to feature on the old opening credits of Scotsport. But that goal against Celtic is one that many seem to remember.

“The thing about it was, Willie Waddell [then the Rangers general-manager] had told us before the game that the police had had a meeting with both clubs, and had specifically asked that there be no over-the-top celebrations at goals by the players. Well, here is me, a full-back, with a minute to go, lashing home the winner like that. I’m jumping about at first but then, if you watch it again, you can see me trying to rein it in as I remember what Waddell had said.”

That last insight is typical Alex Miller – conscientious to the last. This Scottish manager and coach has done football duty all over the world, and his devotion to his remit was never doubted. It is one reason why, among other things, Miller was prized by Gerard Houllier and Rafa Benitez at Liverpool, in 10 years as part of the club’s backroom staff which included winning the Champions League.

The one thing no-one thought they would see Miller do was work in Russia, but he did just that in 2012 when he went to Novosibirsk (if you need more details on that check it out on Wikipedia). The start of that brief sojourn in south-west Siberia was like something straight out of a John le Carre thriller.

“I was told to meet these guys at Frankfurt airport,” says Miller. “The club had got on to an agent, who had got in touch with me. Their president [of Sibir Novosibirsk] was to be there, and a few others, but they weren’t allowed to be landside so we were all to meet in this lounge that had been arranged.”

As it turned out, Miller lasted three months in Asian Russia. “It was an incredible experience. I would regularly travel eight hours in a day and still be inside the country, and still be short of where we were going. Russia is massive. As for the gig itself, it was an impossible job. They wanted to get the club promoted to the Russian Premier League but they were something like 15-18 points adrift with about 12 games to go. There was no chance of making it happen.”

It is 33 years since Miller stepped into management, creating a young and gifted St Mirren team which went on to win the Scottish Cup four months after he left. It is amazing now to note, given how gruelling it sometimes was at the time, that he was Hibernian manager for 10 years – could that really happen today? It was during those Easter Road years, when some Hibs supporters didn’t fully appreciate Miller, that he famously remarked: “It’s not a manager the fans want, it’s a messiah.”

Miller also managed Aberdeen, worked with Gordon Strachan at Coventry, worked in Japan and elsewhere, as well as coaching the Scotland national team. But his most recent stop – appointed assistant-manager of St Mirren in October – came totally by chance.

“I’ve always loved football, and I’d made a point in recent years to go and watch as much Scottish football as I could. I’d been paying my way into places like Livi, Falkirk, Stirling Albion, Stenhousemuir, Raith Rovers, Hearts and Hibs and elsewhere. I just wanted to see what was happening.

“I then met Ian Murray at a Hibs-Rangers game and said ‘hello’. I knew of Ian but I didn’t know him. The next day, out of the blue, I got a call from him to say he needed an assistant, and would I be interested. I told him, yes, I would be, but I said I wouldn’t want a contract or anything like that. I said I’d come in and work with him but that if things didn’t work out, I would walk away, with no financial burden being on the club.”

It is proving another tough gig for Miller. St Mirren are currently seventh in the Ladbrokes Championship, and Murray has already had cross words with a number of Saints supporters, who have been less than impressed.

“Ian is facing a huge challenge – as I am,” says Miller. “We’ve got a very inexperienced squad, with some first-team players now with scarcely a handful of games between them. Keith Watson has just come back from injury, and we’ve now lost Jim Goodwin, a huge influence, for two to three months with injury. We’re also missing Jason Naismith, our under-21 international full-back, who will be out until February with cruciate damage.

“It’s a tough task. We’ve got a working pool of 17 first-team players but maybe seven or eight of them are under 21. I just want to help Ian and St Mirren as best I can.”

One ex-colleague of Miller told me last week: “He is about as decent a guy as you could meet.” Miller has scarcely touched a drop of alcohol in his life. “I’m 66 but I’ve still got energy and enthusiasm,” he says. “I was always disciplined in that way. I wanted to dedicate myself to football and make the best of it. Nothing about me has changed in that regard.”