| Personal information | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Full name | Thomas Vallance | ||
| Date of birth | 27 May 1856 | ||
| Place of birth | Succoth Farm, Renton, Scotland | ||
| Date of death | 16 February 1935 (aged 78) | ||
| Place of death | Glasgow, Scotland | ||
| Playing position | Right-back | ||
| Senior career* | |||
| Years | Team | Apps | (Gls) |
| 1874–1882 | Rangers | ||
| 1884 | Rangers | ||
| National team | |||
| 1877–1881 | Scotland | 7 | (0) |
| * Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only. |
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Tom Vallance (27 May 1856 – 16 February 1935) was a Scottish footballer. Vallance was the first in a long line of inspirational Rangers captains. He made 38 Scottish Cup appearances for the club.
Before football, Vallance was a rower. He is noted as been abnormally tall for the times but was only around six feet two inches. He played at right-back for Rangers from 1874 to 1882. He left Scotland on 22 February 1882 to take a position in Calcutta. He embarked on a career in the tea plantations of Assam but returned after a year suffering from blackwater fever.
Vallance was also capped at international level, making seven appearances for Scotland.
He was a successful restaurateur, a poet and an artist, whose paintings were displayed by the Scottish Academy. Reference has been made to a family connection to Sir Stanley Matthews, but this proved not to be the case.