Alan Gilzean, who has died aged 79, once claimed he did not like football, never watched it and would not miss it when his career was over. It was, said this enigmatic Scot, just a job: “Something I’m good at.” And so he was, first as a member of Dundee’s 1961-62 Scottish First Division title-winning team, then as a striker for Tottenham Hotspur, for whom he was part of the FA Cup-winning team of 1967 and, later, the great Spurs side which in successive seasons between 1971 and 1973 won two League Cups and a Uefa Cup.

Along with that he was capped 22 times for Scotland. Jimmy Greaves, with whom he established the first of two outstanding striking partnerships at Tottenham Hotspur, described him as “possibly the best footballer I’ve ever played with”.

Gilzean grew up in the Perthshire town of Coupar Angus, the youngest of four children; his father, Willie, was a painter and decorator. In Search of Alan Gilzean, James Morgan’s definitive 2010 biography, records that Alan’s footballing ability came from his mother Barbara’s side of the family, the Forbeses; six of his uncles played with distinction for Junior clubs (a tier or two down from what is now the Scotland Third Division).

Gilzean himself began with Coupar Angus Juveniles and Dundee Violet before joining Dundee as an amateur at 17 and signing pro in time for the 1957-58 season. Over a period of seven years he notched up 169 goals in 190 games. Some of them took Dundee to the semi-finals of the 1963 European Cup.

Alan Gilzean, second from left, celebrates with the Spurs FA Cup-winning team of 1967, including, from left, Jimmy Greaves, Dave Mackay holding the cup, Pat Jennings, Terry Venables and Jimmy Robertson. Photograph: Douglas Miller/Getty Images

He was still on Dundee’s books when he made his first appearance at White Hart Lane in October 1964, playing for a Scotland XI against a Tottenham Hotspur XI in a benefit match for the family of Spurs player and fellow Scotland international John White, killed by lightning that summer while playing golf. Gilzean scored twice.

Within two months, he was a Spurs player, signed by their manager Bill Nicholson for £72,500 in the face of competition from Sunderland and the Italian club Torino. He was ostensibly a replacement for the England international Bobby Smith, but while Smith was an old-fashioned, barging centre-forward, Gilzean was a quirkier, far more subtle player, unselfish in possession, effortless of touch and with a great left-foot shot.

His outstanding attribute – some said it was close to a superpower – was his heading ability. When rising to the ball, he would appear not only to hover but change direction while airborne and rather than meeting it head on he would turn his head, letting the ball glance off. That way he could pinpoint a pass as precisely as another player would with his feet.

Tall, gangly and prematurely balding, Gilzean always looked more mature than his fresh-faced team-mates, the receding hairline and penchant for dark suits and white shirts giving him the air of a middle-ranking civil servant. It belied what was, according to the journalist Norman Giller, a formidable capacity for booze: “He had hollow legs and could drink us all under the table. He was the Bacardi and Coke king.” A fan once phoned Nicholson to complain that he had spied Gilzean exiting a club at two o’clock one morning. “No, boss,” protested Gilzean, “I was just going into the club for a nightcap.”

He was rapidly adored by the fans, who crowned him in their chants as the King of White Hart Lane. Another terrace chant followed instantly, the result of his quickly established partnership with Greaves: “We’ve got the G-Men, Greaves and Gilzean. They’re the world’s best goalscoring machine.”

Alan Gilzean celebrates a goal for Spurs against Everton at Goodison Park in the 1971-72 season Photograph: Colorsport/Rex/Shutterstock

“We were like blood brothers,” said Greaves. “Right from the word go we just had this incredible telepathy on the pitch, like nothing I experienced before or since.” During a 1968 Cup tie against Peterborough, Greaves passed up the chance to score an open goal because he and Gilzean were so busy chatting they did not see the ball rolling across the unguarded goalmouth. After Greaves left for West Ham in 1970, Gilzean formed a second striking partnership with Martin Chivers, the success of which was reflected in a new terrace chant: “[Pat] Jennings kicks, Gilzean flicks, Chivers scores, Park Lane roars.”

An elusive, laidback personality who disliked the spotlight, Gilzean had no plans to extend his career in football once he left Spurs, aged 35, in 1974. “I couldn’t stand the aggravation of being a manager, having fans, directors, press, everyone after you,” he said. “No thanks.” A quickly curtailed spell with the Johannesburg club Highlands Park in South Africa, and a brief managerial post with the soon-to-be-defunct Stevenage Athletic, led him to a desk job with an Enfield transport company.

For years, that was the last Tottenham and his former team-mates heard of him. Claiming once that only seven people knew his phone number, and separated from his wife, Irene (nee Todd), a police officer, whom he had married in 1965, he retreated in the late 1990s to Weston-super-Mare in Somerset, giving rise to the inevitable speculation that he had fallen on hard times and was living the life of a vagabond.

His sons took him back to Scotland and in recent years he was persuaded out of self-imposed obscurity and back to north London. Hymned once again as the King of White Hart Lane by fans, many of whom had not been born when he was in his prime but recognised his near-folkloric status, he became a regular member of the Spurs hospitality team and until recently was a popular turn at Legends’ nights.

Irene and his sons, Kevin and Ian, survive him.

• Alan John Gilzean, footballer, born 22 October 1938; died 8 July 2018