As for the football, Munro is said to have joined Abercorn, Paisley's then chronologically second team, starting in its Third Team as a young teenager. He then stepped up to the Seconds in 1885 at perhaps still sixteen, there winning Second Eleven Cup twice, and to the First Team in 1887 at 18,  an outside-left, known for his ball trickery and outstanding shooting. At nineteen in 1888 he had already been capped for the first time, scoring, and again a year later, this time against England, scoring once more in a victory from 2-0 down away. 

Thus at that point a long and fruitful on-field career might have been expected but he, first alone in July but soon joined by the family, made a move that seemed to come out of the blue, although, in fact, it was for "love" or more accurately family. In 1882 John Love, his wife, Flora Ferrier, and family had emigrated from Paisley to the United States, settling in Pawtucket. Additionally, Neil's wife was clearly a Love by her father but her mother was also a Ferrier. The two families were closely inter-related, with one of the Pawtucket Loves, the teenage Alexander, involved in the local soccer scene with semi-professional, Pawtucket Free Wanderers. And it was that club that Neil joined on arrival, within months impressing enough to be included in the Canadian-American party that in August of 1891 crossed the Atlantic to tour first Scotland and then England. He even played in the game at Ibrox against Scotland in October.

The story is then that firstly Abercorn, founder member of the new Scottish League and struggling somewhat, then persuaded him to leave the touring-party in November, not returning to America but to the Paisley club's First team ; even so they would finish just one place above re-election. And secondly that, the family coming home, he would stay with the club, relegated in 1893, until 1894, retiring at still only twenty-five, suggesting injury. After at that he would spend the rest of his life in Paisley working at various jobs. On marriage he has been a labourer in a Starchworks. In 1901 he was a general Labourer, in 1911 working in a boatyard, in 1921 a Hammerman and on his death in 1948 at the age of seventy-nine and back on the same street as a child, a Labourer once more having worked for the Council. He was also a widower, having been predeceased by Mary by two years.