Banksy (40 page)

Prior to meeting Tony Waddington, I had another meeting with Matt to discuss the proposed loyalty payment. It didn’t go well.

‘Have you and the board reached a decision?’ I asked.

‘We have.’

I settled back in my chair to await the good news.

‘We’ve decided not to pay you a penny,’ he said.

I was flabbergasted and furious. I told him exactly what I thought of him and the directors, but he wouldn’t be swayed.

‘There’s to be no compensation payment and that’s final,’ Matt said firmly.

‘Then the deal’s off,’ I told him. ‘If it means me staying here and playing in the reserves, then so be it. You and the board can sing for that fifty grand.’

I left Matt’s office in a dark mood and found Tony Waddington sitting in the main foyer.

‘I’m sorry, Mr Waddington, but the deal’s off,’ I said with a shrug, and proceeded to tell him why.

His face betrayed no emotion whatsoever and he didn’t say much. He simply stood up and said, ‘Leave this to me,’ before sweeping into Matt’s office without knocking.

Five minutes later he marched out. ‘Two grand all right?’

I told him that would be fine by me.

‘Good!’ he said. ‘Then let’s do the deal and get out of here.’

We did the deal and I became a Stoke City player there and then.

A couple of years later, I was on Stoke City’s pre-season tour of Holland, and one night in our hotel I got talking with Doc Crowe, a Stoke City director. I told him how happy I was at Stoke and the story of how my transfer would have fallen through
if Tony Waddington hadn’t persuaded Leicester to come up with the compensation payment.

‘Did they hell,’ said Doc, ‘we paid you that!’

He went on to relate how Tony Waddington had found Matt Gillies as awkward and intransigent as I had. Having got nowhere with him, and afraid that the deal would fall through, Tony had simply walked out of Matt’s office and plucked the £2,000 figure out of the air, knowing that his own directors would back his judgement and that the Stoke board, already committed to paying Leicester £50,000, Tony knew, wouldn’t baulk at parting with another couple of grand if that’s what it would take to sign the current England goalkeeper.

For two years I’d had no inkling that it had been the Stoke board who had paid the compensation – the money had simply been credited to my bank account. It was typical of Tony Waddington; he was a great guy and one of the most underrated managers in football. Tony realized the importance of a good goalkeeper to a team and I’d like to think he believed that his board’s money was well spent. Later he said my efforts in goal saved Stoke City twenty goals a season. Whether that was truth or flattery, it was nice of him to say it.

Some say that Tony was ahead of his time in recognizing the value of a good goalkeeper to a team. To my mind it was more a case of other managers being behind the times. Whatever, I loved the man. He was a manager who always set out to sign gifted players to entertain the supporters; a manager who always believed that football at its most inspirational and creative has a place in the best of all possible worlds.

His first priority was to his players, his second to the supporters who paid their hard-earned cash to watch us. He never forgot how important the role of football was in the lives of working people, as evidenced by his marvellous description of football as ‘the working man’s ballet’.

*

Ursula had lavished so much love and attention on our home in Kirkwood Road that it sold almost straight away. We found a house about ten miles from Stoke, just over the Cheshire border in an area known as Madeley Heath. The house, which had a mock Tudor frontage, was larger than our Leicester home and, though the area was known as a heath, there was a substantial amount of woodland close by, evoking a feeling of country living. We settled in straight away, and on my first day at Stoke City, the warm reception I was given made me feel equally at home there too.

I made my Stoke City debut at Chelsea on 22 April 1967 (just twelve days after my final Leicester appearance against Leeds – though it seemed much longer). Chelsea won by the only goal of the game and, though disappointed not to have begun a new chapter in my career with a victory, I came off the Stamford Bridge pitch happy in the knowledge I hadn’t let myself or my new team down. Tony Waddington seemingly thought so too because he patted me on the back, said he was pleased with me and raised my spirits no end by telling me, ‘Your best is yet to come, and it’ll coincide with the best days this club has ever known.’

Fate decreed that I was to make my home debut for Stoke against Leicester City. Needless to say, I was really on my mettle that day. Goals from Peter Dobing, Harry Burrows and young John Mahoney gave us a 3–1 win over my old team mates, who I have to say were generous in defeat.

Only two games of the season remained, against Arsenal and Manchester United. United had clinched the League Championship the previous Wednesday evening by beating West Ham 6–1 at Upton Park (that might have been me conceding six, had my move to East London gone through!) and over 60,000 packed Old Trafford to see them crowned as champions. Though they were missing Denis Law through injury, United were still formidable with Bobby Charlton, George Best and Nobby Stiles at the top of their form. The pressure from United was virtually
ceaseless, but I learned in this game that Stoke City had a resolute defence. Despite all that pressure we held on for a goalless draw and what my new team mates believed was a moral victory.

I could never have believed when I kept goal for Leicester City at Liverpool on the opening day, that by the end of the season I would be playing for another midlands club. You never know what life has in store, and that’s very true of football. England were the world champions, but in April 1967 in a European Championship qualifying match, we slipped up in sensational style at Wembley, much to the joy and delight of our friends north of the border.

Following the World Cup, England had drawn with Czechoslovakia and beaten both Northern Ireland and Wales. It was evident from those games that, as world champions, England were now the prize scalp on the international scene. All three teams had raised their game and pulled out all the stops in an effort to beat us. In addition to this greater team effort there was an undercurrent of resentment on the part of some nations towards our success in the World Cup. A number of people in South America even believed the tournament had been rigged to enable England to win it. This, of course, was absolute tosh. I know FIFA have done some strange things, but to think they would (or could) manipulate a World Cup in favour of a chosen team is utter nonsense.

I suppose that behind this accusation lay the fact that we had played all our games in London, at Wembley. All I can say is that that is how we came out of the draw for the qualifying group. As far as World Cups were concerned, the team from the host nation usually played their matches at the national stadium. In the 1958 World Cup in Sweden the hosts played in Stockholm, and Chile in Santiago in 1962. Mexico played all their matches of the 1970 World Cup at the Azteca stadium in Mexico City. To the best of my knowledge, no one has ever implied that those host nations had been favoured. However, the pattern in more
recent tournaments has been that the hosts play at least some group and second-round matches outside the capital – France visited Lyon, Marseille and Lens in 1998, and may even have benefited from a slightly less intense atmosphere than the pressure-cooker of their national stadium. So the home-town effect cuts both ways.

In ’66 the winners of Group One had been designated to play their quarter-final tie at Wembley, the runners-up at Hills-borough in Sheffield. It so happened that we won Group One, so we played Argentina at Wembley. If we’d finished as runners-up – and that was entirely possible after we drew our first match against Uruguay – we would have happily headed north.

Whether out of jealousy or resentment, it appeared some people had it in for England and there were all manner of outlandish theories as to why we had won the World Cup. I’d like to think we won it because we were the best side in the tournament and the world. The final against West Germany was our forty-fourth match under Alf Ramsey and we had lost only six times. Over the same period of time, that record was unmatched by any other international team.

Conspiracy theorists apart, those teams who knew we had been worthy winners spared no effort when facing us. England were there to be shot at, and in April 1967 Scotland came up with the firepower.

Neither players nor supporters need to be motivated for a clash between England and Scotland. It is the oldest fixture in the international calendar, one steeped in history, permeated by patriotism, fuelled by fervour and fanaticism and completely nerve-racking to play in. As if there weren’t enough at stake, the game was given additional importance because it was both part of the Home International Championship and a European Championship qualifier.

England did not get off to the best of starts. Jack Charlton broke a toe in the early stages and, as he could not be substituted, he had no alternative but to play on. Alf switched Jack up front,
which affected the balance of the team. Minutes after Alf had dealt with that change, we suffered another setback. Scotland’s Billy Bremner caught Ray Wilson with a tackle that was later than a privatized train. Despite damaged ankle ligaments, Ray too carried on valiantly. Jimmy Greaves, back in the England team, also picked up a knock and though Jimmy’s injury was not as serious as Jack’s or Ray’s, it definitely took the edge off his performance.

With England effectively down to nine men, I think we did well to give what was a very good Scotland team such a close game. No doubt any Scot reading this will say that I’m making excuses for our defeat, so let me say that, on the day, Scotland were the sharper and more incisive team and deserved their victory. In fact, they would have beaten any nine-man team in the world!

Seriously, though, the Scots were up for it from the start. They took to the pitch hyped-up but in control of their emotions. They exuded gritty determination and their will to win was there for all to see. As both teams walked out on to the pitch, I knew we were in for an almighty battle because of one astonishing sight –
Denis Law was wearing shinpads!
In all the games I had played against Denis, I’d never seen him wearing the protectors. I remember thinking, If he’s tooled up for battle, what can we expect from Billy Bremner, Tommy Gemmell, Eddie McCreadie and John Grieg?

As far as the Scottish lads were concerned, this was their World Cup final and in no time at all we were made to realize just how much that meant to them. Fiery and combative from the start, Scotland took the lead through Denis Law. Receiving the ball from Jim Baxter, Denis turned in the space of a hearthrug and fired a shot to my right. I managed to parry the ball, but in a flash Denis was there to lash the rebound into the net. It was like Hogmanay, Burns Night and the resurrection of Harry Lauder all rolled into one as thousands of Scottish supporters wildly celebrated.

The game then developed a pattern of attack and counterattack. Bremner, McCreadie and Gemmell snapped away at the heels of anyone in a white shirt. Bobby Charlton probed and prodded but found the Scottish defence as uncompromising as the truncheon of a Glasgow polis. Twelve minutes from time, Celtic’s Bobby Lennox outwitted George Cohen on the byline, cut inside and crashed the ball past me and into the net.

Almost from the restart a limping Jack Charlton pulled a goal back. I was hopeful we could get something out of the game, but fate had other ideas. Having evaded two tackles, Jim McCalliog bore down on my goal at an angle and I quickly came out to narrow his vision of the goal. I should have given more cover to my near post to force McCalliog across the penalty area. Instead McCalliog glanced up, saw the gap I’d left and struck the ball with venom. The ball flashed by on my near side and I was left to curse what I knew had been a silly mistake on my part while I picked the ball out of the net.

We were far from done for, however. Geoff Hurst put us back in the game with a fine piece of opportunist finishing and in the closing minutes we laid siege to Ronnie Simpson’s goal. At one point I thought we had scored the equalizer but Jimmy Greaves’s effort was hacked off the line. The seconds ticked away, the Scottish players dug in, and their supporters got behind them in no uncertain terms. Scotland defended like demons in and around their penalty area. They denied us space in the approaches to goal and began to frustrate us to the point of desperation. There was conflict, there was drama and in the end, when Herr Schulenburg from (of all countries) West Germany sounded his whistle, there was defeat for England.

It was bedlam. Scottish supporters poured on to the pitch, many producing penknives. They were no threat to us, however. Those Scottish lads had only one thing in mind – to take a chunk of the Wembley pitch back home with them as a souvenir of their famous victory over the world champions. The famous turf was left pitted and scarred as dozens of ecstatic Scotsmen carved
it to pieces. Legend now has it that there is a house in Bonny-bridge that has a Wembley penalty spot in the centre of the lawn in the back garden. I believe it!

The despondency felt by the England players was in marked contrast to the euphoria of the Scottish team. Any thoughts I had of the Scottish players being gracious in victory and appreciative of our efforts were immediately dispelled by Denis Law at the post-match buffet.

‘Gordon, come here, son. We need your help over here,’ said Denis Law as I entered the room. ‘Can you provide the answer to a question that has stumped us?’ asked Denis, looking from me to his pals Jim McCalliog, Jim Baxter, Billy Bremner and Ron McKinnon.

I told him I’d try.

‘England are world champions,’ said Denis, as if butter wouldn’t melt, ‘but we’ve just beaten you. So does that mean we are the world champions now?’

Denis and his team mates roared with laughter. To the side of him was a large bowl of mayonnaise, but I resisted the temptation.