Weekend 2/3 October
One name that links these two teams is Jimmy Hill. For nearly 50 years he was familiar to (and not always popular with) football fans for his match analysis for ITV, BBC and Sky. However, before he settled so successfully in the world of television, he had enjoyed a fascinating career as a player, union rep and manager.
He spent three years at his first club, Brentford, before moving to Fulham in 1952. Lining up over the next 9 years with players like Johnny Haynes and Tosh Chamberlain, Hill took part in some memorable matches that helped to build Fulham’s reputation for entertainment and near misses. Older fans still recall the extraordinary cup-tie of January 1956 where Fulham trailed the holders Newcastle 3-0, fought back to lead (through Hill’s goal), only to lose 5-4, with a contentious offside denying them an incredible 5-5 draw. Two years later, Fulham made it to the semi-finals where they took Manchester United (still recovering from the trauma of the Munich air crash) to a replay which they lost 5-3. Hill, who told the Sunday People after the first match that he felt Fulham would have won if one of their best players, Jim Langley, hadn’t been injured, does not seem to have performed too well in the replay. Peter Lorenzo, writing in the Daily Herald, claimed that he “played as if he’d been up all night licking stamps for the Players’ Union”, which is not the sort of criticism we very often hear levelled at Premier League players.
It was, of course, a reference to Hill’s work for the PFA, of which he was chairman from 1957. Hill played a vital role in the campaign to abolish the maximum wage for professional footballers, the success of which had a direct effect on Fulham in 1961 when chairman Tommy Trinder had to make good his claim that Johnny Haynes was worth £100 a week.
By the time Haynes was receiving his (by the standards of the time) bumper wage packet, Hill’s playing career was over, cut short by injury. November 1961 saw him taking up a post as a “sportsman’s agent” with Bagnall Harvey. Before the month was out, he was manager of Coventry City.
City, then in Division Three, had been dumped out of the FA Cup by non-league King’s Lynn, thus bringing an end to Billy Frith’s managerial reign. Geoff Veasey, writing in Bookable Offence, a When Saturday Comes publication, vividly describes Hill’s impact on the club: he changed the kit to a more optimistic sky-blue, thus getting rid of the club’s old nickname (“The Bantams” anyone?), introduced the first colour format match programmes, pioneered a radio format for matchday announcements and, most importantly, got the club into Division One.
There are parallels here with what Don Revie was achieving with Leeds. He too, took over a club in the doldrums and changed the kit (all white to echo Real Madrid, in Leeds’ case) and galvanised them into quick promotion. The major difference is that Revie continued in post when his team reached the First Division.
Hill, to everyone’s amazement, resigned as Coventry manager two days before the start of the 1967/68 season. The fans were shocked to say the least. Ken Jones, writing under a headline of “The Man Who Never Misses a Trick” in the Daily Mirror of 18/8/67, suggested that Hill “would have made more impact if he had ridden out of the Highfield Road ground in his famous hunting gear”, before adding that “the game can only lose by his going”. It is a tantalising thought to wonder how Hill would have fared on and off the pitch against some of the greatest managerial talents the English game had seen up until that point: Busby, Shankly, Revie, Allison to name but four. Hill himself referred to the strains of management and stated that he had “no more to learn from being a manager”. The Coventry board put on a brave face, taking comfort in the thought that by then they were among the top ten financially successful teams in the country. As it transpired, they would stay in the top flight (often by the skin of their teeth) for an uninterrupted 34 years.
Hill’s influence thereafter was directed from his position in the media. He continued to come up with suggestions about improving the game and is regarded as being influential in bringing in 3 points for a win. Ironically, if this had been in place in 1977 Coventry would have been relegated on goal difference based on their results over the season.
SteveTLooksBack 