I played with Bobby woodruff a few times in the Sunday league for CSL back in early 90's.
Christ what a throw on him.
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I played with Bobby woodruff a few times in the Sunday league for CSL back in early 90's.
Christ what a throw on him.
Proper football match - Paul James who later went on to play for Canada in the world cup and also coached them.
Played in school with Chris Pike.
Played against David Giles, Brian Attley and some guy called Toshack not John, for the school. David Williams he of Norwich and Bristol Rovers fame when he captained both Clifton Athletic and Howardian.
Yeah that's him Colin I believe. Gilo, Attley and Chunky played for Fitzalan who also had a lad that was site Man Utd, Tudor Thomas.
Billy Waith was as tough as teak! He was a semi-pro boxer (he used to deliver bread to local shops by day) and would take a fight at the drop of a hat almost anywhere in the country.
If I'm not mistaken, a very close relative of Billy's has posted in this thread.
Red no 10 on subuteo !!!
He always struck me as the kind of fighter who'd be picked as an opponent for someone who was regarded as promising and on their way up because he could be guaranteed to give them a real test where they'd be found out if they took liberties.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Billy_Waith
I played with an England Under 23 striker - and we visited he and his wife's home for a meal.
Regularly played alongside Bryan T Richards (No 9 in Lynn Davies’ top 10 Welsh Number 10s) at grammar school - he taught us economics. Had an incredible jink off either leg which he used when playing football as well as rugby. That was weird. He only played once for Wales (in an era of brilliant No 10s) but every week he was 'Man of the Match' when he turned out for London Welsh. He used to preach that if you were fit, you wouldn't get injured - until the school forwards broke his nose.
In the late 70's Alan Harrington played for our works team,what a player what a great guy too.
Toshack and Yorath used to go sunbathing on Lavernock beach. I was there when I was in the sixth form with a couple of others travelling there on our scooters. We started kicking the ball around and they joined in as they were leaving so stayed for a bit longer. Toshack and Yorath would have been around 17 at the time. Toshack was far more skilful than he appeared and Yorath tackled as though you had been hit with a brick wall. That's all I can remember but it was about 53 years ago.
Slightly different but same theme, I did coaching badges in the early 90s with the Welsh FA. The first being the now equivalent of the UEFA C Licence but was called Preliminary. I was about 20/21 fit as **** (minus the booze and drugs), playing Welsh League.
Tommy Hutchinson turns up to do the course. Apart from being a fantastic bloke he ran me ****ing ragged not just with his fitness, but speed of thought and movement. I’ve played with and against some lads who went on to have decent careers but To my Hutch was another level.
I also done one course with Mark Aizlewood who was an absolute wanker.
LOL. A fun read.
I once "played" against Ray "Butch" Wilkins, and, like you, wrote an account of it:
Here it is:
Some years after I realized that I was not, never had been and never would be Superman — that tying a raincoat around my neck cape-style did not confer the gift of flight — my second bubble burst.
These are hard lessons on the long, sad journey from the wonderfully mystic world of childhood into the garish light of reality, but they must be learned.
Lesson number two was delivered decisively on a warm summer day in 1972, when I attended soccer camp at a seaside town in south Wales. The camp was led by Stan Montgomery, a professional English footballer long retired.
We trainees were a bunch of 16-year-olds who thought rather highly of ourselves. And not without reason.
We had won every local league and cup competition and were the team to fear.
So when the universe ordered itself so that the youth team of the great and mighty Chelsea football club happened to be touring south Wales during our camp, and caused them to challenge us to a game, Coach didn’t back down. The debacle that ensued is for the ages.
We made two mistakes during that game. The first was agreeing to play it. The second was scoring the first goal. When that header near the far post went soaring past the Chelsea goalkeeper, a cloud of apprehension descended on me. We had poked the bear. This would not end well.
I know that sounds defeatist, but, hey, these were the cream of Britain’s soccer-playing youth, culled from innumerable rag-tag local teams like ours and placed firmly on the professional track, beneficiaries of the best that professional coaching had to offer. These kids were the future of the game.
My job that day was to guard their left winger, which I gamely attempted to do. The first time the ball landed at his feet I approached him cautiously, but suddenly he was no longer there. Like something out of Harry Potter, he simply disappeared. I looked over my shoulder and he was 20 yards downfield, the ball at his feet. I have no idea what he did to accomplish this Houdini-like feat, but it was the end of any fantasy I might have indulged that the professional game beckoned.
We lost 8-1, and my fecklessness guarding Houdini had much to do with it.
Afterward I asked the name of the kid who had so thoroughly humiliated me.
“Ray Wilkins,” I was told. “He goes by ‘Butch.’”
A year later, at the age of 17, Butch Wilkins was playing for Chelsea’s first team. At the tender age of 18 he was team captain. In 1979, Manchester United came calling.
He captained the England national team 10 times and played in the 1982 and 1986 World Cups.
His career, and universally praised temperament, caused the queen to make him a Member of the British Empire, the same honor once conferred upon The Beatles.
So it naturally caught my attention when I read on April 4 that he had died unexpectedly of a heart attack at the age of 61, my age.
His passing was universally mourned across the English game.
It is perhaps a small claim to fame that Ray “Butch” Wilkins once subjected me to 90 minutes of humiliation, but it’s about the only one I have.
So, good luck to you, Butch. If St. Peter gives you any trouble, which I highly doubt, then just do what you did to me, whatever it was, and you’ll be 20 yards inside the gates before he has a clue what’s going on.
I played in the same Reading Schools side as Neil Webb who went on to play for Man Utd & England.
Ray Wilkins story-When i was an apprentice it was my job to clean the away changing rooms. We played qpr in a pre season friendly at NP-Wilkins played. I would have to wait outside with my bin, mop and bucket, most teams would be showered, dressed and out in 45 minutes, some would open a few cans and take their time, QPR took the f ucking piss, i had to get back to llanedeyrn, that's a walk to central and then the 57 bus. I waited for over an hour then popped my head around the door asking them to hurry up, i was told to **** off by Andy Sinton (i'm sure it was him) so i told him to ****off back and had a row with him, telling him i had to get the bus home, i the end i just got on with it and mopped and swept around their feet. Ray Wilkins was chuckling and said to me ' I like your character son' He gave me £10 and said toget some chips on the way home :hehe: Cheers Butch...
Leon Jeanne when he played for Carpenters Arms sunday league. He was overweight and I didnt recognise him at first. Only after half hour when he scored his third goal it clicked. He was doing rainbow flicks over our defenders heads. He was a joke. Played against Joe Jacobson a few times as a teenager as well.
Doesn't surprise me at all, anyone who does something like this can't be bad :hehe:https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=iqVFnxHWnlc
Your comment on Gareth Edwards reminded me that I played football with Gerald Davies, who was my form teacher in the late 60's. He also played rugby in a teachers v school rugby team match and it was a privilege to watch the man in action. Comical too because he run rings around the boys, who had a decent team at the time.
Cricket wise I played against Tony Cordle in the mid 70's. We both scored in the same match but my team lost 3-2. He was a decent centre forward.