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Blues & Villa Before Tv Took Over

S

Shawcross

master brummie

Picture G.jpgALAN INSTONE.jpgGoulden Askey Crowther.jpgTREV ENGLAND DEBUT.jpg
(l to r) Superstar meets Superboy(Pele meets Francis); Blues secretary Alan Instone (centre); Goulden in front of the lens with Leslie Crowther (left) and Arthur Askey'; TF's England debut

* Writer Dennis Shaw and cameraman Bill Goulden bring you some highlights from yesteryear.

BLUES' GREATEST SERVANTS
Trevor Francis was in the final weeks of his wonderful spell at St Andrew's before his iconic £1M move to Nottingham Forest when I began to work there, (as commercial manager in 1978) and it was inevitable with his growing talent and escalating market value that his career would grow elsewhere, sad from Blues' viewpoint but unavoidable. The first time I saw him play, when he was a 15-year-old, I recall thinking he looked rather like a schoolboy who, after dribbling around all his classmates with a tennis ball in the playground, had wandered into a First Division match to carry on doing the same thing. He was that natural and comfortable on the ball from very start of his first-class career when scored four goals in beating Bolton Wanderers all on his own, aged 16.
Some of his solo goals were truly breathtaking. One, against QPR I believe, saw him dribble sideways from the touchline, past player after player, before suddenly letting fly with an unstoppable shot from about 25 yards. For another, against Millwall, he ran with the ball from his own half evading tackle after tackle before picking his spot. His talent wasn't just in scoring goals, of course. I'm not sure I've seen any other player who could be haring down the wing heading for the corner flag when, apparently with pausing, he could cross the ball almost at right angles to his body to lay on a scoring chance. OK maybe my mind has glorified it a bit some 35 years on but that's the mental image I have of him.
It was a lovely, warming, fairy book time at Blues when he was at his best and, unsurprisingly, around an envious First Division people wondered how City beat the field to sign him as a boy from Plymouth. Here I have to hold up my hands and say in all honesty, I haven't a clue, except to write one name: Don Dorman.

DORMAN'S BRIDGE, AND FRIDGE, TOO FAR....!
Don was Birmingham's chief scout when Francis joined Blues and to his memory goes the credit for beating the lengthy queue of clubs who would have loved to get the young Devonian's coveted signature, along with the all-important approval and consent of Trevor's parents. Birmingham-born Dorman, who died in the mid-1990s, was a magnificent servant to Blues, Midland football in general and as a soldier for his country in WW2. Before having an excellent playing career as a goal-scoring wing half/inside forward (midfield in modern parlance) for Blues Walsall and Coventry he was one of those unfortunates whose playing days were curtailed by six years of conflict.
Don was a paratrooper who played his part in the daring Operation Market Garden undertaken to catch the enemy by surprise in being dropped in large numbers to break through enemy lines and seize a number of strategically-placed river bridges, including Arnhem, which didn't succeed but involved some savage fighting. The famous battle was portrayed in a memorable film entitled A Bridge Too Far. I do recall one jokey conversation, about the Trevor Francis signing, with the club secretary Alan Instone and Don in the D Club in which Alan winked at Don and commented: A Fridge Too Far, eh, Don?
Dorman's signings, along with Francis, were players such as Kenny Burns, Bob and Dave Latchford, Malcolm Page, Garry Pendrey and many more. For me he rates right up there among Birmingham City's greatest-ever servants.

Excerpt from A Game of Three Halves by Dennis Shaw
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Game-Three-Halves-Dennis-Shaw/dp/178222341X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1426604014&sr=8-1&keywords=A+GAME+OF+THREE+HALVES
 
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4.Villa with Cup.jpg4.McParland crash.jpgs Cup.jpg2.Villa Park tram.jpg
WHEN ASTON VILLA LAST WON THE FA CUP

"I ended up in the Wembley dressing room drinking champers from the famous trophy with the players..."

What Villa's semi-final victory over West Bromwich Albion meant to me of course (as youngest of the Sports Argus writers in season 1956-57) was that by being given the team least likely to get through round after round, was that I ended up in the Wembley dressing room supping champers with players who were now my buddies, celebrating Aston Villa's then record seventh FA Cup victory. How could we have guessed that, at the latest count at the time of writing, it was to be their ONLY FA Cup win in 95 years since 1920!
Nothing of the many memorable things that happened to me in some 64 years of covering many sports, primarily football and much later golf, has surpassed the feeling of driving out of Wembley Stadium, through those huge gates from the dressing room area, as it used to be, holding the FA Cup aloft with McParland and the club captain Johnny Dixon.
The Midland press corps then included a thrusting young broadcaster named David Coleman and well-known local writers Charles Harold, Dick Knight, Alan Williams and Eric Woodward I was very much the young apprentice at the time and it gave me the chance to watch, listen and learn.
That was it, or so I naively thought, apart from the chug-chug-chugging, whistle-blowing rail journey back from Paddington to Snow Hill in the old-fashioned rattler, where there might just be a few fans waiting to welcome their heroes home. A few? Honestly, I've never seen football crowds like it anywhere. From the Snow Hill station exit all the way to Villa Park and inside there must have been hundreds thousand of them, jam-packed every inch of the way, a solid mass of claret and blue.
We ended up in the press box watching the cup being paraded around the Villa Park pitch watched by what would have been a decent attendance for a league match. I know this sounds corny, indeed, but it's true that a policeman on duty by the press box, helping to marshal the crowds, had tears rolling down his face. We were invited into Villa Park's old, famous Oak Room, for a cuppa, this time, where the Cup was now standing by the large, help-yourself tea pot. This sounds even cornier than the tearful copper, but it's absolutely true: Someone (not me, honestly) had removed the lid from the Cup and had placed inside the trophy...a folded copy of the Sports Argus in which I had written the running report of the match. So you see, some childhood dreams do come true.
Pictures on this page not by Bill Goulden.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Game-Three-Halves-Dennis-Shaw/dp/178222341X/ref=sr_1_1?s=booksHYPERLINK
 
Great stories, Shawcross.

It must be lovely to have those 'I Was There' moments.

Keep the stories coming. I am sure that there are many Blues & Villa fans just loving these stories.

Eddie
 
Thanks Eddie....you've had your share of 'I was there moments'....two lucky guys...our spare time pursuits became our careers...we had to work at it, though didn't we kiddo?
 
smashing photos shawcross...did you take them?? just wondering where the 3rd one was taken and who the people are in it

all the best

lyn
 
Thanks lyn. They're Birmingham Mail pictures and the one is in The Wheatsheaf pub at Coleshill. The licensee at that time, Jack Littlewood was also Sports Editor of the Bimingham Mail and arranged for a club party to take the cup to his pub...those in the picture were lucky customers,some still alive I believe. I got the picture from his daughter Beryl who still lives on Coleshill...Dennis
 
Ellis at desk.jpgSaunders league Cup.jpgMore Saunders.jpgRon Saunders.jpg
Doug Ellis-Ron Saunders: Why they couldn't work together

One of the great disappointments in Aston Villa history, in my humble view, is that Doug Ellis as chairman and Ron Saunders as manager were unable to work together to build on the Championship/European Cup success.
The clash of personalities is discussed in some detail in A Game of Three Halves. Here's en extract from it:

During his Norwich days, before he joined Manchester City and then Villa, he (Saunders) was known by the local press as a hard man 'sergeant major' figure, which wasn't a bad description. Certainly, on the training ground he was the boss and woe betide anybody who flagged. In services terms he was, indeed, a superb non-commissioned officer. What he wanted to be, however, was a brigadier, and in my view he wasn't equipped for that. For me one of the great misfortunes of Aston Villa's history was that the Ellis-Saunders personality clash was irretrievably wide. It could have been so different. Even back then before the top English clubs sold their birthright to obscenely-rich Russian oligarchs, oil-rich Arabs and sundry chancers from around the world, football clubs worked best when shrewd businessmen handled the business, hard-headed football men ran the dressing room and training ground, and experienced administrators did the administrating. When any of them attempt to cross the borders into areas for which they're not qualified, the rot sets in. That's what happened at Villa Park, in my possibly old-fashioned view.
Certainly it was easy to see why Saunders was constantly at odds with his first Villa chairman 'Deadly' Doug Ellis, for a spell Sir William Dugdale, and later Ron Bendall. He wanted more power, more security, and less interference. Rightly, in my view he was never going to get all of that at Villa Park. There was certainly no way Ellis and Saunders could work together. Talk about The Egos Have Landed. It was all very frustrating for Villa because Saunders was beyond question the best and most successful team manager the club ever had. I emphasise the word 'team'. As a 'club' manager I feel that he had man-management problems to put it mildly. Had he stuck to his strength, namely turning out teams that were fighting fit, bursting with stamina and clear-eyed about their duties on the field Villa could have built on their Championship/European Cup success. Below Ellis is seen in deep discussion with the late Lord (Denis) Howell the former referee.

.Ellis Howell.jpg Pictures: Bill Goulden.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Game-Three-Halves-Dennis-Shaw/dp/178222341X/ref=sr_1_1?s=booksHYPERLINK
 

Jasper grasscutter & Flairs.jpgJasper Trevor Blues.jpgJim Smith.jpgJASPER.jpg
Jasper the 'housebreaker'
While Jasper Carrot's love of all things Birmingham City is well known, some may have forgotten that he once worked for the club as Commercial Director... and that happened to coincide with my spell as commercial manager.
Fun is never far away when Jasper is around but there was one occasion when a small favour for his next-door-neighbour, during a visit to his home by the then manager Jim Smith and myself, became downright hilarious.
We were having a general chat about a club topic when Jasper noticed that his neighbour - away for a day or two - had left a window ajar, one that was at an awkward height to close. Helpfully, he tried to reach, couldn't, and asked Jim and I to provide a leg up.
This meant that we two were standing, facing each other two or three feet apart, half crouched using our clasped hands as stepping stones when Jasper, stage comic never far away, pulled that funny face of his, put on his stage voice and said: " I hope the bleedin' fuzz don't come now..." Jim and I cracked up at the scene tht would have greeted 'the fuzz's' eyes and the three of us ended up sat on the lawn laughing like naughty schoolkids...unforgettable. It's all in the book. Click on link below.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Game-Three-Halves-Dennis-Shaw/dp/178222341X/ref=sr_1_1?s=booksHYPERLINK



























 
Tony Butler, Nick Owen.jpg
HOW TONY BUTLER CHANGED RADIO BROADCASTING
Obviously the introduction and growth of local radio, and even more so, television coverage, completely changed football's image in the public eye and slowly overtook the importance of newspapers in the public perception. It was the start of fans having a new platform to express their opinion, a situation that has grown in more recent years with tweeting, facebook and the various strands of social networking. A pioneer in this new branch of the media was BRMB's 'On yer bike' Tony Butler with his public phone-in programmes before during and after matches. All the things that used to be said pretty much privately at the fireside, in the pubs or on the terraces, could now go live on air. I well recall that, on the way home after covering an Aston Villa match for the Sports Argus I was listening to Tony Butler on my car radio firstly for the entertainment value of the post-match debate but also to test if public reaction more or less matched my own. Or not...
This particular call went something like:
Izzat you, Tone..."

Yes, John. What 'ave yer got to tell me?
Just bin down the Villa. Bought the Argus on the way 'ome.
Ya don't wanna read that rag, John.
I know. And Dennis Shaw's got 'is description of the two Villa goals all wrung.
'As 'e, John. Aw, typical 'o Dennis Shaw...
John went on to describe how he saw the goals and Butler sympathised with all the rubbish you have to put up with in the papers, said his goodbyes and asked for the next caller.
Hello Tony, my name's Mark.
What you got to say for yourself then, Mark?
It's about that previous caller. Dunno which match he was at. I've just been down the Villa as well. And I've got the Argus. Dennis Shaw has described the goals exactly right.
'Ow can you be so sure he got it right?
I was standing right behind the goal and what he's written is spot on.
Oh! Fair enough, Mark. But why are you bothering to defend Dennis Shaw?
'Cos he's my dad...
"On yer bike, Mark..."
Picture; Bill Goulden
*An extract from A Game of Two Halves www.amazon.co.uk/books
 
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