Keep Fighting

by paul harrison

  ‘My main regret is that I could not do something for the fans, to give them a team they could be proud of. The fans of Doncaster Rovers have been bloody marvellous to me and the club. I wish each and every one of them good luck for the future.’

  That he was no longer professionally involved in the game of football seemed almost criminal. He had so much to offer the sport: experience, desire and down-to-earth humility and common sense. He was a capable manager, who was unfortunate to take up the trade during a time when boards of directors demanded instant success and interfered in team matters. Money was more influential to them than supporters’ passion. Outside the top half of the first division, financial support was not readily available, and to be honest, neither Leeds United nor Doncaster Rovers were clubs in a healthy financial position. Bremner was constantly juggling club finances in order to meet demands, selling valuable commodities like players, even stadiums, in the vain hope that it would satisfy the directors’ demands.

  His managerial career over, Billy Bremner continued to spread the football gospel to the people who he knew cared, the supporters. A good career in after-dinner speaking was a natural progression for someone who had so much to say, and had thousands of anecdotes to tell. Having attended many such events, I can confirm that he maintained his charisma and was an undoubted success. At Spalding in 1994 he signed autographs for well over an hour, he answered every question thrown at him from the audience in his usual honest and open manner. He visited every table in the room and spoke to everyone, making sure that each and every person had enjoyed themselves and had a good memory to take away from the evening. He told me:

  ‘I still get a buzz out of this. Footballers earn a living the same as everyone else, so I think it's a great honour to be able to recount some of the great and not so great times, and the anecdotes that accompany being part of the game. As for being a manager again, well perhaps if the right offer came along I would consider it, but it would have to be the right club with the right people in charge. People I trusted and the fans trusted. If the Football Association of Scotland were to ask me to manage the national team, I would gladly walk to Glasgow to accept the position, but that isn't going to happen. I have too many opinions for them to see me as a likely candidate. It's time that football clubs, and the people who own football clubs, realised that the fans are the real life blood of the game and without them there would be no football.’

  When I was told in 1997 that Billy Bremner had passed away, I was speaking at a public conference in Scotland. I received the telephone call informing me of the sad news during a break. When the conference delegates reconvened in the main hall, I returned to the podium but I couldn't hide my sadness as tears ran down my cheeks. I made an impromptu announcement:

  ‘Ladies and gentleman, I have just been told that my childhood idol and perhaps the greatest footballer to walk this planet, Billy Bremner of Leeds United and Scotland has passed away. Can we please have one minute's silence as a mark of respect.’

  Over 300 people rose as one to their feet, bowed their heads and displayed the dignity and respect I had hoped they would. As the minute ended, a chant spread from the back of the hall, passing right through the crowd, until everyone was singing. For fully three minutes, the professional audience voluntarily chanted his name: ‘Billy Bremner, Billy Bremner’. It was one of the most moving moments I have had in my entire life. Billy Bremner may be gone, but he will never ever be forgotten.

  I was in Edlington on Thursday, 11 December 1997, stood alongside hundreds of other football supporters, mainly of Leeds United, at the funeral of my idol, Billy Bremner. It was a truly incredible turnout, as dozens of football legends and respected guests attended the ceremony at St Mary's Church. Alex Ferguson made a special journey from Europe, flying out immediately after a European Cup tie against Juventus. The funeral was like a ‘who's who’ of Scotland and Leeds United. The Mass was conducted by Father Gerry Harney, and as he and others delivered personal eulogies, there wasn't a dry eye in the gathered crowds that lined the village. The magic of Billy Bremner truly touched many different people across football and beyond.

  I felt privileged and honoured to have known him and to be there paying my respects, yet deep inside there was a feeling of emptiness, a void that could never be filled. A man who I had admired since I was but a child, a footballer as loyal as they come, was gone. I knew deep inside that it was the end of an era, not only in my life, but in football also. No one could ever replace Billy Bremner.

  18

  BILLY'S MOST MEMORABLE GAMES

  ENGLAND v SCOTLAND

  Home International Championship

  Saturday, 15 April 1967

  Wembley Stadium

  Games between these two countries are always passionate encounters, not only to the fans but also to the players. This classic took on even greater importance to the Scotland side, as the previous year England had been crowned World champions, winning a dramatic Wembley final 4-2 against West Germany. The home nation had achieved an unbeaten run of nineteen games prior to taking on Scotland, making the task facing Billy Bremner and his troops an enormous one.

  A packed Wembley stadium, filled with 100,000 passionate and vocal supporters, covered every piece of the terracing, the majority anticipating a comfortable England victory. Both sets of support were well behaved with much good-natured patriotic banter taking place. Inside the Wembley tunnel the tension was much more obvious, and as both sides lined up alongside each other the anxiety could be cut with a knife. The Scottish midfield, consisting of Jim Baxter, Willie Wallace and Billy Bremner appeared to be unfazed by the occasion. Bremner and Baxter utilised the time to wind up their opponents by making comical quips to them:

  ‘I loved wearing that jersey, playing for Scotland meant everything to me, I always wore it with pride and passion. We were well up for the fight and the game. Some of the England boys were full of themselves, believing in their own hype about being the best World champions of all time, and all that kind of thing. Jim Baxter reminded them that two of their goals should not have been allowed – the ball never crossed the line on one, and the Germany players thought the final whistle had gone for another, and had therefore stopped playing. It was all part of the wind-up and nothing nasty or serious, well not too much anyway.

  ‘The next thing, some of the England players began throwing personal insults at us, so we reciprocated. I kept calling Alan Ball a puff and a softie. He hated it and told me to f—— off out of his sight before he hurt me. I laughed at such a preposterous thought so he began to call me Brillo pad hair! So I laughed even more. He was almost in tears. The tension before we walked out onto the pitch was there for all to sense and I was loving it.’

  With their opponents rattled before a ball was kicked, it could be said that Scotland had won the first battle. When the game kicked off, the England players seemed nervous on the ball, not fully controlling it, and kicking it away as though it was a hot potato burning their feet. Scotland settled far quicker, with Bremner and Baxter dominating the midfield and managing the game with relative ease. The World champions were unnerved and lacking in composure. On the terraces, it was the Scotland fans who sang louder and longer as they sensed the confidence brimming through their team.

  ‘I never really thought a great deal about it at the time, but as I am a passionate Scotsman, I could never accept that as a nation we were inferior to anyone else at anything, let alone football. Each time I went close to an English player I was making comments like “Call yourself World champions – lucky bastards more like, you'll never rule over Scotland.” There was an element of grudge between the players – no one in our dressing room wanted to consider losing to the “auld enemy”.’

  On twenty-eight minutes, Scotland forward Denis Law broke the deadlock with a shot which caught out the usually reliable Gordon Banks in the England goal to give Scotland a 1-0 lead, a lead they held up to half time:

  ‘We went mad when Denis scored, you coul
d see the English hearts sink. We knew that if we could take it to half time and still be leading, then the England crowd would turn on their players, putting even more pressure on them. We were cock-a-hoop at half time in the dressing room and I couldn't wait to get out and at them again in the second half.’

  When the game resumed, it was Bremner who orchestrated much of the football in midfield, stroking the ball in every direction and finding a fellow Scot with every pass. His influence on the flow of the game was incredible. To exacerbate matters even further, when he was on the ball, every so often he would stop, place his foot on it, drag it back a few inches, and look around for a blue-shirted colleague before laying off a pin-point pass. He made it all look very easy. England were getting more wound up by his arrogance on the ball but could do little to stop him. As the game drifted on, and with some England fans streaming out of the stadium, it looked as though the solitary Denis Law goal was to be sufficient to win the game. Then in the eightieth minute, the game again burst into life when Bobby Lennox scored a dramatic second goal for the visitors, latching onto a clever Tommy Gemmell lob, and firing past the helpless Banks.

  The second goal forced England to push forward and attack and in the eighty-fifth minute, Jack Charlton managed to prod home from close range. Incredibly, more goals were to come, but any hope of a dramatic England come-back was destroyed as International debutant Jim McCalliog comfortably slotted home Scotland's third goal of the game. The Tartan Army's celebratory chants echoed around a fast emptying Wembley and the partying began. A late headed goal courtesy of Geoff Hurst couldn't silence the dancing Scots on the terraces. They knew, as did each and every Scottish player on the pitch, that they had done more than enough to win the game.

  As the final whistle sounded, the Scots celebrated their famous victory with conquering hugs and smiles broad enough to span the Firth of Forth. Bremner did not hesitate to remind the English players that Scotland had beaten the World champions, which therefore made them World champions:

  ‘It wasn't the fact that we had beaten them, but we had done it on their own territory and in such an emphatic fashion. Some people have tried to justify the result by claiming that Jack Charlton and Jimmy Greaves were both carrying knocks, but I will have none of that – we won the game fair and square. We beat the World champions in their own backyard. If it wasn't that important a result then why is it so often recalled by writers and football supporters alike? The final score that will be forever shown in the history books was England 2, Scotland 3. It still makes me smile and feel very proud all these years later.’

  LEEDS UNITED v CHELSEA

  Division One

  Saturday, 7 October 1967

  Elland Road

  In their previous game, Leeds had held West Ham in an uninspiring 0-0 draw at Upton Park. Much of the newspaper talk prior to the Chelsea fixture surrounded the Leeds captain Billy Bremner, who was about to play his last game for Leeds before starting a twenty-eight day suspension imposed for a sending-off at a league game with Fulham on 2 September 1967:

  ‘I was made a scapegoat for the incidents at Fulham. The whole game had been bad tempered and I was telling the referee to sort it out and to stop hiding from it. He lost his rag with me and told me to stop interfering and to get on with my own game and not his. A couple of challenges, more like desperate lunges, on our players went without so much as a warning for Fulham. I could feel myself losing it, not only with the Fulham players but with the f—— useless referee.

  ‘The Fulham manager was a man by the name of Vic Buckingham. I wasn't aware of anyone mentioning this at the time but he later said we had been winding his players up by taunting them about fixing games and that's why it had deteriorated so badly. Whatever, the whole situation could have been better managed by the referee. I admit I clattered into a few players, but all I was doing was sending out a message to them not to f—— with us. It backfired big style and I got myself sent off and suffered that ridiculous punishment. I wrote a letter of apology to Fulham right after the game but they sent it back to the club, torn up.’

  A few months before the Chelsea game, the Pensioners (as they were then known) had scraped through an FA Cup semi-final against Leeds, 1-0. The result had come about in controversial circumstances. First, an eighty-third minute Terry Cooper goal had been adjudged to have been ‘marginally offside’ and disallowed, then incredibly, in the final minute, Peter Lorimer flashed a long-range free kick past the despairing Bonetti, only to have the goal ruled out. Experienced television commentator Kenneth Wolstenholme said of the incident: ‘You would have to turn the rule book inside out to find out why the referee has disallowed that goal.’

  Bremner recalled:

  ‘I could not understand why the goal was not given – it was hard to accept at the time. We won the advantage with the foul being awarded to us, yet we were punished. It wasn't the first time something like that happened either, and it certainly wasn't to be the last. We felt much cheated. It was an accepted part of the game at that time that referees were not consistent and could easily be influenced by players and the crowd. Ken [Burns] was one of the better referees but he wouldn't be moved from his decision. Even years later he stood by it as being correct, albeit he did admit that we are all human and therefore make mistakes, so maybe that was him admitting it. The referee's decision is final and we had to accept that, but knowing they were human and could err more than most it didn't make it any easier to accept at the time, or now. I had issues with Chelsea all my playing career. If we were dirty then they were savages. There was nothing they wouldn't resort to.’

  The stage was set for another closely fought encounter. Chelsea's preparation hadn't been good and they had been rocked by the resignation of manager Tommy Docherty the day before the game. Docherty was a class act and a huge loss to the football club and the team's morale. Many of the Londonbased journalists and reporters categorically stated that the loss of Docherty would not particularly upset the professional Chelsea style – they would pull together and fight for victory for the sake of Chelsea FC.

  That day Bremner ran the Londoners ragged. Nowhere to be seen was the arrogant swagger of the Chelsea superstars, and even when they threw themselves to the ground feigning injury, they looked distinctly amateur. The Yorkshire Post reported: ‘Bremner teased and tormented them [Chelsea] with dexterity of foot … he could twist and turn on the proverbial sixpence.’ The Leeds captain turned in a truly world-class performance as Leeds not only beat Chelsea but demolished them with a scintillating display of pure football. Bremner crowned his own performance with a tremendously executed overhead-kick goal which today would still have the pundits raving about its quality and glory in true Brazilian style.

  The other Leeds goals, and there were plenty of them, that afternoon came from Albert Johanneson, Jimmy Greenhoff, Jack Charlton, Peter Lorimer, Eddie Gray and a Marvin Hinton own goal as Leeds ran out very comfortable 7-0 winners. The Bremner goal ensured that Leeds entered the football record books as the first side to win 7-0 with seven individual goal scorers.

  ‘At the time we did not know anything about that record, and to be honest we didn't really care. It was a great all-round performance from the whole team, everything we tried seemed to come off for us. You get games like that every so often. Chelsea caught us on the wrong day, although some may say we caught them on the right day and blame the Tommy Docherty situation on their abysmal display. I believe that whatever the situation that day we would have still turned them over and they would have suffered the same fate. As for my goal, well that was a bit special, more so because I scored it in front of the kop at Elland Road. My back was sore for days afterwards, not from the acrobatics or athleticism used to strike the ball, but from players slapping me on it to congratulate me afterwards!’

  ARSENAL v LEEDS UNITED

  Football League Cup Final

  Saturday, 2 March 1968

  Wembley Stadium

  The route to Wembley for a final is nev
er an easy one to successfully traverse. At times pundits and supporters belittle a team's appearance in a national final, claiming they have got there via an easy route. Such was the accusation levelled at Leeds when they reached Wembley in 1968, by virtue of victories over Luton Town (3-1), Bury (3-0), Sunderland (2-0), Stoke City (2-0) and Derby County in a two-legged semi-final, who were dispatched 4-2 on aggregate. In the final their opponents were Arsenal, a north London-based club with a true armoury of firepower and a battling defence and midfield. The Arsenal side was filled with internationals and experienced professionals and were as tough opponents any team could face in a Wembley final.

  ‘After losing the FA Cup final to Liverpool at Wembley in 1965, I didn't relish the thought of suffering the same emotional despair caused by defeat. I loved the feeling of winning at Wembley, beating England there in 1967 gave me an emotional high, and I wanted to replicate that success for my club. That aside, we really needed to win a major trophy to prove to ourselves and the manager that we had the ability to achieve and progress as a unit. In the build-up to the game there was a lot of talk about consistency and finishing. The boss told us that we would get very few goal scoring opportunities and to make sure we finished and made the goalkeeper work when the chances came along. On the pitch I told the lads to stay calm in the early stages and not to give Arsenal any space, and when we got the chance to shoot at every opportunity.’

  The game opened with the initial sparring and tentative pressure from both sides, as gradually Leeds began to assert themselves on the Arsenal defence. In the seventeenth minute Leeds won a corner. The kick was exquisitely curled into the Arsenal penalty area by Eddie Gray and was headed clear of the goal line by George Graham. The ball dropped to Terry Cooper at the edge of the Arsenal penalty area and, doing as his captain had instructed, without further ado the left back thrashed the ball back towards the Arsenal goal and into the back of the net: ‘It was a great moment for the team and for Terry Cooper. He was such an honest player and deserved that goal. His performance that day was as good as any full back ever produced in a Wembley final.’