Welcome to
my weekly blog “The Igor Bišćan Hall of Fame” every week I’ll be adding two new
additions, one will be a Liverpool Legend or fans favourite, the other a
Player, Manager or Club who have contributed to the world game we all love
(Gary Neville need not worry). Please comment below who you’d like to see make
the IBHoF, here are this weeks entries. YNWA
TOMMY SMITH
1962/63 -
1977/78
If the
spirit of the Anfield Reds ever took on human form it would probably tackle
like a two-legged ton of bricks, bark orders in broadest Scouse and answer to
the name of Tommy Smith. Here was a man, born in the shadow of his beloved
ground, who served Liverpool for 18 years and grew to be the very
personification of his club. He will go down in folklore as one of the hardest
men the game has known - and he was - but to write him off as a mere destroyer
is a mistake. Oh yes, Tommy could play a bit, too.
He made his
debut at home to Birmingham in May 1963 as a deputy for injured right-half
Gordon Milne, but it was in an Anfield encounter with Anderlecht in November
the next year that he made his first major impact. Wearing a number-ten-shirt,
he operated as an extra defender, confusing the Belgians as Liverpool won
comfortably. Instantly Tommy became an integral part of Bill Shankly's first
great side, initially combative in midfield before moving into central defence
where he could more easily make light of a comparative lack of pace. 'Think of
yourself as Ron Yeats' right leg,' Shanks told him, and he developed into a
trusty buttress of Division One's most formidable rearguard.
Tommy, a
rumoured transfer target of Manchester United in his reserve days, was a
confident, aggressive ball-winner whose distribution could rarely be faulted.
His game, which always boasted more skill than he was given credit for, matured
rapidly as he contributed vigorously to the 1965 Wembley victory over Leeds and
the ensuing Championship campaign.
As the
influence of better-known players waned with age, Tommy's authority grew ever
more marked and he was the obvious choice to succeed Yeats as captain in March
1970. Taking over a team in the throes of transformation, he was an inspiration,
constantly driving his team-mates to greater efforts - not shrinking from the
task even if personally off form - and standing up for their rights in
off-the-field dealings. Tommy relished the responsibility and in 1970/71 he
delivered some of the finest performances of his life, being pipped as
Footballer of the Year by Frank McLintock and winning his sole England cap.
That season
he led Liverpool to the FA Cup Final, which was lost to Arsenal, before going
on to a then unique double of the Championship and the UEFA Cup in 1972/73. His
days as skipper were numbered, though, and he lost the job to Emlyn Hughes
following a confrontation with Bill Shankly over being dropped in November
1973. After nearly joining Stoke, Tommy returned to the side at right-back in
place of the sidelined Chris Lawler and helped to ensure a steady flow of
trophies until, troubled by knee problems and with the team prospering in his
absence, he announced in early 1977 that retirement was imminent.
How an
injury to Phil Thompson changed all that! The old warhorse found himself back
in central defensive harness to win a title medal, face Manchester United in
the FA Cup Final and, most stirring of all, head the goal against Borussia
Moenchengladbach in Rome that effectively won Liverpool their first European
Cup. Fired anew with ambition, Tommy stayed for another term and would have
played in a second European Cup Final if he hadn't dropped a pick-axe on his
foot.
The Reds
offered him a one-year contract while John Toshack came up with a better deal
at Swansea, which he accepted. Tommy, who was to make a brief Anfield return as
a coach, left in the knowledge that no one had ever fought more fiercely in the
Liverpool cause. As one ex-opponent, himself no six-stone weakling, put it:
'There's a lot of very hard men - and then there's Tommy Smith!'
BORN:
Liverpool, 5.4.45. GAMES: 632 (1). GOALS: 48.
CLUBS:
Liverpool 62/3, Swansea City 78/9 (36,2).
HONOURS:
League Championship 65/6, 72/3, 75/6, 76/7. FA Cup 64/5, 73/4. European Cup
76/7. UEFA Cup 72/3, 75/6.
INERNATIONAL
CAREER: 1 England cap (71).
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FERENC
PUSKAS
Back in
1953 the widely held view - at least within these shores - was that England's
footballers were the finest in the world. The embarrassing 1-0 defeat to the
United States at the World Cup three years earlier was dismissed as a freak
result. After all, a foreign team had yet to win at Wembley and nobody expected
the Hungarian eleven that took to the hallowed turf on that grey November
afternoon to be any different. Of particular amusement to the confident England
fans in the pre-match kickabout was the 'fat little chap' in the Hungarian
forward line. Just over 90 minutes later, England's proud record had been
reduced to ashes as they were given a six-goal football lesson by the
Magnificent Magyars. And the world had been introduced to the peculiar talent
that was Ferenc Puskás.
By no
stretch of the imagination did Puskás look like a finely honed athlete. He was
short, overweight, couldn't head a ball and only used one foot. But that left
foot was a magic wand with which he cast a bewitching spell over Billy Wright
and Co. England's defenders were bred on man-for-man marking, as a result of
which they were utterly bewildered by Hungary's tactic of playing a deep-lying
centre forward, Nandor Hidegkuti, allowing Puskás and Sandor Kocsis to push
forward from the inside-forward positions. Whilst Hidegkuti hogged the
headlines with a hat-trick, it was Puskás who pulled the strings and still
found time to score twice himself, cruelly toying with the hapless England
keeper Gil Merrick. The rules of football were rewritten that afternoon.
Puskás was
born in Budapest and at the age of sixteen made his debut for his father's old
team, Kispest. Two years later he made his international debut against Austria.
With military teams springing up all over Eastern Europe, in 1948 the Hungarian
authorities took all the Kispest players and turned them into Honved, the
'representatives of the nation's army. Honved romped to the League title in
that first season, Puskás' 50 goals and the fact that he was an army officer
playing for an army team earning him the nickname 'The Galloping Major'. Since
Communist sports teams were considered amateurs, Puskás was able to captain his
country to victory in the 1952 Olympics but their 1954 World Cup adventure
ended in a shock defeat to West Germany in the final - the Hungarians’ first
loss for four years. The great team finally broke up during the Hungarian
Revolution of 1956 when Puskás and others defected to the West. He had scored
an astonishing 83 goals in 84 internationals.
Two years later
he signed for his old Honved manager, Emil Oestreicher, who had taken over at
Real Madrid and, although he was now the wrong side of 30, Puskás inspired Real
to dominate Europe. Four times the leading scorer in the Spanish League, his
finest hour came in the 1960 European Cup final when he scored four goals in
Real's 7-3 annihilation of Eintracht Frankfurt. It was Real's fifth successive
European Cup triumph and Puskás remains the only player to have scored four
times in a European Cup Final. He also scored a hat-trick in the 1962 final but
ended up on the losing side as Real went down 5-3 to Benfica. In total he
scored 35 goals for Real in 39 European matches - a fantastic feat.
Bizarrely
he represented a second country that year, playing for his adoptive Spain in
the World Cup but it was a disappointing farewell to the international arena.
He continued playing for Real until 1966 before 'retiring to concentrate on
coaching and later guided unfancied Panathinaikos of Greece to the 1971
European Cup final. Then in 1993 he was briefly appointed caretaker manager of
Hungary. It was a poignant moment. The star who had fled into exile nearly
forty years earlier had finally been forgiven.
BORN:
Budapest, Hungary. 1.4.27.
DIED:
Budapest, Hungary. 17.11.06 (aged 79).
CLUBS:
1943–1949 Kispest 177 (187), 1949–1955 Budapest Honvéd 164 (165), 1958–1966
Real Madrid 182 (157).
INERNATIONAL
CAREER: Hungary 1945–1956 Caps 84 Goals 83, Spain 1961–1962 Caps 4 Goals 0.
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