James Hamilton on Sport History and Psychology
The mid-sixties brought a gentlemen’s agreement: Liverpool would do the music, and London would do the football. It might have happened earlier. Most capital cities dominated the football in their respective countries, and London had only missed out because we’d invented the game, and invented it north of Watford Gap. But by 1964, the English…
By 1963, England’s top players would have been well used to foreign travel. They were familiar with the routine and experience of flying, so Ramsey’s first fixture shouldn’t have posed a problem just because it was an away friendly. But it was an away friendly in Paris, that most unfriendly and unEnglish of cities. It…
An early hero of Dick Booth’s brilliant new history of broadcast commentary Talking of Sport is Seymour Joly de Lotbiniere. “Lobby” took over as Head of Outside Broadcasts at the BBC in 1935, and was determined to cover more sports. He was especially keen on live commentary with all its spontaneity and excitement. Some sports…
There are only so many clips available for Youtube to uncover. And those it has come up with don’t answer all of our questions. Such as, has the game we love, the game we suspect has more significance to it than just entertainment, topped out? Have we already seen it at its best; have we…
The England team have an excellent disciplinary record. Only ten players have seen red since 1966 – eleven red cards altogether, as David Beckham now has two in his trophy cabinet to put alongside his 107 caps. It’s a tiny sample, so these are only “fun” stats. Of eleven red cards, seven have gone to…
There are so many bad decisions in the first two minutes of this clip that I really don’t know where to begin: [youtube=http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=4xH2ueGntDM] I’d started school the previous January. My grandmother and her sisters had attended Clapham Road Lower School too, seventy years before. It had been brand new then; by the time I was…
He wasn’t first choice: that was Jimmy Adamson of Burnley. And when the job offer did come, he didn’t agree straightaway. Alf Ramsey had enough about him to negotiate, and, courtesy of those elocution lessons he always denied, the voice to do it with. In 1962, these words were not blindingly obvious: I think an…
In May 1957, England came up against the Republic of Ireland at Wembley and won 5-1. Within two years, one in four of the players on show would be dead. Tommy Taylor, Roger Byrne, Liam Whelan died in the Munich crash of February 1958 and Duncan Edwards succumbed to his injuries shortly afterwards. But it…
There was a period in the early 1980s when the great clubs of England’s industrial cities gave way to smaller clubs from quieter places. Southampton, Ipswich, Norwich, Watford and Luton all had their great days between Clough’s first European Cup and the end of the Falklands Conflict. To this south-eastern boy, they were home teams,…
There was a period in the early 1980s when the great clubs of England’s industrial cities gave way to smaller clubs from quieter places. Southampton, Ipswich, Norwich, Watford and Luton all had their great days between Clough’s first European Cup and the end of the Falklands Conflict. To this south-eastern boy, they were home teams,…