Posts Tagged ‘England Player’

Viv Anderson wants tribute for pioneer Wharton

Viv Anderson, the first black England player, talks about the campaign to commemorate Arthur Wharton, British football’s first black professional

Born in Jamestown, Gold Coast – now part of Accra, Ghana – in 1865, Arthur Wharton should be one of football’s most iconic names. As well as a fine cricketer and the 100 yard dash world record holder, he was recognised as England’s best goalkeeper, playing for Darlington, Preston, Rotherham and Sheffield United. He was also the world’s first black professional footballer.

But after retiring Wharton disappeared from public life. He fell into destitution and alcoholism, died in 1930 and was buried in an unmarked grave – and today is still little known. But a campaign to celebrate his life by raising funds for a statue in Darlington has gathered momentum, winning backing from stars including Stevie Wonder. It also has the support of England 2018 World Cup bid ambassador Viv Anderson – the first black man to win a full England cap.

What do you make of Wharton’s story?

VA: Finding out about him was a real surprise. When I was growing up Clyde Best was virtually the only black British face you saw on television, and yet here was this guy, a century before, who’d already achieved so much. When I saw the exhibition on him at the National Football Museum I was totally flabbergasted. I couldn’t believe he’s barely heard of today after achieving so much. And you’d think I’d be one of the first to know about him. There’s a connection between us that will never be broken. He was the first black professional and I was the first to win a full cap. I’m honoured to be associated with him.

How did you become involved in the statue campaign?

The organiser, Shaun Campbell, made contact, and I said yes straight away. When you look at people like Ashley Cole today, they owe so much to Arthur. His story is incredible. When you think he came over in the 1880s, at the height of the Empire, to a small north-east town like Darlington, he must have been in for a rude awakening – but he seems to have won everyone over. He was quite a character by all accounts: pulling down the crossbar so the ball flew over, catching the ball with his legs, running upfield and scoring.

And for him to be a goalkeeper shows what a pioneer he was. A hundred years on and all the black players were flair players, like Cyrille Regis and Clyde Best. I was unusual being a defender – but Arthur was ahead of the game all those years ago.

Many say he should have played for England. Do you think racism stopped that?

I think it was probably more a novelty to have a black face back then so I doubt it was overt racism, as in someone openly saying: “You can’t play because you’re black.” I’d guess it was about ignorance.

How big a deal was it when you won your first cap back in 1978?

Very big. I had letters from the Queen and Elton John and people like that. Laurie Cunningham had won the first Under-21 cap but I got the first full cap and was very proud. But really, I was just this skinny kid from Nottingham who wanted to play for his country, just like anyone else. I was a bit cocooned from it really. It’s now, 30 years later, when you get cabbies and people in the street coming up to you that you’re aware of just how big it was.

At the 2018 bid launch a BNP councillor turned up. How damaging was that?

We’ve got a free country and people can have those views – even if I don’t think we need people in this country with those views. Britain is a proud multiracial society and I think our World Cup bid will reflect that. And Arthur’s story is an important part of that English football culture, and he should be more celebrated. It’s right that we should have a statue in Darlington. I think it’s where he’d want it. Darlington is where he made his name: the people there took him to their hearts.

More on the campaign: arthurwharton.com

Milan interested in repeating loan deal for Beckham

• England player could be headed for a second spell in Serie A
• 2010 World Cup hopes rest on a return to European football

Milan are keen to take David Beckham back on loan from Los Angeles Galaxy in January, his spokesman said today while the England midfielder was on international duty. “Milan have publicly expressed an interest in taking David on a loan move similar to this year but there is no further news to add at this stage,” he said.

Beckham won back his England place during a loan stint at the Serie A club in the second half of last season. The England manager, Fabio Capello, has said he must return to Europe to have any hope of playing at the 2010 World Cup.

Benítez ‘can’t complain’ about Barry

• Liverpool ‘took signing for granted’
• O’Neill will resist bid for Ashley Young

Martin O’Neill believes that Rafael Benítez can have no complaints over Gareth Barry’s decision to move to Manchester City rather than Anfield because, according to the Aston Villa manager, Liverpool never made an inquiry for the England player at the end of last season despite being aware of the £12m asking price.

Benítez remains furious with Barry for opting to join City last month, with the Liverpool manager claiming that the wages on offer in Manchester – the 28-year-old is understood to be earning around £130,000-a-week – were the sole motivation for his decision. O’Neill, however, has revealed Liverpool failed to submit an offer and, though “surprised” at Barry’s choice of club, suggested that Benítez had taken the signing of the midfielder for granted.

“I had said to Gareth’s agent before that we were not going to have the same debacle as last year and that they were perfectly at liberty to speak to, I assumed, the top four teams,” said O’Neill. “Liverpool were aware of the price that we were asking if that was the case. Liverpool did not contact us directly at all in this matter and never offered any money for him so you get the impression that, eventually, it was a straight choice.

“I’m not protecting anybody here,” continued the Villa manager. “I was a bit surprised that Gareth mentioned about the Champions League [before] going [to City] – that’s people’s prerogative. But Liverpool had not put a bid in and we hadn’t heard anything from them. There was an agent working supposedly on their behalf but no offer had been forthcoming and Gareth left. If he wanted to leave, that was up to him. Where he went to was obviously a bit of a surprise.”

Asked whether he thought Liverpool took it for granted that Barry was going to move to Anfield, O’Neill replied: “They may well have done.” Liverpool are also believed to be interested in signing Ashley Young but O’Neill will strongly resist any approach for the England player. Benítez is reported to be preparing a £20m offer for the 24-year-old but Villa’s valuation is £10m higher and even then the Midlands club would be reluctant to part with their most valuable asset.

O’Neill, who watched an under-strength Villa side defeat Peterborough 3-0 on Saturday, is hopeful that he can add to the squad before Villa get their preparations for the Peace Cup under way with their first training session in Spain on Thursday. O’Neill, whose only signing hitherto is Stewart Downing from Middlesbrough, is continuing to pursue Sylvain Distin, though a fee has yet to be agreed with Portsmouth. His other priority is to fill the sizeable hole left by Barry’s departure.

“We are looking for immediate replacements for the likes of Martin Laursen and Gareth and we’re pressing on with that,” he added. “We have inquired about quite a number of people and, of the ones that we would like in, I couldn’t tell you that we would have anybody in by Thursday. It would be fantastic to have somebody by Thursday, but if not, it doesn’t mean that I can’t travel back and sort things out. In an ideal world I would like people in at least fortnight before the Premiership. But a week in advance would be no major problem.”

Capello’s authority is paying dividends

England’s coach comes across as stern and cool but the players like him and it shows in their results

A former Soviet republic with a hardline president was an ideal setting to observe Fabio Capello’s authoritarian style of leadership and the lasting impression from England’s faltering first 40 minutes in Kazakhstan is of managerial fury.

Capello’s gesticulations are imported performance art. The gushes of anger through a generally clenched body yield a rich array of arm-throwing gestures that leave his players in no doubt of his displeasure. By the end England had cruised to a sixth consecutive victory towards qualifying for next year’s South Africa World Cup but not before Capello had bullied a team whose weariness was more forgivable than their positional indiscipline.

The England coach had told his team to “expect” a Kazakh assault fuelled by patriotic fervour. John Terry’s men confessed to having slept badly in Almaty on account of a five-hour time-lag. The Kazakh dervish was their unwanted alarm call. It found Glen Johnson (right-back) dozing and Ashley Cole (left-back) sleepwalking too far forward when the manager expected him to be in defensive lock-down mode. Gareth Barry was evidently dreaming of Manchester City. Capello let them all know it with a succession of convulsions that threatened to detach his hands from his wrists.

So fierce was his rebuke to Cole that “Cashley” fired a few words back at the bench, the first known case of an England player defying the bespectacled martinet. The coach’s point was that England should weather Kazakhstan’s enthusiasm from sound defensive positions and then assume control of the game. Instead they appeared intent on fighting fire with fire from an advanced position and were surrendering possession far too frequently for an Italian’s taste.

“In the first half I was disappointed with the position of some of our players. It was impossible to get my message across,” Capello reported. On the surface these fiery exchanges between an aficionado of order and a team who have been specialists in chaos in tournaments will leave no mark in the annals of long-haul travel. It did, though, point to Capello’s enduring belief that English players cannot always be trusted to apply strong tactical thinking to high-pressure moments. His brand of supervision is the polar opposite of that practised by Sven-Goran Eriksson and Steve McClaren.

Laissez-faire has been scratched out of his dictionary. It was the gravy smell of Football Association largesse that drew him to London but he is not the sort to scoop up easy money without giving effort in return. England have now struck 20 times in six qualifiers. Wayne Rooney, who was often semi-detached under the old regime, has scored eight in six outings and has become one of Capello’s lieutenants on the field. When Shaun Wright-Phillips was midway through a cameo of extraordinary carelessness, in the second-half, it was Rooney who applied the flamethrower of collective disgust.

“The manager is a strong manager and none of us want to let him down,” said Rooney before the game. This is one of the more significant statements of Capello’s reign and not just because Rooney is finally finding his natural voice (his declaration last week that the middle is his best position was unusually bold, given that it was bound to be painted as a memo to Sir Alex Ferguson). Jonny Wilkinson used to say the same about Martin Johnson when English rugby was in its pomp. Some players, especially English ones, prefer to be told what to do, provided the results suggest the dictator is blessed with wisdom as well as strength.

Described as “surly” and uncommunicative by Chelsea’s Carlo Ancelotti last week, Capello certainly conforms to a model of loftiness that most of the Champions League regulars seem to like. They know he has unlocked the potential of this England squad by finding a coherent tactical shape and imposing the more professional tone of a big club striding into a major Champions League tie.

But he is colder, more brutal, in his touchline urgings than even Rafa Benítez. Cole’s indignant reaction to one of his barrages reminded us that these one-man corporations are not infinitely receptive to being treated as unruly toddlers. It is natural for Capello to stop a training session to berate his players or grab one by the shoulders to illustrate a point. For FA grandees this has become something of spectator sport.

The enemy now, after England have increased their haul to 21 points, against Andorra on Wednesday, is complacency in the home games with Croatia and Belarus and the visit to Ukraine. Capello’s eruptions in Almaty say he is alive to this risk. He is the jockey who knows he is on a horse that has to be flogged all the way to the line.

Redknapp admits he wanted to sign Barry

• Redknapp says Spurs ‘could not get near’ City’s bid
• Manager believes Manchester City could win league soon

The Tottenham Hotspur manager, Harry Redknapp, has revealed he wanted to sign Gareth Barry before the England midfielder joined Manchester City from Aston Villa for £12m this week.

“This week, I tried to sign Gareth Barry,” Redknapp told The Sun. “I felt he would be a good addition for Spurs and I knew we had to make a decent offer for a top England player. Liverpool were also prepared to make a big offer but we have both been blown out of the water by Manchester City. They offered a far bigger transfer fee and are giving the lad much bigger wages. We could not get near.”

Barry became the first of what is expected to be a clutch of big-money City signings this summer and Redknapp believes their financial clout could help them win the Premier League title before long. “It wouldn’t surprise me if they won the title quite soon as they seem to have more money than everybody else.”

Redknapp also hit out at the money in football, saying: “While I benefit from a good wage, I’m embarrassed about it, to be honest. A lot of people in football are embarrassed.”