Overpaid prima donnas

[sheffield exile1]

80 years ago today footballers began joining the 30 years old "Association of footballer players and trainers union" in large numbers. Public attention had previously focussed on players being "highly paid young men with vile tempers and rough habits on the field". However a wages scandal had caused more than 2,800 to be thrown on the scrap heap during the summer months of1937 with only 1,861 retained by clubs. The employers pointed to an entertainment tax, heavily draining their income, which had badly affected clubs in the third division north and south. Players union secretary James Fay said there was"tons of money in the game to pay the lads a decent wage. For all that some people care players can starve throughout the summer". Northern clubs tended to offer out-of-season wages of about half the pay of a skilled engineering worker on £3 per week. The FA had defined this as a reasonable wage and clubs often linked this to an offer in the next season of £4 per week. Sliding scales applied whereby teams were ranked by performance. After Jimmy Hill became  a key figure in the unions leadership and it affiliated to the TUC, a campaign against the maximum wage (by then £20) succeded in 1961.  The union had by then become the Profesional Footballers Association, which, after a period outside the TUC, reaffiliated in 1995.

[BobG]

Modern footballers owe Jimmy Hill a helluva lot. That guy was a visionary. Even better, he knew how to make things happen too.

Did you know that 3 points for a win was Jimmy Hill's idea? To get teams to be less defensive.

BobG

[not on facebook]

When I was younger kids my age would look upto footballers and worship a certian footballer from your team.

You would have  pictures of said footballer up on your wall as he was your hero your god you looked up to him.

You looked upto him > is the sole reason why I have not pushed my two lads into football today as one don't play it and the youngest is just started to start playing it > and that's after taking him to rovers v blackpool.

I don't want my kids looking upto any professional footballer in today's game as they will only be dissapointed

[RedJ]

They could do worse than to look up to a man like James Coppinger, by all accounts.

Not a saint, but like George Friend, the kind of bloke you'd want your daughter bringing home.

[RoversAlias]

I was gonna say, if you get them to look up to the likes of George Friend, then you won't go far wrong. Easier for them to latch on to Messi, Ronaldo, Bale et al but it's doable.

Then again when I was a kid I looked up to Jamie Paterson, quite literally as he decked a Southport player right in front of me whilst I was ball boy for the night. True role model!

[NickDRFC]

I was gonna say, if you get them to look up to the likes of George Friend, then you won't go far wrong. Easier for them to latch on to Messi, Ronaldo, Bale et al but it's doable.

Then again when I was a kid I looked up to Jamie Paterson, quite literally as he decked a Southport player right in front of me whilst I was ball boy for the night. True role model!

You must have been pretty small as a kid to "look up" to Paterson, all 4 foot nothing of him!

[phil old leake]

Jimmy hill was a visionary.  I can't remember what club he managed at the time but he upset all the squad by training in an afternoon so that their bodies became accustomed to working hard at 3 o'clock. This meant that they couldn't train in the morning and toss it off on the golf course in the afternoon.  Nowadays he'd be called a genius for such forward thinking

[acko]

The talk of Jimmy Hill takes me back to a cup game Rovers played at Belle Vue against Fulham,all the talk and papers was all about the late great Jonney Haynes Rovers must keep the eye on him.They did Jimmy Hill scored 5 nobody mentioned him.

[Wiltshire Exile]

Jimmy hill was a visionary.  I can't remember what club he managed at the time but he upset all the squad by training in an afternoon so that their bodies became accustomed to working hard at 3 o'clock. This meant that they couldn't train in the morning and toss it off on the golf course in the afternoon.  Nowadays he'd be called a genius for such forward thinking

Managed Coventry City

[RobTheRover]

I was gonna say, if you get them to look up to the likes of George Friend, then you won't go far wrong. Easier for them to latch on to Messi, Ronaldo, Bale et al but it's doable.

Then again when I was a kid I looked up to Jamie Paterson, quite literally as he decked a Southport player right in front of me whilst I was ball boy for the night. True role model!

You must have been pretty small as a kid to "look up" to Paterson, all 4 foot nothing of him!

I used to love it when he would talk to refs and behind their backs do a big "clockwork winding up" motion for the fans to see.  Hilarious

[RoversAlias]

I was gonna say, if you get them to look up to the likes of George Friend, then you won't go far wrong. Easier for them to latch on to Messi, Ronaldo, Bale et al but it's doable.

Then again when I was a kid I looked up to Jamie Paterson, quite literally as he decked a Southport player right in front of me whilst I was ball boy for the night. True role model!

You must have been pretty small as a kid to "look up" to Paterson, all 4 foot nothing of him!

I was only about 9 or 10 tbf!

[Herbert Anchovy]

Jimmy hill was a visionary.  I can't remember what club he managed at the time but he upset all the squad by training in an afternoon so that their bodies became accustomed to working hard at 3 o'clock. This meant that they couldn't train in the morning and toss it off on the golf course in the afternoon.  Nowadays he'd be called a genius for such forward thinking

Managed Coventry City

Am I right in thinking that he's one of the few people to be a player, manager, chairman and administrator (as well as TV pundit and linesman of course!)?

[BobG]

That match against Fulham at BV saw the oft repeated shout from the terraces that my dad told me at least 5 times every season: after Jimmy scored his fifth some wag yelled out "Get that bloody billy goat off the pitch!"

He really was a visionary though. All sorts of things are down to him.

He had a cracking house just outside Coventry too - just off the road to Kenilworth. I used to see it quite regularly as it was down a small country lane very close to Warwick University and I used to go down that lane a fair bit.

And yes, Herbert, I think he was actually tea boy at one point at the SkyBlues too! (Actually I don't know if he played for them tbh. He's known for playing for Fulham though).

BobG

[idler]

I thought that in his first season he was player manager for them but I could be wrong.

[sheffield exile1]

Visionaries innovators, all in their own way, come along in eras. Herbert Chapman lured from Huddersfield after successive league titles to Arsenal, Alf Ramsey to the England job. Graham Taylor and John Beck oops!