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Lovely bloke. Bill used to live next door to me in Bessacarr, a house owned by Rovers. When he left John Flowers moved in, (whose wife became World Ladies Darts Champion). I read somewhere recently that their son was the ex keeper Tim Flowers - can anyone confirm this?
Our recent relegations from the Championship and L1, after appearing to be perfectly safe, have really scarred and scared all of us! Thus a Rovers history post to take our minds off what constitutes L1 safety. I didn't know until recently that two of my heroes, one a Rovers player/manager and one a politician, attended the same school during World War Two. Big Bill Leivers was Rovers manager when I first started attending BV regularly. He succeeded Oscar Hold as manager in the summer of 1964, and assembled the team that would win, with some skill and much elan, the 1965/66 D4 Championship. He had brought Coleman, Gilfillan, Sheffield, Nicholson, Watton, Kelly, Ricketts and Wylie to the club -- and one of those players, Bobby Gilfillan (what a lovely bloke) told me in the 80s that Leivers had been a great leader, manager, and a no-nonsense character. Unfortunately those attributes caused Big Bill to clash fiercely with the Rovers Board on many issues, but particularly when two Board members told him what players to pick -- so in February, 1966 Leivers quit the club in disgust -- just as his talented team started to challenge for promotion. I think Big Bill shared the same kind of bloody-mindedness (and high morals) demonstrated by one of my other heroes -- Dennis Skinner. Leivers and Skinner were born within a month of each other in Bolsover, Derbyshire in 1932. They were in the same year at Tupton Hall school in Clay Cross, which of course has long been the Beast of Bolsover's seat. I still love to see Dennis speak in the Commons -- at 86 a remarkable man in many ways. Dennis's old schoolmate, Big Bill, is also 86 and doing well, now living in Cornwall.PS -- we won't go down this season!
He was captain at Man City at one time.
Quote from: idler on April 09, 2018, 09:37:25 pmHe was captain at Man City at one time.He was in the City team that won the 1956 FA Cup, Idler; he may have been the captain that day, but I'm not sure.