Speaking terms: Amby Fogarty and Charlie Hurley in the Republic of Ireland side against Sweden in 1959
Yesterday’s blog supposed that I’d never met “King” Charlie Hurley, who died this week, but had twice interviewed Sunderland’s player of the 20th century – Charlie patient, entertaining, obliging – on the telephone.
Former Brandon United chairman Bill Fisher recalls differently. “What about our sportsmen’s dinner at the Three Tuns in Durham in 1989?”
Oh aye.
Charlie appeared with former Sunderland team mate and fellow Republic of Ireland international Ambrose Fogarty, jointly paid £1,000 – the lion’s share to the former skipper – and says Bill, the King was worth every penny.
“As well as being a great footballer he was also a gentleman” adds Bill – and so greatly appreciated that he was subsequently invited to a talk-in at Brandon’s clubhouse.
“Charlie did his talk and then went around every table chatting to the fans. People couldn’t believe how friendly he was.”
The evening was summed up in one local’s reflection. “I would have queued up for hours to meet and greet Charlie but didn’t need to. The bugger came and sat next to me. I simply couldn’t believe it.”
*That 1989 dinner, and Amby Fogarty’s bit part in it, had also been recalled in my Northern Echo column back in 2016 – King Charlie somewhat improbably described as “a sort of London Irish Tommy Cooper”.
Among much else, he’d observed that you never saw a great goalkeeper who was good looking. “Look at Monty, look at Southall, you wouldn’t want to kiss them, would you?”
Amby Fogarty proved a man of altogether fewer words. Bill, the evening’s MC, introduced him and sat down. “My backside had barely tocuhed the chair before Amby was back on the chair next to me” he recalled.
“He said something about everyone had come to see Charlie, not him, and that was about it. He was an Irishman not possessed of the gift of the gab.”
Fogarty scored 37 goals in 152 Football League appearances for Sunderland, moved to Hartlepool (under Brian Clough) in 1963 and made the last of his 11 Eire appearances while at the Vic, the first – and last? – player to win full international honours with Pools.
He later managed both Cork Hibernian and Cork Celtic – Charlie’s home city – and guided Athlone Town to a still-remembered UEFA Cup goalless draw against AC Milan. He died in 2016, aged 82.
*We’d supposed Charlie Hurley’s Ireland debut to have been in a 1-0 World Cup qualifying defeat against England in 1957. The match was right, the score wrong. It was 1-1 and there are old men among the record 47,600 Dalymount Park crowd (receipts £11,750) who still wistfully talk about it.
Needing a draw to make a play-off, Eire led in the third minute, Alf Ringstead firing past Sheffield United team mate Alan Hodgkinson. So the score remained until injury time when, from a Tom Finney cross, John Atyeo of Bristol City headed the equaliser which sent England to the finals in Sweden.
“The goal turned a day of glory into Stygian darkness” reported the Irish Independent (with thanks to blog reader John Briggs). “Never has a score been received in stonier silence and never has a draw tasted so like defeat.”
Another report was terser yet: “The silence could be heard on O’Connell Street.”
The Irish side included Liam Whelan of Manchester United and Arthur Fitzimons, who had ten years with Midlesbrough between 1949-59, hitting 49 goals in 223 appearances in later seasons in partnership with Brian Clough.
As Brian Hird sombrely points out, Whelan and four of the England team – Roger Byrne, Duncan Edwards, David Pegg and Tommy Taylor – died in the Munich air disaster a few months later.
*Tony Jones, also among those greatly appreciated card-marking readers, had particular reason to remember England’s late equaliser. Now in Newcastle but an exiled west country man, Tony knew that it was John Atyeo’s fifth goal in six England appearances – and that he was never picked again.
“That he never played in the first division probably didn’t help him” Tony concedes, but Atyeo went on to break City records for both appearances and goals.
The Republic of Ireland team pictures in yesterday’s blog was (back) Pat Saward, Ronnie Nolan, Seamus Dunne, Tommy Goodwin, Charlie Hurley, Noel Cantwell (Front) Alf Ringstead, Liam Whelan, Dermot Curtis, Arthur Fitzsimons, Joe Haverty.
Grass Routes 