Soldiers join the crowd at the Boleyn, its September the second and the country is on tenterhooks preparing for possible war, The Germans had invaded Poland and Britains prime minister, Neville Chamberlain, had issued Hitler a last ultimatum, withdraw or face war.
Around the country though the usual Saturday trip to football continued, and at Upton Park West Ham faced Leicester City in what was a Division 2 league game, it was actually the last Division 2 game played that season as the very next day war was declared and all current football leagues were stopped.
West Hams last pre war team that day were
Harry Medhurst,
Charlie Bicknell,
Ted Fenton,
Charlie Walker,
Richard Walker,
Joe Cockroft,
Stan Burton,
Archie, Macaulay,
Cliff Hubbard,
Len Gouldon,
Jackie Wood.
West Ham lost the game, played in front of 13,400 fans, 2-0. Their first defeat after winning the two previous games, away to Plymouth and then home 2-1 against Fulham.
Football didn’t resume until late October with the league re-organised into a regional competition.
The season would end in glory for the hammers though by winning the War cup at Wembley., defeating Leicester as it happens on the way
Newspaper reports of the game show that West Ham were the dominant team in the game, with England international Len Gouldon performing on the wing
Christmas 1967 and West Ham face Leicester in two games over the festive period that were packed with goals, mainly by 1 player but also we see perhaps the start of a legendary career as a young academy graduate score for the first time.
That season the hammers had a indifferent start to the season before slumping down to the lower reaches of the table hanging around the bottom three for a period in November and into December but in the last game before christmas with goals by Billy Bonds and Brian Dear, West Ham managed to defeat rivals Spurs 2-1 at the Boleyn to start a run of 6 wins in 7 games with the only defeat in that time away to Manchester United.
GAME 1
Boxing Day 1967
The Beatles were No 1 with Hello, Goodbye as the hammers welcomed Leicester to the Boleyn to witness the first of the two games with the team that day
Bobby Ferguson, Billy Bonds, Frank Lampard, Martin Peters, John Cushly, Bobby Moore, Brian Dear, Ronnie Boyce, Trevor Brooking, Geoff Hurst and John Sissons
The 26,000 in attendance that day were treated to to great spectacle as Dear grabbed himself a hat-trick, his second of the season after he grabbed 5 V West Brom earlier in the season, the other Hammers goal was grabbed by 19 year old Trevor Brooking, scoring his first ever goal for the club in his first season as a first team player in only his 8th start for the club.
As was the tradition back then it wouldn't be long till the clubs met again in the league, in fact it was just 4 days
Game 2
Dec 30 1967
The same two teams met at Filbert St but this time the Match of the Day cameras were on hand to record the game, which was played in poring rain.
In typical West Ham fashion the good start in the first half, Brooking scoring again with his second goal for the club, was undone by two Leicester goals leaving the Hammers training 2-1 at half time.
In the second half that all changed as a header from the man of the moment Brian Dear put the teams level, then next the foxes young keeper, a certain Peter Shilton 29 years before he joined the hammers, would be left embarrassed as the ball squirms through him into the goal direct from a John Sissons corner.
Brian Dear completed the victory with his second of the game and fifth against Leicester in 4 days and those two victories pushed the hammers up the table away from the relegation places, a trend that continued in the second half of the season as West Ham managed to finish in a respectable 12th place.
The video below is the goals from the second game with David Coleman providing the commentary.
As this week the hammers face old rivals spurs for the last time at the Boleyn and with the sad news this week of of his health problems its perhaps fitting that we look at Jimmy Greaves, a Hero to some, but a legend of the English game. Born in 1940 within earshot of the Boleyn Ground, Hitlers blitz put paid to him being brought up in Manor Park where he was born, instead after his parents house was flattened just 6 weeks after Jimmys Febuary birthday and they were moved out to Dagenham, an area that would prove to be a rich training ground for football in the 60's. While being East london of birth it seems though West Ham was not his club of choice as a kid, infant Jimmy says while he did visit Upton Park at times, he preferred the local non-league scene of the time which in the 50's could attract crowds numbering in the thousands for big local games. Jimmy was also a school boy star at football, playing for both London, and Essex School boys and soon the scouts of London's top clubs would be looking to sign him, though both spurs and the hammers showed an interest it was Chelsea who won his signature signing for them in 1955, the same year the Blues, with future hammers manager Ron Greenwood, would win the first division championship. Jim broke into their team as a 17 year old in 1957 making his debut against Spurs, scoring in a 1-1, he managed an amazing 124 goals in 157 games before going AC Milan in 1961. Milan was short lived but 9 goals in 12 games showed his quality, but homesick and with stories of him escaping out of windows in Hotels to try get away, Spurs soon came in for him and ended his misery in Italy. At Tottenham is safe to say the word Legend is not over doing it, 220 goals in just over 300 league games in 9 years in North London, before he finally came back home, to the East End, to join his best mate Bobby Moore at West Ham in the March of 1970. His first game for the Hammers came away at
Manchester City and as he had done for every club /team he had debuted for Jim scored on his debut, in fact netting twice in a 5-1 victory against the blue half of Manchester. greaves played 6 games at the end of the 69/70 season scoring 4 goals in total, so it seems he had lost none of his goal scoring exploits. The first game of season 70/71 would see his first return to White Hart Lane since his departure in the March, and true to form he delivered a goal for the Hammers in a 2-2 draw. The goals were now getting harder for him though, only 2 in October and again only 2 in December showed a poor tally for the formerly prolific goalscorer. What was not known to the outside world was Jim was descending into Alcoholism. In the January of 1971 West Ham faced Blackpool away in a F.A Cup game, the game was in doubt and after Greaves and Booby Moore had a chance meeting with BBC camera men in the hotel they were informed the pitch was so frozen they doubted the game would be played, and so Greaves and Moore, together with Brian Dear and the youngster Clyde Best they decamped to Boxer Brian London's night club on the Blackpool sea front. How much they drank is disputed, Best was tee total so only had orange Juice, but the other three still did take in Alcohol, Three hours they spent in the club before retreating back to the Hotel. In the morning the pitch was declared fit to play and with the four all playing West Ham were outplayed, out fought and out of the cup 4-0. To put the result into context, Blackpool had just been promoted into the top division but were rock bottom and had just sacked their manager who would not save them from the impending relegation. For one West Ham fan though who made the journey the defeat was bitter, especially as he had seen the four players and the physio Rob Jenkins in the nightclub, that fan confronted Ron Greenwood on the Monday after at the Boleyn and next day the press had their teeth into the story. Greenwood wanted to sack all 5, the board though bulked at that fault, Dear though would go while the rest received suspensions. Bobby Moore would later comment years later of his treatment "I had claret-and-blue blood, but I could never forgive the club for the way they treated me" After a month out the team, Jimmy returned v Coventry away scoring in a 1-0 win but again his goals were too few and far apart, in fact just 3 more were added to his tally taking his season tally to 9 in 30 games, not anywhere near his usual prolific tallies in previous seasons, and so aged just 31 Jimmy Greaves retired from professional top flight football. 366 top flight goals in just over 500 games leaves him as the country greatest top flight goalscorer, in fact he is Europe's greatest top flight goalscorer with Lionel Messi still 60 goals behind him. He is also England's 4th all time greatest goalscorer with 44 goals though his came in just 57 games Jimmy Greaves West Ham record stands at 13 goals from 38 games, and his time with us is looked at as disappointing but in comparison Dean Ashton scored 15 in 46 games and is looked at as a hero of the club. Greaves conquered his alcohol problems and managed to forge a career on the TV for years though sadly last year he suffered a massive stroke and is now wheelchair bound with severe impaired speech. The future for him does not look great and he needs constant care hopefully the English football family will rally round to support him in his hour of need to help England's greatest goalscorer
May the 14th 1977 As Bobby Moore waved goodbye to his football career, walking off after his last league game for Fulham v Blackburn Rovers, it wasn't to be his final farewell to playing football as the summer before he had spent a season in the burgeoning soccer scene in the United States where he played in Texas for the San Antonio Thunder.
San Antonio played at the Alamo stadium and Moore appeared 24 times, for the Thunder including another match up against his old friend Pele as they beat the New York Cosmos 1-0, with Bobby setting up the winning goal.
The season though was not a success as their stats show that they may have won 12 games but they lost 12 as well with no draws, though at that time in the NASL there were no tied game, extra time was played then a shoot off was held to decide any games with level scores.
They finished 4th in the league, with 107 points (don't ask) failing to make the playoffs and with only an average crowd of 4,700, which was only 300 more than the season before the writing was on the wall for the club.
Sadly at the end of the 1976 after just 2 seasons of existence the franchise was moved to Hawaii and renamed Team Hawaii and with it it seems Moore's journey in America.
While with San Antonio though Bobby had 1 more international tournament to appear in, to celebrate the two hundredth year of independence of the U.S of A, a 4 team competition was organised with England Italy Brazil and a North american soccer League representative team called Team America.
The format was simple, each team played the three others with Some of the best stars of the NASL pulled on the red Jersey and swore allegiance (temporarily) to the cause
and so on May the 31st at Philadelphia's JFK stadium Bobby Moore led his Team America out against his beloved England, who were captained by QPR's Gerry Francis. The mercenaries though were out done by Revies England, wearing a strange Yellow kit for the only time, with England running out 3-1 winners (Keegan 2 T.Francis) and finishing runners up in the tournament to Brazil. Team America lost every game and would never appear again.
After his summer sojourn in Texas Moore was back at Fulham for what would be his last season yet he was not finished in America and a full year since his last game at Blackburn, and nearly 20 years since his debut for West Ham he joined Seattle Sounders for the summer of 1978.
Why Seattle, well probably the fact that his former hammers teamates Bobby Howe and Harry Redknapp were assisting the manager, Jimmy Gabriel. Seattle had reached the championship final the year before losing out to Pele's New York Cosmos and attracted good crowds, over 22,000 regularly, so in 1978 the fans were looking forward to another successful season and possibly so was Moore, but unlike his ever present season at the Thunder in Texas he managed just the 5 games, one of them again against the New York Cosmos with Seattle losing out 2-1. Strangely for Moore he didn't wear the number 6 shirt he has become so synonymous with but the number 9
Moore also appeared for the Jimmy Hill owned franchise of Detroit Express in a friendly in Austria alongside his great friend George Best, best scoring in a 2-2 draw.
And so it seems that would be the end of Bobby Moore the footballer but there was one more stop to come,in 1983 joining up with Ex Fulham pal Rodney Marsh at Carolina Lightnin, a minor league team in Charlotte North Carolina, Moore, now 42, was his assistant on the coaching team but one night it seems injuries to the team meant for one last time in a competitive game, Bobby Moore put on his boots, crossed the white line and rolled back the years. in an interview with an american magazine, one opposition player on the night described how he found himself up against a world legend. Glenn Davis was a rookie that summer with the ASL’s Pennsylvania Stoners and recalled his shock at finding Moore in the American Soccer League i
“Carolina had so many injuries they activated Bobby Moore to play that night against us. Bobby was probably 43 years old and he obviously can’t move. He’s kicking everything and everybody that he can get close to. And we’re just going “Oh my God – it’s Bobby Moore.”
I remember we had a 2-0 lead and we absolutely crumbled in the final ten minutes with their fans going nuts. They had probably about 7,000 or 8,000 fans in this cool little stadium in Charlotte. I think it was called the Memorial Stadium. We totally collapsed as a team and lost 3-2. I remember our owner on the bus back to the hotel and screaming at one of our players. I think a lot of us were just still in shock that Bobby Moore was playing that night.”
Moore and Marsh Carolina Lightnin
Its quite possible that the above picture is from the last competitive that Bobby Moore played in, Carolina had a poor season in 1983 but with the heyday of soccer is the U.S long over the ASL folded and so ended Moore's time in the states. He returns to England where he takes over at Southend United for 2 seasons. success eluded him there as well and professional football closed its door on him in 1986 when the Shrimpers languishing in the fourth tier of english football let him go.
Alan Taylor is a player that will live on forever in the clubs history though his best remembered exploits were sandwiched into 2 months and none of the games were at The Boleyn.
Signed from Rochdale in November 1974 by John Lyall, who was in his first season as team manager after Ron Greenwood had moved upstairs, his career for the Hammers initially was stop start making 3 sub appearances in the December all from the bench, in fact his first game in the starting 11 came in the F.A cup sixth round at Highbury on the 8th March 1975 and here Alan scores his first two goals for the club to put the hammers into the Semi-final.
Alan was lucky to even appear for West Ham in that seasons cup competition as just before leaving Rochdale he suffered an injury that ruled him out of the First round proper of the tournament, leaving Rochdale the week after the game he missed out on being cup tied for his new club.
The first semi-final against Ipswich was a dull 0-0 draw played out at Villa Park and just 4 days later the teams met again at Stamford Bridge where the hammers triumphed 2-1 with again both goals being scored by the Hinckley born striker, sending the us to Wembley for the first time in 10 years and to a meeting with the clubs favourite son Bobby Moore, who was seeing out his career at Fulham. They had defeated Birmingham City the same night 1-0 with a 120th minute winning goal from John Mitchell.
Taylor would see out the season in the first team but failed to score in the league again as the club geared up for its third wembley F.A cup final appearance and yet on the 3rd of May in the Final Alan Taylor stamped his place into Hammers History with both goals to secure the trophy again after first winning it in 1964.
To think that just barely 6 months before was turning out in the basement of English football in front of crowds around the 3,000 mark and his season ended in front of 100,000 at wembley and in front of millions around the world watching.
The next season was saw Alan find his scoring boots hitting the ground running scoring 5 goals in the first three games of that season, including both away to Liverpool at Anfield in a 2-2 draw and by the end of the year he had hit 12 in total with another winning goal against Arsenal at the Boleyn in that total. 1975 turned into 1976 and West Ham were on another cup run this time though in Europe as they attempted to win the Cup Winners Cup for the second time but Alans goals were getting fewer and fewer though he did score against the Dutch outfit Den Haag as west Ham turned a 4-2 1st leg deficit into a away goals victory after a 3-1 victory at home to move into the Semi-Final.
Alan missed the semi-final victory and only made the bench for the final v Anderlecht in Belgium but with Frank Lampard sustaining an Injury in the first half Alan came on but the locals ran out winners 4-2 with future Hammer Frankie Van Der Elst being the star player.
Though ending in disappointment that first full season would be Alan's best for the club scoring a total of 17 goals in all competitions in 47 appearances finishing top scorer at the club for the only time, the next seasons were not the best for West Ham nor Alan injuries and form meant he was in and out of the team evident by the fact that in his first 18months at the club he made 44 league appearances scoring 15 times, but yet in the next 3 years after he managed just another 44 league games scoring just 10 goals.
On the 5th of May 1979 almost 4 years to the day of his finest game Alan played his last game for the Hammers away to Blackburn Rovers, in the summer he left to join Norwich City but he lasted only a season and left to ply his trade in the American soccer league for Vancouver. Cambridge, Hull, Burnley and Bury were the next short stops on his travels before finally going back to the Canaries in 1988 for just 4 games where he finally retired, though he did play in the local Non League scene in East Anglia.
In retirement Alan has been a Milkman, ran his own Newsagents and worked as a pallbearer all around the Norwich area but he can also be found around the lounges of the Boleyn ground, wowing the fans with his rags to riches story and if i do say so myself he is also one of the nicest men you could wish to meet.
