Whatever happened to Albion’s heroes?
Wednesday 28th October 2009, 9:10AM GMT.
Albion’s Sporting Star columnist Neil Whitehouse ponders the lack of a West Brom talisman at The Hawthorns.
During the brief spell when Paul Thompson was Albion Chairman, I remember him saying that a football club can never stand still – it is either going forwards or backwards.
I always felt he never got the credit he deserved for getting the Albion moving forwards again.
Since his departure on the eve of our first Premiership season, Jeremy Peace has continued to move the club forwards despite our inability to sustain top flight football.
We have seen the continued improvement of The Hawthorns into a first class stadium, the development of excellent training facilities, the creation of a flourishing Academy and the establishment of a scouting network that I am told now means we can compete with the top clubs for young talent.
It would appear that in many areas, the club is still making progression.
But, for some reason, I have started to get the impression that the feel good factor that we have had in abundance amongst us during the past few seasons has just started to ebb away a little in the last couple of weeks.
Although the exchange between Jonas Olsson and a few of our fans at the end of the Coventry game was a minor isolated incident, it happened nonetheless and that comes as a surprise.
Hopefully, it is only a one off issue related to our recent dip in results and normal service will be resumed in the very near future.
What we must see is the continuation of the momentum we have built up over the last six or seven years both on and off the pitch because if that starts to falter, then it is easy for a club like ours to stop going forward.
Hopefully, the Chairman is astute enough to be aware of this when it comes to adding to the squad between now and the end of January.
But, maybe one other reason why our supporters have lost their voices a little is that we are missing a hero or a talisman at the moment.
During my years as a Baggies fan, for large periods we have thankfully had a player or players that have become focal points for support.
Mine started with Willie Johnston and then Johnny Giles.
There afterwards, my all time favourite Albion player is still Bryan Robson closely followed by Cyrille Regis that provided plenty of worship that took me through to the early eighties.
Our demise in the late eighties and early nineties corresponded with the lack of any terrace heroes although Don Goodman did his best for a short period to raise us.
For me, it wasn’t until Super Bob Taylor and Richard Sneekes came on the scene that the level of support gained strength again.
The likes of Lee Hughes, Darren Moore, Geoff Horsfield and Kevin Phillips were next in line to give us that focus but that all seems to have come to an abrupt end at present.
I am sure there are a few players I may have inadvertently missed for some fans but can anyone say there is any of our current squad that gets you out of your seat right now.
Where have all our heroes gone?
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my era doesnt go too far back its really around the Goodman days, with Tony Ford and Colin West, Then Peggy Ashcroft & Kevin Donovan joining us in our promotion at Wembley.
I think its because Albion now expect so much in this division that even a slight hiccup in results causes tension and then fans on tender hooks !! Lets hope we find a few heroes in the coming months to put out nerves to one side
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Trouble is we now have our own version of the “prawn sarnie” brigade…. “fans” who started to follow us when we first got promoted to the prem and who have enjoyed the roller coaster of fairly unbroken success since.
These fans seem to think its our right to be playing in the prem, and somehow its insulting to THEM if we don’t beat teams like coventry & Palace.
If you pay your money I guess you now have the right to insult your players, to shout personal and insulting remarks – and to be offended when a player has the “nerve” to stand up to you…..
For fans who remember bleaker times, or who are able to take a balanced view of results and who don’t think West brom owes them anything – its a worrying time.
I do agree that we need a “hero” on the pitch – either someone who is blood and thunder, or is tricky and skillful – and of course we need a goalscorer to focus the team…. Ollson is doing a great job at the back, but he hasn’t yet caught our imagination… maybe he needs a bloodied bandage round his head !!!!!
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I also think its harder to have heros in these times of such expectation and critisism…
I’m sure many of todays fans would have been dismayed at Big Cyrille’s lack of running in the channels or work off the ball, and would have berated Willie Johnson for taking on too many players.
Every player has bad games and every player has weaknesses – its just that in previous times I think fans were far more tolerant and prepared to forgive.
We remember the teams of 78-80 with such affection – however their failure in 2 FA cup semis plus failing to win the league (when they were the best team in the country) would have resulted in mass derission on forums such as this had they existed – better times I think.
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The feel good factor has dissapeared following the Middlesborough game since when the team has hit a bad patch. It looked for a time that the Albion and Newcastle would run away with the league , but several injuries and a lack of quality replacements has changed that for both clubs. As far as players to get us out of our seats Jerome Thomas is capable of that but is inconsistent and Roman Bednar has encountered a difficult period in his career and is not yet the player he was two years ago. Perhaps when Chris Brunt is fully fit an scoring his goals things may get better.
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Derek McInnes? (not sure about the spelling)
For guts and determination and some goals, Roman Bednar seems to be the fans favourite at the moment but I would suggest he is not in the same league as some of those you have mentioned.
The Talisman OR for me a real man of experience. A leader, is what what we are missing at the moment.
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Agree with point about heroes. Agree too that club has moved forward with Jeremy Peace. That movement has peaked now, and I fear that the lack of heroes is a sign of entering a period of decline.
Greatest heroes? My first one was goalie John Osbourne – forever getting knocked out during games, very brave, brilliant stopper and sadly underrated. But brilliant!
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Guys I have to say that im one of the few supporters of the big J Peace,eveyone talks about getting a new chairman in with loads of dosh,but who I ask ???,please remamber the start of last season when the club was put up for sale,nobody came in to make a serious offer ( or did they!!! )
Hero’s for me..
Steve Lilwall
Kawmi Ampadu
Andy Townsend
Micky Evans,,,,,the list goes on :-)
By the way ,when are we going to get a shirt sponsor ???
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Thanks Happy Baggie for giving me such a laugh this morning. The thought that the Hawthorns would ever be populated by the prawn sandwich brigade has conjured up some amazing images in my head that would make a good few old baggies fans turn in their graves.
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Good replies Happy and I agree about our ‘PL fans’ although I think there are also some who have been here longer and suffer selective amnesia.
I don’t know if you listen much to Talksport but you get, for example, the Arsenal fans ringing in. When they lose a couple Wenger is an idiot, good only for the sack. When they win a few he’s a mystical genius. I think there are a new breed of fans who have a limited attention span. They only see the present. If we win we’re great, if we lose, the only answer is to sack everyone and spend millions we haven’t got on new players.
Football is going to the dogs. It’s a business not a game with no place for the fans any more. The people running it think that tackling should be outlawed, while diving is part and parcel of the game. I dread to think what these message boards will be like in a few years time.
On the subject in hand. Like most, I love goalscorers like the King, Bomber, Cyrille, Superbob and tricky wingers like Chippy Clark, Willie and Laurie Cunningham. But I must admit I’ve always had a soft spot for the no nonsense tacklers. I started off as a lad, getting a place on the wall at the Smethwick End. Graham Williams was the left back and he looked like a short Superman as he looked after his territory, broad shoulders tapering in at the waist. Graham liked a tackle. He was replaced eventually by, to my mind the very under rated Ray Wilson, a converted left winger, who during our early European campaigns put many an unsuspecting fancy Dan continental over the advertising boards. If they tried swapping wings Dougie Fraser would be there to greet them, hard as nails, while in the middle was the indestructable Johnny Kaye. This was a golden age for my love of a good tackle. Then came the Wile and Robertson combo, Alan Brazil always mentions them first when he reminisces about CH’s. As Jeff mentioned, DM would fit very well in this company. I think Jonas Olsson would as well except for one thing. Hard men are being hounded out of the game.
As I said earlier, the game most of us know and love is fast becoming a distant memory. George Best was agenius, but he could look after himself. He regularly got kicked up in the air but rarely missed games through injury. Today’s players are over protected. It’s about time the people that rule football ask themselves why nearly every country in the world wants to watch British football not European football and instead of dragging our game down to their level, bring theirs up to ours.
BRING BACK TACKLING.
Rant over.
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BMW Baggie,
Steve Lilwall is a close friend of mine that has taken to teaching. I will pass on your words of praise to him I`m sure he will be chuffed.What about Michael Forsyth !! now working with Ferrari formula one team in the pits. Wow how life changes when you pack – up football.
BOING BOING
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9,The Real Bully Hoo
Great comments and the memories come flooding back,I grew up with that backline of Fraser,Talbut,Kaye & Williams,proper blokes who as you say liked a tackle.John Kaye lived next door to me through that golden era so he wasnt a hero, just Uncle John!!!
We all had our own hereos but we all had only one King.!!!
Bomber,Hope,Chippy Clarke,Ossie all Albion men, unfortunately in todays game players dont stay long enough to become heroes.
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Flourishing academy? How many players have we had come through? Jared Hodgekiss played a few games and went to scotland? Our stadium is fairly good but has recently been reduced. We lost our manager replaced by a guy with 1 years experience in a lower league, captain and most influential player in jonno and the club could not find anybody interested in being our main sponsor? Ticket prices are still high for the poor standard of football on offer and we do tend to have a high turn-over of players but keep the ones who embaress the club and deal drugs? Senior players gesturing to our moaning supporters for the last few years so with regards to Paul Thompson saying a club never stands still at the moment I feel we are very much going backwards on the pitch and we are stood still if not going backwards off it. Sad times when reminded of the glory years.
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Happy Baggie – you are so right, the level of expectation amongst some johnny newcomers has meant that a lot of the good feeling has been lost at the club.
As for heroes now, Jerome Thomas gets me out of my seat, but I don’t think he has a real affinity with the fans, Mulumbu could potentially be a favourite in time.
I agree with you HB – Williw Johnstone was my hero at the time and as for talisman, look no further than Tony Bomber Brown.
P.S – Did somebody mention Colin West earlier??? As a hero??? The best thing he ever did for this club was get sent off whilst playing for Swansea against us in the 92-93 play-off semi final for stamping on Ian Hamilton. Colin West was rubbish – no skill, no brains, rubbish.
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My all time favourite is the late Ronnie Allen.
Probably the best genuine two footed footballer I’ve ever seen. And as for versatile, centre forward, left winger, half-back, why I even saw him take the goalkeeping position when, I think it was Ray Potter got injured. This of course was decades before substitutes and teams comprising dancers and divers.
Tacklers? How about Maurice Setters and Charlie Drury,in his second coming in the first team, Sir Bobby at right half also knew how to tackle.
More recently the art of good hard, but fair, tackling seems to have died away. Is it that the skills are no longer there? Or is it the over fussy refs protecting the dancers and divers?
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11.
I was just about to say that Hodgkiss wasn’t from the academy and the oldest players coming through are now 18 years old when I realised it was you Shadrag. How do you choose your names (when you remember to change it that is) you Wally.
12 53.
Ronnie Allen was before my time, he was my Dad’s hero along with Ray Barlow. I met Ronnie at the ground back in the late eighties, he was a lovely man, happy to talk football even to an ignoramus like me.
I remember Maurice Setters playing against us for Stoke, my memories of him were man and ball or any combination of such in any order.
I remember a right winger called Chuck Drury but I’m guessing Charlie Drury must have been an earlier incarnation.
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Definitely Steve Bull.What a goal scorer he was.
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My Albion hero is Sir Terry Baggie – never backs down in the face of the enemy.
A perfect mixture of blood and thunder coupled with midfield trickry – always leaves the dingles trailing in his wake !!!
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Sir Terry every time he’s always there to help a damsel in distress, he’s got blue and white stripes running through his veins.
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Heroes
LEN CANTELLO— Had everthing CLASS ON GRASS
Top Drawer
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Some great posts, particulary Happy’s 1st two and No.9 Real Bully, put perfectly (far better than i could) about the state of the modern game and lack of physical contact. Rant welcome mate!
I wouldn’t necersarily say we dont have any current players who get me out my seat, Luke Moore springs to mind…. although thats proberbly for an entirely different reason!!
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My dads hero was Mr West Bromwich Albion, Tony Brown, nuff said there.
For myself as I am of a more recent vintage would have to say the twin pronged nightmare of so many opposition defences of SuperBob Taylor and Andy Hunt for the 92/93 play off campaign and as for cult heroes would have to say the gruesome twosome mentioned earlier of Kevin (jayse) Donovan and Lee (peggy) Ashcroft, these during the dark times of our almost perpetual struggle to stay in the 2nd tier of football, never in the field of football have so many mazy runs been ventured by so few to the delight of so many!!!
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16.
Spot on. One of the lower leagues great goalscoreres along with Frank Large. In the big league however, Tony Brown, Jeff Astle along with your own John Richards.
17 Happy.
And he always plays the game with a twinkle in his eye.
11 Streetly.
Apart from the day we pipped the Dingles to promotion, my best football memory was beating Liverpool in the 6th round replay at Maine Road in 1968, better even than winning the Cup. We were packed into the front of the Kippax St Stand, with the Liverpool fans at the back. We were under a constant bombardment of coins and anything else they had to hand. There were a group of Liverpool dockers behind us that tried to stop the throwing and when they failed, they actually shielded some of our female fans. Not all Scousers are bad.
The King scored as he did in every round but the real hero of the night for me was Johnny Kaye. Bloodied and bandaged, he held everyone together and repelled everything Liverpool threw at us and they were a formidable side in those days.
During and after the game it poured with rain. We came out of the ground and our coach was parked some distance away. I remember running round the back alleys of Manchester under the orange street lights, trying to avoid gangs of Liverpool fans as well as locals all bent on carnage. I was fifteen at the time and didn’t expect to see sixteen. Somehow we found the coach and had a fantastic celebration all the way home, partly over the result and partly over getting out in one piece.
Of course, this game couldn’t happen these days when the season has to finish on time so that Man Ure can go on their tour of Singapore and the Emirates. Ain’t money a wonderful thing.
Happy days.
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11 Streetly.
I sent a rather long post replying to you, reminiscing about Johnny Kaye. Unfortunately I also sent two others, one of which was replying in a semi sarcastic manner to No 16.
Obviously a Wolves fan doing the regulating today as all of the posts were on there last night and I’m being punished for daring to be provocative in reply to what was meant as a provocative post.
I don’t suppose this will reach the site, some very small minded people about.
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Please ignore my post at No 23. Obviously the ramblings of a sad, confused old man.
Sorry E&S.
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Well of all the heroes you’ve mentioned, I only recognise Bryan Robson!
I reckon you can become a terrace hero at West Brom for just knowing which way your kicking!
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25.
I think Cyril will agree that one of the most disappointing traits in many modern youngsters, is boasting about your ignorance.
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Lower Leagues and INTERNATIONAL level.
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22, The Real Bully Hoo
Remember the game well and the memories of seeing John Kaye for days later with bandages covering his head.Also remember talking to Tommy Smith at a gentlemens evening around 10 years ago and he talked at length about that match and he said that even he flinched every time John Kaye headed the ball and continously got blood over the ball.This would never be allowed in the game today!!
Again proper blokes,proper footballers and great Albion people.
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I think your whole team are heroes for condescending to put on that horrible blue and white stripey shirt that they are forced to wear… Oh, the shame!
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BMW Baggie
I`d love to see David Gold buying the Albion.
The bloke got a raw deal at Blues and feel he`d
do us a cracking job.
My all time favorite Albion player has to be
Tony Brown,Iam only a young bloke so never got
to see him play live but some of footage
ive seen of him is absolute class.
Some of the modern day hero`s has to be
Andy Hunt,Bob Taylor,Richard Sneekes,
Lee Hughes,Jason Roberts,Jason Koumas,
Zoltan Gera,Kevin Phillips.
Albion still have players who can get you off
your seat,
Felipe Teixiera,Ishmael Miller,Graham Dorrans,
Jerome Thomas,Gianni Zuiverloon,James Morrison.
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27.
Yeah but even David Nugent scored for England.
29.
One word DORITOS.
28 Streetly.
Great memories of a real bloke.
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