Walter Winterbottom, who has
died aged 88, was the first full-time manager of the
England football team, and kept the job for an
astonishing 16 years, from 1946 to 1962. During this
time England consistently qualified for the World
Cup, although in the 1950 tournament in Brazil they
lost 1-0 to the United States - possibly the greatest
humiliation in the history of English football.
Winterbottom was
concurrently director of coaching at the Football
Association, and significantly was wont to say that
he considered this the more important of his two
jobs. When his mentor, the FA secretary Sir Stanley
Rous, retired in 1962, everyone expected Winterbottom
to become the new secretary. But journalists who
supported him overplayed their hand, with the result
that Professor Sir Harold Thompson, who detested
Rous, succeeded in steering through a compromise
candidate. Winterbottom instead became secretary of
the Central Council of Physical Recreation.
The charge that Winterbottom
could never communicate with England players because
he had not played professional football himself was
unfair. He had in fact played it with some success.
Born in Lancashire,
Winterbottom was educated at Oldham grammar school
and Chester College. It was there that he met Eddie
Lever, a Portsmouth footballer whose career had just
been ended by a knee injury. In later years, Lever
would become the Portsmouth manager. Long
conversations about tactics stimulated the young
Winterbottom. "It was largely from Eddie Lever's
knowledge," he admitted, "that I got my
yearning for the game."
Winterbottom then became a
schoolmaster. He taught for three years in Oldham,
playing centre-half meanwhile for Royston Amateurs in
the Lancashire and Cheshire League, and for Mossley.
It was here that he was spotted by Manchester
United's legendary chief scout, Louis Rocca; and the
money he earned from turning professional with United
allowed him to study at Carnegie physical training
college, where eventually he joined the staff.
His debut for United was in
1934, in a League match versus Leeds, which he
remembered chiefly because he had eaten something
that upset him and felt violently ill. Yet he played
well enough to displace, for a time, one of United's
salient pre-war players, George Vose.
Spinal trouble put him
prematurely out of the game, and when the second
world war broke out in 1939 he joined the RAF,
becoming chief instructor of physical training at RAF
Cosford, then head of physical training at the Air
Ministry. He later resumed his playing career,
turning out as a guest for Chelsea at half back and
full back, and was even named twice as an England
reserve. A star he may not have been, but he had
every right to call himself a first-class footballer.
When he was appointed
England manager and senior FA coach in 1946, he
inaugurated a series of courses. He was concurrently
in charge of the senior, amateur and youth
international teams - the latter a new departure -
till pressure of work obliged him to give up the last
two responsibilities.
He found himself confronted
by a welter of prejudice and ignorance. If the FA
coaching scheme may in later years have ossified into
a new orthodoxy, initially it had much to offer; and
much to contend with. At many clubs, training still
consisted of endless running round the track, with
nothing seen of the ball, the theory being that the
less players saw of it during the week, the more they
would want it on a Saturday.
Having never been a club
manager, Winterbottom found himself subject to much
criticism. And so he gathered around him a band of
like-minded disciples; men such as Ron Greenwood and
Bill Nicholson, who would become influential managers
in the years to come.
Tall, agile, pipe-smoking
and bespectacled, he could have passed for a public
school beak, which had much to do with the way he was
perceived. Coaching, he insisted, was merely "a
means of showing how to practise". His apothegms
were always illuminating: "Football is a game
where superiority in match play can't always be
indicated by goals, because of the difficulty of
mooring."
He inherited a talented
England team, though it must be emphasised that he
never, officially, had responsibility for picking it.
He deferred in this to a panel of selectors, and yet
was the target of the press when things went wrong.
However, by the time of the 1958 World Cup finals,
England's third in a row, he had the selectors
dancing to his tune.
In no other footballing
country in the world could a manager with
Winterbottom's results have survived so long. You
could hardly blame him for the ghastly defeat in
Brazil when, as he said, "We did have our
chances, dozens of them," but he was never an
inspirational figure, he had a tendency to talk above
his players' heads, and for all his interest in
tactics, his strategies were often flawed.
This became particularly
plain in 1953, when England were thrashed 6-3 by
Hungary at Wembley. When they went to Budapest the
following May, they had learned so little that they
were humiliated 7-1. Still, Winterbottom kept his
job, and took the team on to the 1954 World Cup in
Switzerland, where they honourably attained the
quarter-finals.
Meanwhile, the FA coaching
scheme was becoming the domain of theorist
schoolmasters who, unlike Winterbottom, had never
played at professional level. Jargon abounded. Asked
once about the ability of certain players almost to
photograph the field around them, Winterbottom
replied, "We know all about that, but we call it
environmental awareness."
England's 1958 prospects
were damaged by the Munich air crash, which killed
three key players - Roger Byrne, Tommy Taylor and
Duncan Edwards. Leaving the Bolton centre-forward Nat
Lofthouse out of a World Cup party was an evident
blunder. A second was not to give the young Bobby
Charlton a single World Cup game. A third was to
throw two neophytes, Peter Broadbent and Peter
Brabrook, in at the deep end for the doomed play-off
against the Soviet Union.
But under Winterbottom,
England qualified again in 1962 and reached the
quarter-finals, going out to Brazil. The time had
come, it seemed, for Winterbottom to succeed Rous -
which he would have done, but for the machinations of
Harold Thompson.
He married his wife Ann in
1942. She and their two daughters survive him; a son
predeceased him.
• Walter
Winterbottom, football coach, born March 31 1913;
died February 16 2002
Howard Wilkinson, The F.A.’s Technical Director
today paid this tribute to Sir Walter Winterbottom,
saying: "Quite simply, he was a visionary, light
years ahead of his time.
"With England and the
Football Association, he worked tirelessly to drag
the coaching set-up out of the Dark Ages.
"After England’s
disastrous performance at the 1950 World Cup in
Brazil, Walter produced a prophetic report which
recommended the essential need for better qualified
English coaches to concentrate entirely on the
development of technique and skill in the very young.
He also called for the provision of floodlit training
areas to facilitate this work in the evenings and
furthermore recommended that the FA should have its
own centre – a "home" as he put it. He
was a knowledgeable and modest prophet in his own
land to whom the game owes an incalculable
debt."
Sir Walter, 89, who ran the
team from 1946-62, died on Saturday at Royal Surrey
County Hospital in Guildford.
Born in Oldham on January
31, 1913, he was a centre halfback for Manchester
United until his playing days were ended by injury in
1939.
He was appointed national
director of coaching in 1946 with responsibility for
the national team, aged 33, and officially became
manager in May 1947.
Sir Walter started on high
note, with a 7-2 thrashing of Northern Ireland in in
his first match in charge in September 1946.
He subsequently guided
England through four World Cup finals during his
stint as the team’s longest serving manager,
before handing over the reins to Sir Alf Ramsey.
He was awarded an OBE in
1963 for services to football, receiving a CBE in
1972 and his knighthood in 1978 for services to
sport.
Sir Walter Winterbottom was
England’s first full-time manager and the
longest-serving of the post-war era.
He was appointed chief coach
by The Football Association in 1946 and was later
installed as manager after some political manoeuvring
by secretary Stanley Rous.
With great players of the
like of Stan Mortensen, Tom Finney, Stanley Matthews,
Raich Carter and Tommy Lawton at his disposal, he
oversaw some emphatic victories in his first few
years in charge.
Portugal’s 10-0
thrashing in Lisbon in 1947 followed 7-2 and 8-2
defeats of Northern Ireland and Holland respectively.
Northern Ireland particularly became favoured
whipping boys with 6-2 and 9-2 wins following in
subsequent years.
Winterbottom was also the
first manager to lead England into World Cup
competition in 1950.
The tournament in Brazil was
the first time England had entered, having hitherto
considered the Home Nations Internationals their
priority.
Winterbottom resigned four
months after his fourth World Cup in charge ended
with defeat by Brazil in 1962.
He left the job after being
overlooked for the role of F.A. secretary following
Rous’ elevation to FIFA president. He went on to
take up a post with the General Council for Physical
Education.
His record remains the most
successful of any post-war England manager having
recorded 78 wins, 33 draw and 28 defeats from his 139
matches in charge.
The F.A.’s Executive
Director, David Davies, warmly
recalled Sir Walter, telling TheFA.com: "He was
a lovely guy and a highly intelligent man.
"He was an innovator
and set up the first ever national coaching network
as well as initiating what was then the England
Under-23 team.
"He had a great sense
of humour and a tremendous work ethic. When England
teams travelled under him, he was in charge of food,
travel and training, though not team selection which
in those days was made by the International
Committee.
"He was England manager
for 16 years, taking charge of players who are
household names such as Matthews, Wright, Finney and
Lawton.
"He gave a lot to the
game and will be sadly missed.
Former England manager, Bobby Robson, was deeply inspired by Sir Walter
and credits him with putting him where he is today.
Robson, who celebrates his
69th birthday tomorrow, said: ``I’m very
saddened because Sir Walter is one of the finest men
I’ve ever met in football, not because he
brought me into the international arena, which he did
- he gave me my first cap and I played all the
matches under Sir Walter.
``He was my mentor, he was
one of the most, if not the most, knowledgable men in
football I’ve ever met.
``He was a fantastic guy, he
was a great coach, he had a wonderful knowledge of
the game and he could impart that knowledge. I could
listen to Walter for hours talking about
football.’’
And Robson revealed it was
one of his predecessors as national coach who
persuaded him to try his hand at management.
``I wouldn’t be here
today if it wasn’t for Sir Walter because when I
played for him, he came to Don Howe and I and said `I
want you two to come to Lilleshall every summer and
get your qualifications and get your diplomas and
stay in the game’, and we responded to
that,’’ he said.
``I kept in touch with him
and he used to write me fantastic letters of support
when I was the England manager.
``I’m very sad to hear
of his death and it’s a funeral I really must go
to.
``He was a great football
man, one of the finest football men this country has
ever, ever produced.’’
Former England
captain paid his own tribute, describing him as
a ``terrific bloke’’ who was a ``true
gent’’.
Winterbottom handed Armfield his international debut against
Brazil in 1959 - the first of 43 caps for his
country.
And Armfield was quick to
praise Sir Walter for the way he managed
such exceptional talents as Sir Stanley Matthews and
Stan Mortensen.
``He was a terrific
bloke,’’ Armfield said. ``He had a problem
in a way - he came in just after the war when we had
such great talents and he had to get those into a
team.
``He believed in a coaching
system so he was ahead of his time really, he was
director of football for a time.
``From my first cap in 1959
in Brazil right through to being captain in 62 he was
there. I think I brought a lot with me from Walter
Winterbottom - he was a gent, a nice man, a really
nice person.
``You have to remember what
it was like at The F.A. in those early days just
after the war, you can imagine them all sat together
and he probably had 12 or 13 players to look at and
pick 11 of them.
``Eventually he proved his
point and got his own way.
``He had some highs and some
lows. We had the famous defeat by the USA - that was
one of his lows, he always said that.
``He always said that the
team he had was as good a bunch of players you could
put together at that time so he always felt he was
privileged - that was the kind of man he was.
``What he did is put down
the first coaching book in this country and it
provided the skeleton for all the others - a lot of
European countries who used this
skeleton.’’
England legend Sir Tom
Finney paid tribute to the spirit of English football
under Winterbottom.
He said: ``The game has
changed in so many ways.
``He had so much success
during his spell as manager and there was nowhere
near the sort of pressures the present managers are
under.
``In those days it was
really the enjoyment of playing and managing your
country.’’
