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From an armchair by the fireplace in his home on the outskirts of the Peak District, Tommy Docherty gifted visitors with a series of beautiful stories, often revolving around things he was wrong about.
“I should never have been to Rotherham,” it said. “I should never have gone to Australia” or “I should never have left my job in Scotland.”
He would confess his shortcomings and curse his own impatience. ‘Yes, that’s one of my weaknesses,’ he said.
As the quintessential storyteller, Doc, who passed away on Thursday at age 92, knew where the laughter lurked.
His wit was quick, and his timing was honed with hundreds of speeches delivered after dinners, at fan events, and most recently aboard cruise ships.
Depending on his audience, it could be due to his failed attempt to score Juan Alberto Schiaffino when Scotland leaked seven against Uruguay in the 1954 World Cup.
It could be about his talent for upsetting people with his brash nature, caustic humor, and inability to maintain a single decent line for himself. There are many examples.
Even if he dared venture, he could tell a lighthearted story about his romance with Mary Brown, which ended his tenure as Manchester United manager just days after winning the FA Cup.
Although she was more likely to comment that she became ‘the only manager fired for falling in love’ and that there were no regrets because she was worth ’20 Man Uniteds’.
Docherty was never afraid of his own opinion and rarely lacked confidence. He was quick to joke about his mistakes, but acknowledged his successes, and came to view his marriage to Mary as perhaps his greatest success.
Born in Gorbals in Glasgow, he served in the Highland Light Infantry and was on duty inside the King David Hotel in Jerusalem when it was blown up by terrorists, killing 91 people, in 1946.
His footballing exploits in the British Army earned him a contract with Celtic before moving south at the age of 21 to Preston, where he would spend most of his playing days.
He was a talented right half on a team with Tom Finney on the wing. They won promotion to the top flight in 1951, finished twice as runners-up in the former Division One, and reached the FA Cup final in 1954.
Docherty won 25 games for Scotland and went to two World Cups, though he will be most remembered for a charismatic coaching career at 13 different clubs.
He was the original with ‘more clubs than Jack Nicklaus’ and went abroad to Portugal as Porto coach, in 1970, and to Australia with South Melbourne and Sydney Olympic, twice. He was in charge of Scotland for just over a year and two spells at Queens Park Rangers. Or was it three?
Docherty spent 29 days in charge of QPR in 1968, between Rotherham and Aston Villa, and returned after leaving Derby in 1979. President Jim Gregory fired him in May 1980 only to reinstate him nine days later and fire him again in October.
He built a reputation for dueling the biggest egos in the locker room. Yet amid all the unrest, banter and confrontations, Docherty created two fabulous teams over extended stints at Chelsea and Manchester United.
Both were built on youthful foundations, both were committed to attacking style, and their work at Stamford Bridge and Old Trafford left a deep impression on those watching from the stands.
At Chelsea in the 1960s, where his playing career ended, Docherty revived and revolutionized a declining club with modern training techniques and bled young players from the successful youth team, including Ron Harris and Terry Venables.
Quickly dubbed ‘Docherty’s Diamonds’, they won promotion to the top flight in 1963 and the League Cup in 1965, a first major trophy since the league title a decade earlier, and in Europe.
Docherty always said that his Chelsea team would have won the league ‘three or four times’ if financial problems had not forced them to sell the Jimmy Greaves goal machine to AC Milan for £ 80,000, just a few months before he replaced Ted. Drake.
He was in charge at 33, and one of his first assignments was to fly to Italy on the orders of President Joe Mears and offer the illusion that he was trying to re-sign with Greaves.
“We left under the instruction not to bring it back because we couldn’t pay for it,” he said. “It was just to make it look good to punters.”
The closest they came to the title was in 1965. They were challenging Manchester United and Leeds when, in April, Docherty sent eight players home for breaking the curfew in Blackpool and lost 6-2 without them. They finished third, five points behind champion United.
He was fired after an incident on a season-ending Caribbean tour shortly after their defeat to Tottenham in the 1967 FA Cup final, but his legacy at Bridge extended beyond exciting football and soccer. foundation of the team that won. the FA Cup and the Recopa de Europa with Dave Sexton.
Docherty also introduced blue shorts to replace the white ones they wore. He came to reflect on Chelsea as his “favorite club”. They sent him a Harrods basket at Christmas, he noted. Manchester United, on the other hand, wanted to charge him for tickets.
He left the Scotland job to replace his friend Frank O’Farrell at United, and despite relegation and a season in the second division, Docherty was able to break ties with the past and instill new purpose.
Legends like Sir Bobby Charlton, Denis Law and George Best left and a new team emerged around young players like Sammy McIlroy and Brian Greenhoff and lower league signings Gordon Hill and Steve Coppell.
Back in the former Division One, they finished third and lost to Southampton in the FA Cup final and, a year later, won the FA Cup, beating Liverpool at Wembley to prevent Bob Paisley’s team from claiming a triple.
It was United’s first major trophy since the 1968 European Cup victory. Once again, they moved up.
‘If they had held me for a couple more years, the trophies would have been coming,’ Docherty said, but his tenure ended abruptly when he informed the board that his 27-year marriage to Agnes, with whom he had four children, was and was in love with Mary, the wife of United physio Laurie Brown.
After the fight, pain and recriminations, the doctor and Mary enjoyed a long and happy marriage. They have two daughters. He retired from soccer in 1988, after a year in charge of Altrincham out of the league.
“If I had known I was going to live that long, I would have taken better care of myself,” he said.
Keep joking. Still telling stories. I keep talking about football. He remains in love with Mary Brown until her death on New Year’s Eve at age 92.
Source: m.allfootballapp.com
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