Billy Bingham

For the English footballer of the 2000s, see Billy Bingham (footballer born 1990).

Billy Bingham

Personal information
Full name	William Laurence Bingham
Date of birth	5 August 1931 (1931-08-05)
Place of birth	Belfast, Northern Ireland
Height	5 ft 7 in (1.70 m)
Playing position	Outside-right
Youth career
	St Donard’s Youth Club
Senior career*
Years	Team	Apps†	(Gls)†
1948–1950	Glentoran	60	(21)
1950–1958	Sunderland	227	(47)
1958–1961	Luton Town	97	(33)
1961–1963	Everton	98	(26)
1963–1965	Port Vale	43	(6)
Total		525	(133)
National team
1951–1963	Northern Ireland	56	(10)
Teams managed
1965–1968	Southport
1967–1971	Northern Ireland
1968–1970	Plymouth Argyle
1970–1971	Linfield
1971–1973	Greece
1973–1977	Everton
1977	PAOK Salonika
1978–1979	Mansfield Town
1980–1993	Northern Ireland
* Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only. † Appearances (Goals).

William Laurence "Billy" Bingham, MBE (born 5 August 1931, Belfast) is a former international footballer and football manager. He is currently a scout for English Football League Championship side Burnley.

As a player, his first professional club was Glentoran, who he played for between 1948 and 1950. Making the move to England, he then spent eight years with Sunderland, making 227 league appearances. In 1958 he switched to Luton Town, making close to 100 league appearances in a three years spell. This was followed by a two year association with Everton, where he again went close to 100 league appearances. He finished his career after breaking his leg in a match for Port Vale in 1964, at the age of 33. Between 1951 and 1963 he won 56 caps for Northern Ireland, scoring 10 international goals.

His management career would be as notable as his playing career. After taking charge at Southport in 1965, he was appointed manager of Northern Ireland two years later. During his time as an international manager he also took charge at Plymouth Argyle, and later Linfield. In 1971, he was appointed as the head coach of the Greece national side. Two years later he returned to the domestic game with Everton of England. He returned to Greece for a brief spell in 1977, taking the reins at PAOK Salonika. The following year he went back to England to take charge of Mansfield Town for one season. In 1980 he was re-appointed as Northern Ireland manager, his final position, and a post he would hold for the next thirteen years.

Playing career

School Career

When he attended Elmgrove Primary School, he was captain of the schools football team.

Club career

In his playing career, Bingham was a small elusive right winger who provided fine deliveries from the flank. He joined Sunderland in 1950 for £8,000 making 227 appearances and scoring 47 goals, before his departure in 1958 for Luton Town where he played in the 1959 FA Cup Final. At the start of the 1960–61 season after Luton's relegation, he joined Everton for a fee of £15,000. During his time at Everton, he made 98 appearances and scored 26 goals. Bingham left Everton after being in the 1963 First Division winning team and joined Port Vale for a then joint-club record of £15,000 in August 1963. He retired from playing after breaking his leg in a 4–0 defeat at Brentford on 5 September 1964. He left for Southport on a free transfer in April 1965 to become their trainer-coach.

International career

He was a Northern Ireland international and played for his country in the World Cup finals 1958. He was awarded 56 full caps, a record at the time, and also scored 10 goals, half of which were scored in British Home Championship matches against Scotland.

International goals

Scores and results list Northern Ireland's goal tally first.

#	Date	Venue	Opponent	Result	Competition
1	3 November 1954	Glasgow, Scotland	Scotland	2–2	1955 British Home Championship
2	8 October 1955	Belfast, Northern Ireland	Scotland	2–1	1956 British Home Championship
3	16 January 1957	Lisbon, Portugal	Portugal	1–1	1958 FIFA World Cup qualification
4	5 October 1957	Belfast, Northern Ireland	Scotland	1–1	1958 British Home Championship
5	15 October 1958	Madrid, Spain	Spain	2–6	Friendly
6	18 November 1959	London, England	England	1–2	1960 British Home Championship
7	6 April 1960	Wrexham, Wales	Wales	2–3	1960 British Home Championship
8	7 November 1962	Glasgow, Scotland	Scotland	1–1	1963 British Home Championship
9	28 November 1962	Belfast, Northern Ireland	Poland	2–0	UEFA Euro 1964 qualifying
10	12 October 1963	Belfast, Northern Ireland	Scotland	2–1	1964 British Home Championship

Management career

While manager of Southport the team won promotion in 1967 from the Fourth Division to the Third Division of the Football League. He guided the team to second place in the Fourth Division winning promotion to the Third Division.

Bingham took over as manager at Everton in May 1973, and the "Toffees" finished seventh in his first season. He brought in players such as Martin Dobson and Bob Latchford. Everton seemed likely to win the title again in 1975, but only won once in the last five games finishing fourth. In 1975–76 Everton finished eleventh; but a run of eight league games without a win resulted in Bingham being sacked in January 1977.

Bingham managed Northern Ireland in two spells and it would be during the second that he would be best remembered as a manager. He led Northern Ireland to the 1982 FIFA World Cup, and despite a limited squad with only one or two genuine world class players at his disposal Bingham's team stunned the host nation, Spain with a 1–0 victory.

Bingham's trademark as Northern Ireland manager harked back to his days as a player at the 1958 World cup when team captain Danny Blanchflower famously quoted that the idea was to equalise before the other team scored.^{[citation needed]} Northern Ireland regularly punched above their weight under Bingham with a string of single goal victories over top European opponents, including home and away against West Germany. They qualified again for the 1986 FIFA World Cup but Bingham's team was an ageing one and after failing to reach the 1990 and 1994 finals he stepped down.

The final game of the 1994 World Cup qualification campaign was against Republic of Ireland, and was to be marred with sectarianism and controversy. Bingham's men set out to deny the Irish the point they needed in order to secure qualification, with Northern Ireland unable to qualify. Jimmy Quinn's strike was cancelled out by a late Irish equalizer, and after the game there was an ugly exchange between Bingham and Ireland manager, Jack Charlton.

In May 2008 he came out of retirement to become a talent spotter at Burnley.

Awards and honours

Amongst the numerous awards and honours granted to Bingham, he was made an MBE for services to football in 1981 and the Professional Footballers Association made him the recipient of their annual Merit Award in 1994 for "outstanding contribution" to the game. This latter makes him one of just 34 individuals so honoured since the award was inaugurated in 1974, putting him in the company of such managerial luminaries as Bill Shankly, Bob Paisley, Brian Clough, Sir Alex Ferguson and Sir Bobby Robson, as well as playing greats like Pelé, Sir Stanley Matthews, Sir Tom Finney, Sir Bobby Charlton and fellow Northern Ireland International George Best.

Bingham also received FIFA's "Centennial Order of Merit" in 2004, to mark 100 years since the founding of the world governing body of football.

External links

• Bingham's playing career
• Bingham's managerial career