Bill Shankly

Bill Shankly

Personal information
Full name	William Shankly OBE
Position(s)	Wing-half

William "Bill" Shankly, OBE (September 2, 1913 – September 29, 1981) was one of Britain's most successful and respected football managers.

Background

Shankly was born in the East Ayrshire mining village of Glenbuck, Scotland, into a family of ten children. He was one of five brothers who went on to play professional football. His brother Bob was also a successful manager, guiding Dundee to victory in the Scottish championship in 1962. His tough upbringing was the basis for his own brand of humanitarian based socialism, and he would joke in later life that he never had a bath until aged 15, and that the poverty brought about a good sense of humour.

Football was a way of getting away from the mine shafts - either on a Saturday afternoon and during weekly training, or as a professional option. All five Shankly brothers were members of the Glenbuck Cherrypickers - a team famous at the time for producing 49 footballers from the village, straddling the latter part of the 19th and the early years of the 20th century - although Bill, the youngest brother, never played for their first eleven.

Player career

Bill Shankly's playing career began in Scottish Junior Football, where he played for the now defunct Cronberry Eglinton and Glenbuck Cherrypickers. In July 1932 he caught the eye of scouts and was signed to play for Carlisle United making his debut on 31 December, 1932 against Rochdale. In July 1933, after only 16 appearances for Carlisle, he signed for Preston North End for a fee of £500.00

He was a key member of the Preston side promoted to the First Division in 1934 and played in two FA Cup finals, Preston losing to Sunderland in 1937, but beating Huddersfield Town in 1938.

Shankly made his debut for Scotland in a 1-0 win against England in April 1938. He made four further appearances for his country, plus another seven in wartime internationals, but his distinguished playing career was cruelly interrupted by war in 1939.

He played for a number of teams during the war, including Northampton Town, Liverpool, Arsenal, Cardiff City, Bolton Wanderers, Luton Town and Partick Thistle and helped Preston to victory in the 1941 Wartime Cup Final at Wembley. When the 1946-1947 season kick-started organised professional football again in England, Shankly resumed playing for Preston, but was 33 and coming to the end of his playing days. World War II had taken away the best years of Shankly's career.

Managerial career

He retired from playing in March 1949 and the same month was appointed the manager of Carlisle United, starting his managerial career where his professional playing career had also started. He was undistinguished at Carlisle, and walked out citing a lack of financial commitment on the part of the directors - a pattern which would repeat itself for the next ten years across a succession of northern English football clubs.

After a failed interview at Liverpool, Shankly moved to manage Grimsby Town in 1951, then Workington in 1953, and finally Huddersfield in 1956 - where he signed a talented 15 year-old called Denis Law. After Law broke into the first team at 16, Shankly recommended on business grounds improving Law’s terms and tenure, but the board saw no reason to increase the wages of a player they already had under contract. In 1956, the board wanted to accept an offer of £45,000 for Law, from Everton. Shankly went ballistic: “Get out your diary and write this down. One day, Dennis Law will be transferred for £100,000.” After four years at Huddersfield, Manchester City signed Law for a transfer fee of £55,000, setting a new British record.

Shankly appeared prone to falling foul of the boardroom at each club, as he never felt they gave the same commitment to team affairs as he did. It was Shankly's own commitment and enthusiasm that had initially intrigued Liverpool chairman T.V. Williams when Shankly had been interviewed for the vacant Liverpool job in 1951. It was felt at the time that he was both lacking experience and wasn't a big enough name for the club, but this time Williams knew instinctively that Shankly and Liverpool were right for each other.

Liverpool

Shankly became the manager of Liverpool in December 1959. Shankly is remembered by many Liverpool fans as their greatest ever manager. His record of honours (in itself notable) pales compared to some of his successors (including the man that immediately followed, Bob Paisley) but he is credited with establishing the club's reputation and setting the scene for subsequent successes.

In 1959, Liverpool was a club in the bottom of the old Second Division, with a crumbling stadium, poor training facilities and a large and poor quality playing staff. The only quality was in the backroom staff, with Joe Fagan and Reuben Bennett, added to by the recently retired and Shankly admired Bob Paisley. Shankly firstly told the three of them that they all had jobs while he was there, recognising that the team around was a key to success - and that was probably the start of the now infamous Bootroom.

The training ground at Melwood was in a terrible state, overgrown and with only one mains tap. But Shankly turned this into a strength, by getting the players to arrive instead at Anfield, and then bus them over to Melwood - this created team camaraderie. At Melwood Shankly introduced fitness training including diet assessment, and skills training including using an artificial goal painted on a convenient wall, split into eight sections which he would demand the players hit each time. For playing practice, Shankly introduced five-a-side games that so defined his football thinking - pass and move, keep it simple, a creed taken from the daily matches played by the miners of Glenbuck. After training, the team would all bus back to Anfield together to shower, change and get a communal meal. This way Shankly ensured all his players had warmed down correctly and he would keep his players free from injury. As a result, in the 1965-1966 season Liverpool finished as champions using just 14 players and two of those only played a handful of games.

1960s team

Slowly at first, and then with a gathering pace, Shankly and his backroom team turned Liverpool around. The Anfield crowd sensed change, with gates regularly topping 40,000 and with new signings Ron Yeats, Ian St. John and Gordon Milne, promotion was gained back to the first division in 1961-1962. The addition of Peter Thompson (along with a failed swoop for Jack Charlton) to his ever-improving team. The supremacy of Everton in the city of Liverpool was the first target for Shankly now that he had got the club back into the top flight, and in 1963-1964, Liverpool clinched their 6th title, from former champions Everton.

The first F.A. Cup win in 1965 was followed by Europe where Liverpool were stopped by Ajax, led by then 19-year old Johan Cruijjf (7-3 on aggrate; including a 5-1 hammering in Amsterdam). Whilst Shankly, orchestrating events at Anfield was at one with the fans, perfectly in tune with the Kopites, knowing and understanding how they felt about football and the pride a successful team gave them - remaining in touch with his working class roots. His would tell anyone who cared to listen that his lads played to a socialist ethic. If a player was having a poor game Shankly would expect a team mate to cover for him and bail him out like you would do for a neighbour or a colleague down the mine.

1970s team

The decline of the 1960s team saw the birth of Shankly's second great Liverpool side. Out went Hunt, St.John, Yeats and Lawrence, and in came Kevin Keegan, Steve Heighway, Larry Lloyd and Ray Clemence - he missed out on signing Lou Macari, and sent a note round to the players after Macari had signed for Manchester United that Shankly had only wanted him for the second team. The UEFA Cup, the first European trophy, arrived in 1973, won in tandem with the club's 8th league title. In 1974, the F.A. Cup came back to Anfield after a breathtaking Wembley performance against a hapless Malcolm Macdonald and an under-performing Newcastle United. The result was 3-0 but could easily have been six or seven in one of the most one-sided finals ever.

Shankly told Kevin Keegan in 1971 as Liverpool were playing West Ham United "Christ son, I've just seen that Bobby Moore. What a wreck. He's got bags under his eyes, he's limping. He's got dandruff and it looks as if he has been to a nightclub again". Moore played a blinder during the match but Keegan still scored. After the game Shankly said to Keegan "Aye he's some player that Bobby Moore isn't he?. You'll never play against anyone better than him".

Relationship with fans

Bill Shankly during a lap of honour of Anfield, during the infamous scarf incident

Due to his working class background, Shankly had a strong feeling for how the fans followed the team and wanted them to perform. He felt he was letting the fans down when the team didn't do well.

When he wasn't managing a football club, Shankly was usually at his typewriter, personally replying to the letters which arrived at Melwood. Shankly even called some supporters at home to discuss the previous day's game, while the accounts of him providing tickets for fans are endless.

One of the most iconic images of all was caught on television, when a Liverpool scarf which had been thrown at Shankly during a lap of honour was flung to one side by a policeman. Shankly pounced on the scarf and reprimanded the copper, uttering the immortal words "Don't do that. This might be someone's life". In a tour of the United States Shankly couldn't believe American people had never heard of Tom Finney. Shankly was a huge fan of Finney's as a footballer, and was also a close friend of his.

After his retirement he said: "I was only in the game for the love of football - and I wanted to bring back happiness to the people of Liverpool."

The journalist John Keith, who wrote the play "The Bill Shankly Tribute Story", commented that Shankly knew how important the fans were to a successful team, and that even after his retirement, at the 1976 second leg of the Uefa Cup final in Brugge: "A fan came over and said he didn't have a ticket - so Shanks went and bought him one."

Retirement

Shankly was by now 60 years old, and in July 1974 decided to retire - he said that going to tell the chairman of his decision was like facing the electric chair. He wanted to spend time with his wife Ness and their family. When news of Shankly's resignation first emerged, distraught fans jammed the club's switchboard and local factory workers threatened to go on strike unless their hero returned .

The club was left in capable hands, with the bootroom staff supplemented by ex-players Ronnie Moran and Roy Evans and they got behind new manager Bob Paisley. Later it was revealed that Shankly wanted Jack Charlton to succeed him at Liverpool, and not Bob Paisley. This was the start of a deteriorating relationship between Shankly and the club, which only got worse during his retirement. Indeed, Shankly would often frequent the training headquarters and ground on match days of City rivals Everton, often saying that he 'feels more welcome here'.

Shankly was awarded the OBE in November 1974. He even went regularly to Melwood, to watch the team train. He continued to live in the terraced house that he and his wife had bought when they moved to Liverpool, and he was a regular sight around the city, happy and willing to talk to anyone about football. In the end his wife had to take him shopping to Manchester instead.

On the morning of 26 September, 1981 Bill Shankly was admitted to Broadgreen Hospital following a heart attack. Whilst in Hospital he insisted on being nursed in an ordinary ward not a private one. "That is where he wanted to be," a hospital spokesman told the Liverpool Echo newspaper.. His condition was stable and it appeared that he was going to make a full recovery. There was no suggestion that his life was in danger. The switchboard was jammed with concerned fans and prayers were said for him in the Sunday morning and evening services at both of the Anglican and Catholic Cathedrals. However, late on 28 September Shankly unexpectedly took a turn for the worse and died, aged 68, at 1.20am on 29 September 1981. He was cremated, and buried at the Anfield Crematorium on 2 October. .

The Labour Party conference stood in a minutes silence when his death was announced, for a man who had always been a socialist. Sir Matt Busby was so upset when he heard that Shankly had died he refused to take any telephone calls asking him how he felt. Johnny Giles suggested afterwards that something inside Shankly exploded and that "he could have died of a broken heart, being ignored by the board and also seeing the team going on to achieve greater glories without him". Indeed there may be some truth in this as Bill Shankly was a very fit man, who rarely was ill and who neither drank or smoked.

His rift with the club was quickly resolved, when on the first game at Anfield following his funeral, a huge banner was unfurled on the Kop which read "Shankly Lives Forever".

Bill Shankly was made an Inaugural Inductee of the English Football Hall of Fame in 2002, in recognition of his impact on the English game as a manager.

Honours

Playing

• 1934 Second Division runner-up (with Preston North End)
• 1937 FA Cup finalist. (with Preston North End)
• 1938 FA Cup winner. (with Preston North End)
• 1941 Wartime Cup winner {with Preston North End)

Managerial

1962 Second Division champions
1964 First Division champions
1965 FA Cup Winners, European Champions' Cup semi-finalists.
1966 First Division champions, European Cup Winners Cup beaten finalists.
1969 First Division runners-up.
1971 FA Cup beaten finalists, Inter-Cities Fairs Cup semi-finalists.
1973 First Division champions, UEFA Cup winners.
1974 FA Cup winners, First Division runners-up.

Managerial statistics

Team	From	To	Games	Won	Lost	Drawn	Win %
Carlisle	1949	1951	108	48	27	33	44.44
Grimsby	1951	1953	80	47	17	16	58.75
Huddersfield	1956	1959	134	49	50	35	36.57
Liverpool	1959	1974	753	393	175	185	52.19
TOTAL			1075	537	269	269	49.95

Quotations

• An interview on a Granada Television chat-show hosted by Shelley Rohde in 1981 produced arguably Shankly's most famous (and most often misquoted) quote - "Someone said 'football is more important than life and death to you' and I said 'Listen, it's more important than that'."
• Shankly famously said about the offside law, "If a player is not interfering with play or seeking to gain an advantage, then he should be."
• When asked what he thought about the team on the other side of Stanley Park he replied "There are only two teams in Liverpool; Liverpool and Liverpool Reserves."
• When Liverpool player Tommy Smith once consulted Shankly to tell him he couldn't play next week, due to his injured knee, Shankly replied: "Take that poof bandage off, and what do you mean Your knee, it's Liverpool's knee!"
• His name is in a song of Hibernian F.C due to the fact his brother Bob was once Manager of Hibs. The song goes - "Said Billy Mee to Bill Shankly have you ever heard of the Northbank Highbury. Shanks says no I don't think so, but i've heard of the mental Hibees. We are the Mental Hibees!

See also

• The Boot Room

External links

• LFC: Kevin Sampson - 25th Anniversary memories of Bill Shakly original from Esquire magazine
• LFC 25th Anniversary collection of Shankly's quotes
• LFC Online profile
• Bio at the English Football Hall of Fame
• Shankly.com a website dedicated to the life and times of Bill Shankly
• This Is Anfield: Managerial Profile
• Manager profile at LFChistory.net