It's not often I start a thread, and this is probably my first on this LFC board, but I think Sir Bob deserves to be highlighted today.
http://www.liverpoolfc.com/history/past-managers/bob-paisleyFirst Division champions 1976, 1977, 1979, 1980, 1982, 1983
League Cup 1981, 1982, 1983
European Cup 1977, 1978, 1981
UEFA Cup 1976
European Super Cup 1977
FA Charity Shield 1974, 1976, 1977 (shared), 1979, 1980, 1982
Twenty trophies in nine seasons - not bad for a man who was loathe to make the step into football management.
But then, that was the reluctant genius that was Bob Paisley.
The humble son of the North East always was more at ease in the wings than on centre stage but when it came to knowledge of the game and the ability to spot a player, his record spoke volumes.
Born the son of a miner in the County Durham village of Hetton-le-Hole on January 23, 1919, Paisley's childhood was spent absorbing knowledge and advice.
As his late widow Jessie recalled: "Bob always tried to remember what his headmaster told him; that if you speak softly people will try to listen to what you're saying. If you shout they're liable to walk away and not take it in."
Such homespun psychology would serve Paisley invaluably during his management years when Europe bowed to the stocky figure in a flat cap that belied a masterful football brain.
Following in the footsteps of the great Bill Shankly was a task many believed was akin to mission impossible and yet Paisley's transition from bootroom coach to boss was almost seamless.
It all came about in July 1974 when Shanks rocked the football world by announcing his retirement from the game.
Who would be brave enough to take on a role in which the shadow of the great Scot would loom large? For the Liverpool board there was only one name on their short-list.
Bob had flanked Shankly's shoulder from the day he had arrived at Anfield back in 1959, after the great man had swapped the Pennines of Huddersfield for the banks of the Mersey.
He was a pioneer of the 'Liverpool way', the brand of football that was pivotal to Shankly's football ethos. He also had a relationship with the club that stretched back even further than his predecessor's, one that began two decades earlier when he had arrived at Anfield as a 20-year-old left-half on May 8, 1939 for a £10 signing-on fee and weekly wage of £5.
Wartime service in Egypt and the western desert delayed Paisley's league debut as a Liverpool player until 1946-47. It was during this campaign that he won the first of 10 championship medals in his various Anfield roles, in a team that included Scotland and Great Britain star Billy Liddell and centre forward Albert Stubbins.
Despite being ready to leave the club after being dropped by the directors who picked the team for the 1950 FA Cup Final, he played on and went on to captain the side before hanging up his boots following Liverpool's relegation in 1954.
However, it would not be the end of his love affair with the Reds.
He went on to establish a role as a reserve team trainer and also became a renowned, self-taught, physiotherapist.
He was the perfect foil for Shanks, a football lover with an unquenchable thirst for knowledge, but one that was happy to leave the limelight to the man with a flair for public speaking.
And so, when it came to finding a successor to Shankly, Liverpool only had one man in mind…
The only trouble was that Paisley was reluctant to step into the spotlight.
It needed much persuasion from the club and his family to convince the 55-year-old to take on the challenge awaiting him, but how important his positive response would become to the future success of Liverpool Football Club.
After much soul searching he agreed, saying: "It's like being given the Queen Elizabeth to steer in a force 10 gale."
Maybe so, but what a magnificent navigator he would prove to be.
In his first season he led the Reds to the runners-up spot in the Championship, an achievement he was disappointed by, remarking at the time, "I was like an apprentice that ran wide at the bends."
That may seem somewhat harsh, but he made amends for what he saw as failure the following year, leading the club to a league and UEFA Cup double.
The title was secured with a famous 3-1 win at Wolves on the final day of the season while a 4-3 aggregate success of Belgian outfit Bruges clinched European glory.
It was a season that would have proved difficult to surpass for most sides and yet the following campaign, Paisley's Liverpool would do just that.
Having retained the league title with consummate ease, it could so easily have been an all-conquering year for Liverpool had they seen off Manchester United in the FA Cup final.
However, luck was with the Red Devils as they ran out fortunate 2-1 winners - not the best preparation for Liverpool's first ever European Cup final.
Lesser teams would have suffered a crisis of confidence, but not the Reds, who shrugged off their Wembley disappointment to go on and conquer Europe for the very first time just four days later.
The Eternal City was the setting for what Paisley would later refer to as his "perfect day" with Liverpool going on to claim a 3-1 victory over a strong Borussia Moenchengladbach side.
The victory installed Paisley as the first English-born manager to lift Europe's greatest prize following the success of Scottish duo Jock Stein (Celtic) and Sir Matt Busby (Manchester United).
As the celebratory champagne flowed, Paisley, who was later honoured with an OBE, sat quietly in a corner of the team hotel.
"I'm not having a drink because I want to savour every moment," he said. "The Pope and I are two of the few sober people in Rome tonight!"
The Roman carnival also heralded the end of Kevin Keegan's fine Anfield career and many felt it would prove to be the end of an era for the Reds.
But they reckoned without Paisley's unique eye for talent.
The taciturn genius swooped to sign Celtic hero Kenny Dalglish for less than the income from Keegan's transfer.
It was an inspirational move that would see Dalglish go on to surpass the achievements of Keegan and secure his place as the undisputed King of the Kop.
"There's never been a better bit of business than that," beamed Liverpool Chairman John Smith.
Few would argue with such a statement, although Paisley's supreme ability in the transfer market was nothing new to Reds fans.
He had already captured the likes of Phil Neal, Terry McDermott, Joey Jones and David Johnson, while his decision to switch Ray Kennedy from a powerful striker to a left midfielder was a masterstroke.
As he often said: "I let my side do the talking for me."
Indeed, what he may have lacked as an orator, he made up for with a record on the pitch that spoke volumes.
Few managers can claim to have brought through some of the greatest players of the post-war era but that is exactly what Bob did.
Alan Hansen, Graeme Souness, Alan Kennedy, Ronnie Whelan, Ian Rush, Craig Johnston, Mark Lawrenson, Bruce Grobbelaar, Steve Nicol - the list seems endless.
With the help of these players he soared into the stratosphere of managerial achievement by guiding Liverpool to two further European Cup triumphs. A win over Bruges at Wembley in 1978 saw the Reds retain the trophy while the mighty Real Madrid were the victims three years later in Paris.
Paisley's teams annexed a total of six championships, the most remarkable being in 1978-79 when they emerged with a record 68 points under the old two-points-for-a-win system. The campaign saw them concede a record low of 16 goals in their 42 games, with 85 goals scored and only four defeats. He also guided Liverpool to a hat-trick of League Cup successes, failing only to land the FA Cup.
That gap in his collection was bearable given his torrent of triumphs and he passed command on to Joe Fagan in 1983, having amassed a grand total of 23 Bells Managerial Awards.
On retirement, he was elected to the board of directors and was an advisor to Kenny Dalglish, Liverpool's first player-manager, before being tragically stricken with Alzheimer's Disease.
It says it all about the great man that three of the club's finest servants have no hesitation in hailing him as the finest manager of all-time.
Kenny Dalglish, Alan Hansen and Graeme Souness, the world class Scottish trio signed by Paisley and a threesome not given to hyperbole, unhesitatingly place him at the management summit.
"There was only one Bob Paisley and he was the greatest of them all," said Dalglish. "He went through the card in football. He played for Liverpool, he treated the players, he coached them, he managed them and then he became a director."
"He could tell if someone was injured and what the problem was just by watching them walk a few paces. He was never boastful but had great football knowledge. I owe Bob more than I owe anybody else in the game. There will never be another like him."
Hansen agreed, declaring: "I go by records and Bob Paisley is the No.1 manager ever."
While Souness saluted him thus: "When you talk of great managers there's one man at the top of the list and that's Bob Paisley."
If that wasn't enough, then his achievements were summed up perfectly by Canon John Roberts at his funeral service at St Peter's, Woolton in February 1996 when he saluted him as an ordinary man of extraordinary greatness.
The world of football, not least Liverpool FC, was enriched by his massive and exemplary contribution to it.
On Thursday April 8, 1999 the club officially opened The Paisley Gateway as an enduring monument to this great man.
His achievements in such a short period in charge cannot be underestimated, nor will they ever be eclipsed and he is quite rightly recognised, by many within the football community, as the undisputed Manager of the Millennium.
http://www.lfchistory.net/Managers/Manager/Profile/10Liverpool offered Bob Paisley the job of reserve team manager in 1954 and eventually his skill with the new electrical equipment made him the in-house physio. Don Welsh was first-team manager and continued to struggle as Liverpool adjusted to life in the Second Division. Meanwhile, after finding his feet in his new role, Bob Paisley's reserves, whom he inherited from Jimmy Seddon, began to make pleasing headway. In his second term at the helm Paisley guided the reserves to runners-up spot in the Central league. Phil Taylor, who had quit playing for Liverpool at the same time as Paisley, took over essentially as caretaker-manager after Welsh's sacking at the end of the 1955/56 season and having served his apprenticeship for a whole season it was reported on 1 May 1957 that: "At their weekly board meeting last night Liverpool FC directors appointed Phil Taylor as manager. Hitherto he has been acting manager only. While Mr. Taylor has been acting manager, the club did not fill the coaching position which he formerly occupied. They have now appointed Bob Paisley, at present second-team trainer, as chief coach." A series of near-miss promotion attempts ensued as the 50's turned into a frustrating decade for the Reds that ended with the blessing of Bill Shankly's arrival.
In 1971 when Shankly signed what was to be his last contract for Liverpool Paisley was promoted to assistant manager with Joe Fagan replacing him as first-team coach. Three years later, at 55 years of age, Paisley became the successor to Shankly. Some thought that Shankly had made a hasty decision he would later regret. New chairman, John Smith, offered him a contract on an increased salary, but it wasn’t about money. Shankly had been at Liverpool for nearly 15 years and it was a terrible wrench to leave. He recalls in his autobiography that he suggested to the directors that “the only way to make the changeover was to promote the rest of the staff." He even added that he had “elevated them earlier with a view to what I was going to do later on." Having signed professional forms in May 1939, Paisley had already been at Anfield twice as long as Shankly and despite his reluctance to take the job, if the job was going to remain in-house, he was the only logical candidate. Paisley knew the club and the game inside out and was a fine judge of a player. He had an almost uncanny ability of being able to correctly diagnose an injury and treat it accordingly. But where personality was concerned Bob was totally opposite to Bill. He had been in the background for so long that the responsibility of dealing with the press was frightening. Paisley knew the enormity of the task at hand and confessed to the press: “It’s like being given the Queen Elizabeth to steer in a force 10 gale.” Chief Executive Peter Robinson confirms Paisley had to be virtually manhandled to accept the responsibility. "When we approached Bob he said no. In the end the Chairman, directors and I had to gang up on him.”
While Paisley prepared for his first League game against Luton Town on 17 August 1974 Shankly spent his first Saturday afternoon in retirement watching his local home match; Everton - Derby County. Even though Paisley wasn't the darling of the media like Shankly he showed early on that he was also capable of a one-liner. When the press asked Bob what Shankly was doing this particular afternoon, he replied: "He's trying to get right away from football. I believe he went to Everton." Paisley’s first season in charge was not a success, not by the high standards set by his predecessor anyway. The team fought hard to reclaim the League title but defeat at Middlesbrough on the penultimate weekend of the season meant their challenge was over. There was disappointment in the cups too with a late Ipswich goal at Portman Road putting the holders out of the FA Cup and Middlesbrough beating them in the League Cup at Anfield in November. Liverpool enjoyed their biggest-ever competitive victory with an 11-0 thrashing of the Norwegian part-timers from Drammen in the opening round of the Cup Winners’ Cup but conceding a last-minute equaliser at home to Ferencvaros in the next round was a blow the team was unable to recover from and they eventually went out of the competition on the away goals rule a fortnight later. As things turned out, that 1974/75 season would be the only one during Paisley’s reign that no silverware was won.
Continuity on the pitch was vital to the club's success. The sort of wholesale buying and selling that would be commonplace long after his retirement was not part of Paisley’s agenda. Changes were made gradually and the newcomers integrated carefully into an already successful side. Phil Neal arrived in 1974 soon replacing Alec Lindsay, the only change to the regular 11 from Shankly's last campaign in Paisley's debut season. Terry McDermott, who had arrived from Newcastle, was having trouble adjusting as well as the final signing of the Shankly era, Ray Kennedy. In 1975/76 the most vital changes to Paisley's side took place in midfield. Peter Cormack's days were numbered following Paisley's successful transformation of Ray Kennedy into a left-sided midfielder and Jimmy Case was promoted from the reserves to replace the industrious Brian Hall. Liverpool's improvement on the road provided Paisley's team with nine more points to win the League Championship in 1976 as well as repeating Shankly's UEFA Cup success from 1973. Prior to the 1976/77 season Liverpool purchased David Johnson who slowly made his mark on the team while Joey Jones was preferred to Tommy Smith in defence. Liverpool retained the Championship and were unbeaten a home in the League, a feat Shankly only accomplished once in the top division, 1970/71. Liverpool embarked on a historic run in the European Cup in which young striker, David Fairclough proved vital as well old hand Smith who returned to centre of defence late in the season following Phil Thompson's injury. Shankly had seen his European dream crushed in 1965 at the hands of a dishonest referee, but there was no stopping Paisley's army. He put down a marker when Liverpool were triumphant in Rome in 1977.
Arguably the greatest signing Paisley ever made brought a new dimension to the side. Kenny Dalglish replaced Kevin Keegan as the catalyst at Liverpool, in 1977. Two months later Paisley made another key signing in Graeme Souness from Middlesbrough. The third Scot, Alan Hansen, had joined in May 1977. Paisley had formed the core of the side that was going to achieve more than any other previous Liverpool team. Amazingly Paisley won the European Cup for the second year running, but lost the League to Nottingham Forest. Winning can become a habit but Liverpool were winning in style, no more so than during the 1978/79 season when they scored 85 goals in their 42 League fixtures with Ray Clemence only conceding 16 at the other end. During the next eight years before he stood down in 1983, Paisley’s teams won the English Championship six times and also won four European trophies as well as taking the much-maligned League Cup more seriously than before and achieving a hat-trick of victories in his last three seasons as manager, an achievement that would be added to in Joe Fagan’s initial year in charge. The domestic success was remarkable on its own but to couple it with unparalleled success in Europe was almost beyond belief. Bob Paisley became the only man to coach teams to the European Champions’ cup on three different occasions.
By the time he retired in 1983, Bob Paisley had been associated with Liverpool Football club for 44 years. He would continue to offer advice to his successor Kenny Dalglish for a couple of years before becoming a boardmember. With his mentor by his side Dalglish led the club to the League and FA Cup double in his first season in charge. There was some irony in that because the FA Cup was the one domestic trophy that eluded Bob as a manager. There were as many great games during Paisley’s time in charge as there were great players. This can only be a general summary of an astonishing period in the club’s history. Will there ever again be one man who serves a single club for so long and with such devotion and such success? The answer is almost certainly not. Knowing that the 1983 League Cup final would be the last time Paisley would lead his team out as manager at Wembley, the players graciously allowed their boss to climb the famous steps to collect the trophy on their behalf. A man who preferred to stay in the background had a special moment to remember, that is the one of the most heartwarming sights Liverpool fans have ever seen. A few weeks later Paisley walked out at Anfield for the last time as the man in charge to be presented with the Championship trophy yet again. Bob Paisley, the man who had to follow a legend, had become one himself.
This is an article I wrote a year ago, and updated over the summer for inclusion on this site. Thought it was worth digging out again, given the other threads on the forum.
Sir Bob Paisley - Possibly the Greatest Man to Ever Live
I was in Tenerife, almost five years ago to the day, when I heard the news. I was gobsmacked. It felt like my own grandfather had died. As the saying goes, I remembered where I was when I heard the news: Bob Paisley had died.
Bob had been closer to mind than he had for a while, seeing as amongst my holiday reading was the newly-released hardback biography of Shanks by Stephen F Kelly, and so while I read about the most charismatic manager of all time, I was also reading about his indispensable sidekick, Bob Paisley, perhaps the brains behind the gusto. It was all the more weird reading about results on wet Wednesday evenings in the early sixties when lying in blazing Canary Island sunshine, and weirder still when I picked up a paper later one day that told of Bob’s death.
I knew Bob had been suffering with Alzheimer’s for some time, and it seemed especially cruel that someone who achieved so much should die of a disease that rots one’s memories away. Not for him the chance of growing old and weak with the one compensation of being able to look back on a truly remarkable life. That remarkable life was wiped from its very owner’s mind. A great man doesn’t deserve that. No one deserves that.
I don’t doubt that Bob was the greatest manager ever. When I hear all these current managers (such as Jim Jeffries and Walter Smith - i.e. Scots!) say that Alex Ferguson is the best ever manager, it makes me so angry. Alex Ferguson has spent fortunes in his time, and has six [now seven] championships and one European Cup as his major honours in fifteen years in the English game (yes, for all the hype and the knighthood, that still reads as just ONE European Cup, and okay, Ferguson had success at Aberdeen, but he has been a manager over three times as long as Bob was). Bob Paisley won six championships and THREE European Cups in NINE just years. The team Ferguson inherited was doing badly, granted, but please don’t tell me they were anything other than a sleeping giant, with lots of cash and players like Robson, Strachan, McGrath and Whiteside - not quite in our class, but not duffers either. It can’t be said that they were anything other than underachieving.
I even rate Bob above Shanks - I really do. Shanks is the reason we are all here now, and that is set in stone - he rebuilt us. But he did so with Bob Paisley at his side. So not only was Bob involved in our rebirth, he then took us that all important next stage - the stage where true greatness is achieved. And kept us there. The team Bob inherited had won the FA Cup in Shanks’ swansong in 1974, but in truth it wasn’t one of the best Liverpool sides (I’m going on what people generally believe - I was three years old at the time, and therefore not especially qualified to comment on it’s merits through first hand experience. I have of course seen lots of video footage of the 1970s teams, to give me some idea). A lot of the players that had been the cornerstones of the 1960s side had retired or moved on - St John, Yeats, Hunt. New players were in their place, although the likes of Ray Kennedy, bought to play up front, and Larry Lloyd at centre half, were not looking as good as their predecessors. One of Bob’s masterstrokes was turning Ray Kennedy, who looked like he had lost the fight for the job up front as a target man/battering ram, into a superb, skillful left-sided midfielder with a wonderful passing game. It’s the equivalent of Peter Reid deciding to turn Niall Quinn into a tricky winger (and no, that ain’t gonna happen). Bob took this team, changed it around, and bought new players, and made it his own. What Bob didn’t have, and what gets him overlooked in terms of accolades, was a larger than life personality. Shanks was a master with words about the game, whereas even his own players had difficulty in understanding exactly what Bob had to say. A good player was “whassisname” or “wadjamacallit”, and apparently everything was referred to either as the “gubbins” or the “doings”. Though his words were muddled, the message always got through, and was crystal clear.
Bob was similar to Gerard Houllier - both quiet, softly spoken men, but both hard as nails underneath. GH was ruthless in showing Paul Ince the door, but Paisley was faced with a more difficult expulsion. Ince was a prat who was causing GH problems behind the scenes, and therefore totally expendable. Bob had to show he meant business when, after retiring, Shanks would turn up at Melwood on a daily basis and watch training. All the players still called him ‘boss’, and Bob had to ask Shanks - in the nicest possible way - to stay away. He was in charge now, and that was the end of the matter. The last thing Bob needed was the massive presence of his predecessor looming large over him - it was hard enough following in his footsteps, without those footsteps still literally around him (It’ll be interesting to see how Ferguson’s successor does, given that Fergie will always be there in the background, ready to take the credit for whatever the new guy achieves, and no-doubt ready with an oversize oar to put in [or will he after all the recent turmoil at OT about his future? PT 7.6.2001]).
Then there were Bob’s dealings in the transfer market which were, to be truthful, nothing short of remarkable. Faced with the crisis of the exit of Kevin Keegan - a Liverpool legend - Bob goes out and signs Kenny Dalglish as his replacement: LFC’s greatest ever player (come on, you’re not arguing with that, surely? What do you mean you reckon I’m wrong here and it should be Ronny Rosenthal? Istvan Kozma?...). Bob went on record as saying he would have wanted both Keegan AND Dalglish, had he been presented with the option - but that would have just been plain unfair, and the other 21 clubs would have taken their ball away and sulked with “we don’t want to play anymore”. I love Mark Lawrenson’s story of when he met Bob Paisley to sign - he got into the car to find Bob sat there in his cardigan and slippers!
In this age of ‘flash’ we would do well to remember that Bob was about the bare necessities. Look at the players he bought: Dalglish, Hansen, Lawrenson, Nicol, Souness, Whelan, Rush, McDermott - just awesome talent, and nearly all of them the Football Writers Player of the Year or a runner-up at some stage. I know we didn’t rely on fancy tactics back then, but if you buy players as good as that - players who could think for themselves - then half the battle is already won. These days it is impossible to have a monopoly on talent like that, as back then you were picking from the British Isles, whereas now the world is a manager’s oyster. We have the homegrown Steven Gerrard as our heartbeat, but Arsenal have bought Patrik Viera, and he wouldn’t have been an option for these shores fifteen or twenty years ago. Bob had a smaller area to pick from. A lot of Ferguson’s credit is for the talent of homegrown players, and yet the likes of Cantona, Yorke, Stam, Schmiechel, Barthez, etc, are the reason United are/were successful - without Cantona and Schmiechel they would have not made the essential leap to Champions. So whilst Fergie bought well at times, he too had a wider group of players to choose from. Fergie’s buys weren’t picked up from obscurity. Ferguson’s buys were established internationals.
I’m not demeaning GH by the same measure, just saying that in1981 you picked players from these shores, and you had to unearth diamonds in the British lower leagues or in Ireland or Scotland (Whelan, Nicol, Rush, Lawrenson) rather than always cherry picking ready-made players. Spurs had Ardiles and Villa, but the influx of foreign talent was a dripping tap as opposed to the Niagra Falls of 2001.
But ignore all this - ignore the man’s achievements. Forget he was the best manager ever. That’s only half the story of Bob Paisley.
What I want to highlight first and foremost about Bob - what I want you all to remember - was that he was just a great man: an honest, fair man, who puts most current managers to shame. When I saw the awful loser and general moaner Alex Ferguson get knighted, and Bob with his three European trophies have nothing, it made me sick. So it’s Sir Bob, from now on. This was a man who went to Rome in 1977 to help us lift the European Cup for the first time, going back to the place he helped liberate in a tank at the end of the Second World War. How many modern managers can claim such noble feats outside of the game? [Addition: Ferguson even suggested this season that Bayern Munich didn’t deserve to win the trophy, and that United were disappointed, as they think they are the better team. Bayern topped both of their groups in the early rounds: Man U neither of theirs. Bayern then beat Man U - not once, but both home and away. Bayern then beat Real Madrid home and away. So it seems that to defeat the previous two competition winners so convincingly as well as winning their group stages - and the final itself, of course! - is not good enough. Man U, who have won the trophy as many times as Nottingham Forest, are of course the rightful heirs to the throne. How dare Bayern beat them to it? Would Bob have been so distastefully vulgar in defeat? PT 7.6.2001].
No great player or manager likes losing. All the greats hate losing - it’s what spurs them on, that avoidance of the sickening sinking feeling of collapse. But there’s this quality a true champion needs: humility. He needs to know when the better team won.
You have to remind people of Sir Bob, as people want to forget - after all, since the advent of the Premiership it seems that achievements in the game no longer exist if they pre-date 1992 (I read recently about how Andy Cole was one of the top scorers in the Premiership history, having reached 100 Premiership goals, and I thought how p*ssed off current players like Tony Cottee must be when overlooked, having scored bags of league goals when it was the plain old First Division - and I keep reading how we’ve never won the Premiership, as if the Premiership is anything other than the First Division with a flashy new name. Eighteen league titles, I don’t care what you want to call them other than that. Eighteen titles, six due to Sir Bob directly, and a good few more before and after his rein indirectly, such as when he helped out Bill; and, crucially, provided assistance for Kenny in the double winning season of 1985/6).
So in the end Bob himself forgot all he had achieved, and it is not right that the rest of football does the same. So please excuse me if I remind you all again in a few month’s time [hello! Is it that time already? 7.6.2001] - not because you will have forgotten, but in order that you may remind a few others, who perhaps support other teams, from whose minds he might have slipped. The Roma home tie is Bob Paisley Flag Day, and that’s great, that’s apt, but don’t stop there.
Right boys, get carving that bronze statue now. I want to see it right next to Shanks, out by the front of the Kop, so the two great men of our history are side by side once more, and so they can scare the living shit out of any opposing team who dare enter Anfield.
http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/news-and-comment/bob-paisley-the-reluctant-genius-only-grows-in-stature-as-shadow-he-cast-lengthens-a6744296.htmlThere can be little doubt that Jürgen Klopp and his methods would have interested Bob Paisley, not least because Continental innovations always fascinated him. The legendary Liverpool manager’s pursuit of knowledge about what we might today call medical science led him to have a machine shipped in from Germany, which by all accounts had electrode pads designed to relieve muscular pain. The machine was having no material effect on Jimmy Melia one day, despite Paisley, then the Liverpool physiotherapist, turning the dial as far as it would go. Someone spotted it wasn’t plugged in and did the necessary. Up went Melia.
Some aspects of the Klopp gegenpressing football would not be alien to Paisley either, though he might wonder why it has taken the arrival of a Continental to restore some of the very fundamental aspects of good football management which were once a byword at Liverpool. Qualities which include spotting where a player is best deployed – for Alberto Moreno, now profitably restored to left-back, read Chris Lawler, a left-half before Paisley established his true calling, or Ray Kennedy, recast as a marauding left-sided midfielder – and a wish that the ball be shipped around the field very quickly indeed.
“It was a part of the philosophy then – and it’s coming back now – that goals were easier to score on the counter-attack,” Ray Clemence reflected years after Paisley had brought 19 trophies in nine seasons – a ratio comfortably better than Alex Ferguson’s or Brian Clough’s. “So if we got the ball quickly and attacked the opposition as quickly as we could, we’d have a better chance than if we took 90 seconds or so to move the ball upfield.” So there you have it: 90 seconds was a lifetime to Paisley’s Liverpool. That thought came back to mind on Saturday evening as Klopp’s new Liverpool eviscerated Manchester City at pace.
There can be little doubt that Jürgen Klopp and his methods would have interested Bob Paisley, not least because Continental innovations always fascinated him. The legendary Liverpool manager’s pursuit of knowledge about what we might today call medical science led him to have a machine shipped in from Germany, which by all accounts had electrode pads designed to relieve muscular pain. The machine was having no material effect on Jimmy Melia one day, despite Paisley, then the Liverpool physiotherapist, turning the dial as far as it would go. Someone spotted it wasn’t plugged in and did the necessary. Up went Melia.
Some aspects of the Klopp gegenpressing football would not be alien to Paisley either, though he might wonder why it has taken the arrival of a Continental to restore some of the very fundamental aspects of good football management which were once a byword at Liverpool. Qualities which include spotting where a player is best deployed – for Alberto Moreno, now profitably restored to left-back, read Chris Lawler, a left-half before Paisley established his true calling, or Ray Kennedy, recast as a marauding left-sided midfielder – and a wish that the ball be shipped around the field very quickly indeed.
“It was a part of the philosophy then – and it’s coming back now – that goals were easier to score on the counter-attack,” Ray Clemence reflected years after Paisley had brought 19 trophies in nine seasons – a ratio comfortably better than Alex Ferguson’s or Brian Clough’s. “So if we got the ball quickly and attacked the opposition as quickly as we could, we’d have a better chance than if we took 90 seconds or so to move the ball upfield.” So there you have it: 90 seconds was a lifetime to Paisley’s Liverpool. That thought came back to mind on Saturday evening as Klopp’s new Liverpool eviscerated Manchester City at pace.
Manchester City vs Liverpool - player ratings
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The appreciation of Paisley grows as the shadows lengthen on the memory of the success he delivered. It was the deeply flawed impression that he simply basked in the inheritance Bill Shankly bequeathed which created complacency about the size of the man’s accomplishment. But gradually, that is changing. The Anfield banners bearing Paisley’s name and face grow more ubiquitous and the memory is soon to be rekindled with an event marking 20 years since his death which will seek to investigate anew the great man’s secret.
The journalist and broadcaster John Keith, who has done more than anyone to champion Paisley’s achievements, will stage the evening show next February, joined by Ian Callaghan, Jimmy Case, Alan Kennedy and Phil Neal at the Atkinson Theatre in Southport, the seaside town north of Liverpool. Similar such events Keith has hosted have elicited many insights.
Philosophies we are now justifiably celebrating in Klopp – whose vast personality and self-confidence are a far cry from Paisley’s frequently uncompleted sentences – are familiar to Keith from those extraordinary nine seasons between 1974 and 1983. “A reluctant genius is what I have always called him,” Keith tells me. “Because genius is what he was, with a fantastic ability to assess players and build teams.”
At times, it was a bumpier story than you might imagine. A winter victory over Manchester City like Saturday’s might have given Paisley cause to smile, given the terrace doom-mongers he faced up to after the bad home defeat to that opposition on Boxing Day 1981.
It was Liverpool’s sixth home defeat of that calendar year – an indignity they had suffered a mere nine times across the previous 10 years – which left the side 12th in the First Division. The letters pages of the Liverpool Echo were filled with proclamations of how Paisley was sending Liverpool – the reigning European champions for the third time under his guidance – into terminal decline. “I never thought this would happen,” states one. “Liverpool built their reputation by careful planning, wise spending and total dedication at all levels. A new word has crept up: ‘apathy’.”
“Have faith in me,” Paisley said in no uncertain terms after John Bond’s City had left town. “We know our ways. We know the changes we will have to make. The people have to trust us.” His players embarked on a 14-game unbeaten run and surged to the title.
“He could say those things to the fans with confidence because he had worked for so long at Liverpool, knew it top to bottom,” says Keith, who chronicled Paisley’s managerial reign for the Daily Express and knew him as well as any. “The doubts of the fans actually worried him less than they did Bill [Shankly].”
Paisley in fact seemed to enjoy the criticism. “I’m glad when someone – the press, another player or manager – has a go at us,” he once said. “I can use that. I’m always picking my brains at home to find something new, searching for the little straws.”
He knew the rewards of supreme endeavour and beautiful simplicity. As every Liverpool manager to have followed him will attest, that’s a lot more difficult than it sounds.
And just to rub it in a wee bit
http://talksport.com/es/magazine/features/121107/after-26-years-fergie-will-never-better-bob-paisleys-european-achievemen-184769
This week Mr. Ferguson celebrates an incredible 26 years in charge of Manchester United and he will soon have a statue unveiled outside Old Trafford to further cement his legend. The Scot is the most successful manager in the history of British football by almost every conceivable measurement, but there is one notable exception where he falls short against another managerial giant; Bob Paisley's record in the European Cup.
A total of 17 managers have won the European Cup/Champions League on two occasions, including Ferguson, Jose Mourinho, Pep Guardiola and Brian Clough, but only one man has so far lifted the trophy three times and did so in an incredibly short space of time. That man is former Liverpool boss Paisley, whose triumphs in 1977, 1978 and 1981 still set him apart from some of the greatest names in football history.
To have won the trophy twice is testament to Alex Ferguson's immense expertise and it is worth noting that his two successes came nine years apart, proving his ability to rebuild from one great side to another (only the late Ernst Happel has gone longer between his two European Cup wins as a manager, tasting victory with Feyenoord in 1970 and Hamburg in 1983).
Yet it remains a source of frustration at Old Trafford that, in two decades of near total dominance at home, lifting 12 Premier League titles to overhaul Liverpool's record of 18 top flight triumphs in the process, Ferguson has managed to win 'just' two Champions Leagues - just one more than a patently inferior Liverpool have managed in the same period.
All of which puts into perspective Bob Paisley's remarkable achievement of guiding Liverpool to three European Cups in the nine-year period in which he led the club.
The argument that Paisley was lucky to inherit a powerful Liverpool from his predecessor Bill Shankly, who himself had been forced to guide the Reds from Second Division obscurity, carries a little weight, but too easily ignores the task Paisley faced in turning the club into Europe's finest.
Under Shankly, Liverpool's finest European hour was a 1973 UEFA Cup victory, but more often than not the Reds would crash out of continental competition in the early rounds. In Paisley's first season as manager this pattern continued, when Liverpool lost in the second round of the old Cup Winners' Cup, but he was astute enough to tweak their style of play to suit the demands of Europe, further emphasising the importance of possession, playing the cream of Europe at their own game, but with added British grit.
The results were spectacular, with another UEFA Cup added in 1976, followed by back-to-back European Cup wins and a third triumph against Real Madrid in 1981. By the time Paisley retired in 1983, the Red machine was so slick that a fourth European Cup was won a year later.
His achievements not only put him on a managerial pedestal, but also elevated Liverpool to the ranks of the European Cup greats, spoken of in the same breath as dominant eras achieved by Real Madrid in the 1950s and Ajax and Bayern in the early and mid-1970s.
By comparison, Alex Ferguson has not quite put Manchester United in the same bracket. Three finals in four seasons went a long way to proving his capability in the competition, but comprehensive defeats to Barcelona on two of those occasions put United firmly in their place.
Some like to argue that the modern Champions League, in which the stronger countries are permitted to enter more than one club to the competition, and also includes a group stage, is tougher to win than the old, straight knockout European Cup, but arguments can be made for the strength of both formats. Under the more stringent entry regulations of the old European Cup, for example, Manchester United - having finished runners up to Arsenal in the previous season's Premiership - would not have even been in the 1998/99 tournament, which they memorably won under Ferguson's management.
Likewise, if the Champions League is much more difficult to win than the old European Cup, why did a comparatively poor Liverpool team win the tournament in 2005, finishing fifth in the Premier League having finished just fourth the season before? By contrast, the 1978/79 Liverpool team - back-to-back defending European champions and a side that would win the First Division at a canter that campaign, conceding just 16 goals in 42 games - was knocked out of the European Cup in the first round, having had the misfortune to be drawn against English champions Nottingham Forest (there being no protective seeding or group games to protect the big clubs).
The competition's format has certainly changed over the years, but one thing has remained consistent: it is an extremely difficult trophy to win. That is why Bob Paisley's three European Cups in just nine years (eight, considering Liverpool had not qualified for the tournament in his first season in charge) is a remarkable rate of success that Mr. Ferguson - no matter how incredible his career - will never match.
This is possibly my favourite ever Liverpool related picture
Imagine having a dinner chat with these two
I can't see any football manager ever having the success of this man. One of only 2 men to win 3 European Cups. The only man to win 3 in 5 seasons.
Some of my favourite quotes by and about Bob, shamelessly stolen from lfchistory.net
http://www.lfchistory.net/Managers/Manager/Profile/10. I'll genuinely never tire of reading things like this about him. It may be a bit taboo to pick someone ahead of Shankly, but Bob has and always will be number 1 for me.
"I said that when I took over that I would settle for a drop of Bell's once a month, a big bottle at the end of the season and a ride round the city in an open top bus!"
"Terry McDermott once got us hysterical in the dressing room, laughing at Bob Paisley’s expense. The boss had a habit of saying the word “doings” all the time. He’d refer to opposition players as “doings” instead of naming them. So Bob comes into the dressing room and starts a talk.
Terry stood behind him with a big grin on his face and every time Bob says “doings” he holds a finger up. By the time he gets to six, Terry is starting to titter and we’re trying not to laugh. Ray Kennedy is kicking me and when he gets to 10, Ray just turns and flees into the toilet, he’s in absolute fits. We were like a bunch of schoolkids."
Phil Neal
"My first match at Anfield was at right-back for Aston Villa. The roar from the Kop was awesome as Billy Liddell waltzed down the wing making us look like idiots. Then I began to recognize the source of Liddell’s magic. He was Liverpool’s inconspicuous craftsman at left half, Bob Paisley."
Former Spurs' captain and Aston Villa player Danny Blanchflower
Praise doesn't come any higher than this
"Bill depended a lot on Bob. They were like the terrible twins when they got going. I think Bill needed Bob. I think he calmed him down a bit."
Nessie Shankly
"Bob and I never had any rows. We didn’t have any time for that. We had to plan where we were going to keep all the cups we won."
Bill Shankly
"People who sit in the stands perhaps don't realise the extra pressure exerted by the emotional side of the game. It's not easy to cope with and it's quite possible to become drunk on four ounces of wine gum!"
Bob Paisley
"The secret is that our Liverpool team never know when to stop running and working. At Anfield we have always believed in players supporting each other and concentrating on not giving the ball away. You can't go charging forward all the time, willy-nilly. You must have patience, and this is where we can play the Continentals at their own game."
Bob Paisley
For me at least, this still rings true today
"The whole of my life, what they wanted was honesty. They were not concerned with cultured football, but with triers who gave one hundred percent."
Bob Paisley on the Kop
"I go by records and Bob Paisley is the number one manager ever."
Alan Hansen on Paisley
Bob the player, the physio, the manager
Expressed by one of his most loyal lieutenants, Joe Fagan, Bob Paisley's soccer credo amounted to this.
"I was always interested in physiotherapy when I was a player. I took a correspondence course for two years before I hung my boots up. Then Sir John fixed me up with a full-time course. It meant going to Belmont Road hospital from nine to five every day. It was all changing then from what it had been through most of my playing days. Then it was the hot and cold water treatment. Trainers had to have hands like leather. There was hardly a player who got by without suffering first degree burns at some time or other. You put the hot towel on and then the cold one, it was the main treatment. The first person I ever treated was Albert Shelley, our first-team trainer, for a boil on his backside. Albert was one of the old school. He taught me how to harden my hands with the towels. When the physio machines came in I had to show him how to use them, but he never really came to terms with them. He had a common-sense approach to the practical side of it, but he was frightened by the electrical stuff, he even used to put a handkerchief on the leads. So when the machines came in I virtually took over the treatment of all the players."
I was going to leave the last word to The King,
"There was only one Bob Paisley and he was the greatest of them all. He went through the card in football. He played for Liverpool, he treated the players, he coached them, he managed them and then he became a director. He could tell if someone was injured and what the problem was just by watching them walk a few paces. He was never boastful but had great football knowledge. I owe Bob more than I owe anybody else in the game. There will never be another like him."
King Kenny on Uncle Bob
But I think it's only fair to leave the last word to the person that new him best...
Jessie Paisley on how she introduced Bob to her family
"I was nervous as a kitten. I had on my best suit, shirt and tie, my best bib and tucker. I went down to reception and the doorman spotted me and said 'Mr Paisley is waiting for you in his car outside'. When I got in the car I saw that Bob was wearing slippers and a cardigan. I couldn't believe it. That was my first meeting with Bob Paisley and I knew I'd come to the right place. They'd just won the European Cup and there was this fellow, who everyone in football thought was an absolute god, driving me to the ground in his slippers and cardigan! I thought 'you'll do for me!'"
RIP BOB
