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Stuart Leary

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  • I was there that day......went on my own (I was 12) and sat in front on the wall at the opposite end to the one where Leary scored......happy days, we deserved a draw but lost 3-2, South African Brian Tocknell hit the post with a few minutes left......Spurs went on to do the double.
    I think they were the first team ever to achieve that?
    How many Charlton fans went ?
    I have no idea......pure guess would be around 7000?
    Blimey it was 13,000 originally.
  • Leary, Summers,Firmani a forward line to fear!
  • Got the hump now , never knew we played them in their double winning season,  gutted we could have stopped that bit of history .

    Good to hear the commentator glory boy our fans off 
  • Leary, Summers,Firmani a forward line to fear!

    Sadly never played together, Johnny came after Eddie was sold.
  • My older brother Stuart is named after Leary
  • I was there that day......went on my own (I was 12) and sat in front on the wall at the opposite end to the one where Leary scored......happy days, we deserved a draw but lost 3-2, South African Brian Tocknell hit the post with a few minutes left......Spurs went on to do the double.
    I think they were the first team ever to achieve that?
    How many Charlton fans went ?
    I have no idea......pure guess would be around 7000?
    Blimey it was 13,000 originally.
    Yes I know......I said it was a guess and having thought about it and used a bit more logic I realised  my original guess would have been very wide of the mark so I halved it.
    Thing is, 7,000 is still a complete guess as well.
  • Sam Lawrie was a dapper little Scottish fella with jet black hair. He scored 24 goals in one season in the early 60’s playing at outside right......the line up included Leary and Summers.
  • Sam Lawrie was a dapper little Scottish fella with jet black hair. He scored 24 goals in one season in the early 60’s playing at outside right......the line up included Leary and Summers.
    And, if my memory serves me right, Sam got a second half hat-trick in a FA Cup game at Ashton Gate in the 1959 -60 season, to turn around a 2-0 half time deficit. We got knocked at Wolves, who went on to win the FA Cup that year.
  • Pretty sure the commentator is the legendary Kenneth Wolstenholme.
    “Some people are on the pitch, they think it’s all over...........it is now.”
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  • PeterGage said:
    Sam Lawrie was a dapper little Scottish fella with jet black hair. He scored 24 goals in one season in the early 60’s playing at outside right......the line up included Leary and Summers.
    And, if my memory serves me right, Sam got a second half hat-trick in a FA Cup game at Ashton Gate in the 1959 -60 season, to turn around a 2-0 half time deficit. We got knocked at Wolves, who went on to win the FA Cup that year.
    He died at the early age of 45......like dear Johnny Summers he was taken way too early.
  • Yes I was there remember a chap at work said no chance of us scoring, replied if Johnny Summers hits the ball from outside the box no defence can help other than the keeper and yes took a good save to stop him . 
    A great Spurs side though.
  • dwb said:
    Stuart Leary is my all time favourite Charlton player.
    Mine too.

    He was the original deep lying centre forward although Don Revie did it later and became more famous for it.

    Before Revie, certainly, but hardly the original. Hidegkuti of the great Hungarian side had made the strategy famous a few years earlier. But he did not invent it either. There were Austrian and South American players in the 1930s who had great success playing that way. Perhaps someone with a better memory than me could supply their names.

      Matthias Sindelar was one of the original deep lying cf.  Greatest ever Austrian player, and the man who put wunder in the Austrian Wunderteam of the 30's.  Scalone won the first WC with Uruguay, and was said to be another deep lying cf.  There's a great noughties BBC documentary on Sindelar that get's repeated occasionally.

      As you'd expect there's a link through the Austrian Wunderteam, Puskas and onto Cruyff and Barcelona.  Jimmy Hogan an English/Irish manager coached the Austrian team, and coached in Hungary.  The manager of the Mighty Magyars said they learnt how to play from Hogan.  Ernst Happel played for the Wunderteam and went on to coach the '78 Netherlands WC team.  There's a great documentary to be made with the emergence of European Football from the Combination Game and the Scottish System:  Albeit with little footage until the 30's!
  • The state of that pitch, perhaps it's no wonder that they slowed things down playing on a surface like that.
  • Stig said:
    The state of that pitch, perhaps it's no wonder that they slowed things down playing on a surface like that.
    Was quite normal and acceptable back then.........doesn’t seem possible does it.
  • It is so nice that so many people on this thread, have lovely memories of the great Stuart, he was a truly great player, and I remember little Sam Lawrie what a good player he was.
  • It is so nice that so many people on this thread, have lovely memories of the great Stuart, he was a truly great player, and I remember little Sam Lawrie what a good player he was.
    Sam went on strike once and worked as a barman in a local pub. 
  •  
    Great thread. Sure my grandfather could have commented on this, regret not asking more. Thanks.
  • I was at that match proudly wearing the huge red and white rosette my mother made for me.  I've still got it but it's very yellowed now!

    Great to see that clip.  What a terrible playing surface by today's standards.

    At home games we used to stand at the top of the old East Terrace, way above the top of today's East Stand and from there you had a great bird's eye view of Leary spraying passes across the pitch.  What a player he was.   
  • edited September 2019
    It is so nice that so many people on this thread, have lovely memories of the great Stuart, he was a truly great player, and I remember little Sam Lawrie what a good player he was.
    Sam went on strike once and worked as a barman in a local pub. 
    On match days he would come to The Valley on his Lambretta and if he saw someone at a bus stop going to the game he would stop and offer them a lift........much to their amazement I would think.
    Not 100% sure of this, but something tells me that at one point he lived in one of the two club houses in Harvey Gardens, alongside the East Stand entrance.....next door to John Hewie.
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  • edited September 2019
    It is so nice that so many people on this thread, have lovely memories of the great Stuart, he was a truly great player, and I remember little Sam Lawrie what a good player he was.
    Sam went on strike once and worked as a barman in a local pub. 
    On match days he would come to The Valley on his Lambretta and if he saw someone at a bus stop going to the game he would stop and offer them a lift........much to their amazement I would think.
    Not 100% sure of this, but something tells me that at one point he lived in one of the two club houses in Floyd Road, alongside the East Stand entrance.....next door to John Hewie.
    Doesn't make sense to me. Do you mean alongside the West Stand entrance ?
    Perhaps, you mean Harvey Gardens, alongside the East Stand entrance ?
  • The two houses next to the East entrance near to where the Valley club was. 
  • The two houses next to the East entrance near to where the Valley club was. 
    The two houses next to the East entrance near to where the Valley club was. 
    Thanks, that's Harvey Gardens.
  • It is so nice that so many people on this thread, have lovely memories of the great Stuart, he was a truly great player, and I remember little Sam Lawrie what a good player he was.
    Sam went on strike once and worked as a barman in a local pub. 
    On match days he would come to The Valley on his Lambretta and if he saw someone at a bus stop going to the game he would stop and offer them a lift........much to their amazement I would think.
    Not 100% sure of this, but something tells me that at one point he lived in one of the two club houses in Floyd Road, alongside the East Stand entrance.....next door to John Hewie.
    Doesn't make sense to me. Do you mean alongside the West Stand entrance ?
    Yes, my mistake, they are in Harvey Gardens.
  • ColinTat said:
    dwb said:
    Stuart Leary is my all time favourite Charlton player.
    Mine too.

    He was the original deep lying centre forward although Don Revie did it later and became more famous for it.

    Before Revie, certainly, but hardly the original. Hidegkuti of the great Hungarian side had made the strategy famous a few years earlier. But he did not invent it either. There were Austrian and South American players in the 1930s who had great success playing that way. Perhaps someone with a better memory than me could supply their names.

      Matthias Sindelar was one of the original deep lying cf.  Greatest ever Austrian player, and the man who put wunder in the Austrian Wunderteam of the 30's.  Scalone won the first WC with Uruguay, and was said to be another deep lying cf.  There's a great noughties BBC documentary on Sindelar that get's repeated occasionally.

      As you'd expect there's a link through the Austrian Wunderteam, Puskas and onto Cruyff and Barcelona.  Jimmy Hogan an English/Irish manager coached the Austrian team, and coached in Hungary.  The manager of the Mighty Magyars said they learnt how to play from Hogan.  Ernst Happel played for the Wunderteam and went on to coach the '78 Netherlands WC team.  There's a great documentary to be made with the emergence of European Football from the Combination Game and the Scottish System:  Albeit with little footage until the 30's!
    Thanks Colin. You answered my question, and with knobs on.
  • A slightly longer clip here.  

    Tottenham: Bill Brown, Maurice Norman, Dave Mackay, Peter Baker, Ron Henry, Danny Blanchflower, Terry Dyson(1), Les Allen (2), Terry Medwin, Bobby Smith, John White.   

    Charlton:  Bill Duff, John Sewell, Don Townsend, John Hewie, Jago, Brian Tocknell, Sam Lawrie, Dennis Edwards, Stuart Leary (c), White, John Summers

    Attendance 54,969.  7th Jan 1961.
     
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fvrx2avZNf0
  • Be interested to know from those of you posting on this thread who were at these games and saw Stuart Leary etc play, what you thought of Ronnie White ?

    He was my late Father's ('Waldo' on Charlton Life) favourite all time player

    Dad started going late 1940's to the Valley and I think Ronnie was with the club for almost all the 1950's
  • Yes I liked Ronnie White, tricky winger loved to take players on
  • edited September 2019
    Yes, a good stylish little player but he wasn’t a winger Js5......he usually wore the 8 or 10 shirt as I remember.
    He wasn’t a nailed on selection.....and I wouldn’t put him anywhere in the same class as most of the forwards we had at the time. He was never a certainty to be on the team sheet. Those ahead of him in the pecking order were of course Leary and Firmani as well as Edwards, Lawrie, Lucas and Mathews.
    I am surprised he was someone’s favourite player when you consider some of the forwards we had to choose from during that era.
    The competition was very strong and when picked never disgraced himself.
  • yes I was there aged 15 standing behind the goal and saw Tocknell's thunderbolt just grazed the post, what an attack Lawrie, Summers and the great Leary
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