Bilo Posted 14 April 2013 Share Posted 14 April 2013 A great article in FourFourTwo about him and his time with City. Fascinating read about how he actually felt a career in which he scored 434 goals was unfulfilled due to his lack of playing time in the First Division and being overlooked for England. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bob Weasel Fox Posted 14 April 2013 Share Posted 14 April 2013 A great article in FourFourTwo about him and his time with City. Fascinating read about how he actually felt a career in which he scored 434 goals was unfulfilled due to his lack of playing time in the First Division and being overlooked for England. Legend is too often used but for Arthur Rowley it is the only way to describe him Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Langley Posted 14 April 2013 Share Posted 14 April 2013 I couldn't agree more. I find it fascinating that we as a club don't celebrate him, with Sep Smith, as much as we should. 265 goals for us. "In his 8 seasons at Filbert Street overall, he scored 265 goals in 321 games, including 16 hat-tricks." With Sep, I think that this is one of the best quotes about him, from another City Legend. Smith mentored former Leeds United and England manager Don Revie during his time at Leicester. Revie, who dedicated an entire chapter in his autobiography entitled "What I Owe to Sep Smith" claimed "I'm proud now to think of how much time Sep spent passing on his Soccer [sic] knowledge to me. He played a big part in my shaping my career." He also referred to Smith as "an extraordinary footballer," saying "he could place the ball within an inch of a man's toe - [and] that when he lobbed the ball to his winger the opposing full back felt the ball graze his hair as he tried to strain his neck that extra inch, like a drowning man trying to lift his head out of the water." If we had Rowley today, we'd have won the league by Christmas. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bilo Posted 14 April 2013 Author Share Posted 14 April 2013 The only problem I can think of is that the vast majority of his goals were scored outside of the First Division, and he was therefore seen by much of the football world as a 'flat-track bully.' That seems more than harsh given he scored more than 20 goals in both of his First Division campaigns with us, both in teams stuck in a relegation fight. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
connorlcfc Posted 14 April 2013 Share Posted 14 April 2013 tend not to think about him he nicked my granddads place in the first team!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
melrose Posted 14 April 2013 Share Posted 14 April 2013 I would be interested to know how much his wages were! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
smudger63 Posted 14 April 2013 Share Posted 14 April 2013 I couldn't agree more. I find it fascinating that we as a club don't celebrate him, with Sep Smith, as much as we should. 265 goals for us. "In his 8 seasons at Filbert Street overall, he scored 265 goals in 321 games, including 16 hat-tricks." With Sep, I think that this is one of the best quotes about him, from another City Legend. If we had Rowley today, we'd have won the league by Christmas. Just a little add on to the quote from Don Revie about Sep.Sep was my great uncle, and his brother joe was my Grandad, and he was also at City, but moved to Watford because he couldn`t push his way into the team past another city legend Adam Black. Don Revie was very much taken under the wing by Sep, and in fact Revie actually lodged with my Great Grandma while he was at City. My Dad always said that if you ever saw Revie play, you had seen Sep play, such was the influence Sep had on Revie. Sep only won one England cap, but it`s said that if he had moved to a more fashionable club, he would have won numerous more caps. Sep was one of seven brothers, five of who played professional football at league level,and sep played against two of his other brothers, Jack and Billy in the 1934 FA Cup semi final who were with Portsmouth. Another of Seps brothers Tom also played for City, before moving to Man United, but died in his early thirties. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Callabinho Posted 14 April 2013 Share Posted 14 April 2013 Doesn't he hold the record for the most goals scored in the football league? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
art924 Posted 15 April 2013 Share Posted 15 April 2013 Doesn't he hold the record for the most goals scored in the football league? Certainly is and just 8 short of Arthur Chandler's record for City. Really annoys me about football that great players from the past especially pre TV age are ignored, something we could learn from Cricket. Jimmy Greaves is the highest scorer in the top division with 357 goals, how many people know this fact? Very few I suspect, instead we are feed meaningless stats from Sky (football only started in 1992 remember?) that Alan Shearer or Andy Cole are the best top scorers ever. Considering these guys especially in Rowley's era played for a pittance on slave labour contracts we should be admiring them even more. On a side note I read an excellent biography on Garrincha- amongst those who saw him he was rated every bit as good as Pele- considering he shagged about a thousand women fathered about 13 children, had a disability and was a raging alcoholic dying before he hit 50- thats some achievement. The Brazil side of 58 and 62 is seen as a better one one by those who saw them than the 70 side. But because we have TV footage of Brazil 70 so they are the ones only ever talked about. The Brazil side of 62 invented the concept of the flat back 4 but all we get when Brazil are on the TV is that idiot Tydlesley making snide comments about dodgy Brazilian defenders. It's the lazy journalists and TV companies which treats us Football fans as dumb one dimensional idiots which cause this I guess Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DANGEROUS TIGER Posted 15 April 2013 Share Posted 15 April 2013 Arthur Rowley was a goal scoring machine, who is a true legend. I would like to see a statue of him erected outside our stadium.-- GENIUS! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Babylon Posted 15 April 2013 Share Posted 15 April 2013 How the hell have I managed to go 34 years without knowing Revie started his career at Leicester? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kitchandro Posted 15 April 2013 Share Posted 15 April 2013 Certainly is and just 8 short of Arthur Chandler's record for City. Really annoys me about football that great players from the past especially pre TV age are ignored, something we could learn from Cricket. Jimmy Greaves is the highest scorer in the top division with 357 goals, how many people know this fact? Very few I suspect, instead we are feed meaningless stats from Sky (football only started in 1992 remember?) that Alan Shearer or Andy Cole are the best top scorers ever. Considering these guys especially in Rowley's era played for a pittance on slave labour contracts we should be admiring them even more. On a side note I read an excellent biography on Garrincha- amongst those who saw him he was rated every bit as good as Pele- considering he shagged about a thousand women fathered about 13 children, had a disability and was a raging alcoholic dying before he hit 50- thats some achievement. The Brazil side of 58 and 62 is seen as a better one one by those who saw them than the 70 side. But because we have TV footage of Brazil 70 so they are the ones only ever talked about. The Brazil side of 62 invented the concept of the flat back 4 but all we get when Brazil are on the TV is that idiot Tydlesley making snide comments about dodgy Brazilian defenders. It's the lazy journalists and TV companies which treats us Football fans as dumb one dimensional idiots which cause this I guess Top post. Garrincha is generally rated better than Pele by Brazilians. Apparently there's a saying in Brazil that goes - Brazil is the only country where all the drug dealers snort coke, the prostitutes have orgasms and the best footballer has bent legs. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
marbelladave Posted 15 April 2013 Share Posted 15 April 2013 I doubt there are many on here who actually saw Rowley play but I can just recall seeing him in the 1956/7 promotion season. The game I can remember most clearly was the last game of the season, Orient formed two lines and clapped us onto the field as we were already champions, then proceeded to stuff us 1-4. We were presented with the trophy, a shield I think, on the field at the end of the game. The only time I have actually seen City win anything, in person anyway. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DANGEROUS TIGER Posted 15 April 2013 Share Posted 15 April 2013 How the hell have I managed to go 34 years without knowing Revie started his career at Leicester? These things happen Babble on. He missed the 1949 Cup Final against Wolves due to injury. Some things never change. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DANGEROUS TIGER Posted 15 April 2013 Share Posted 15 April 2013 I doubt there are many on here who actually saw Rowley play but I can just recall seeing him in the 1956/7 promotion season. The game I can remember most clearly was the last game of the season, Orient formed two lines and clapped us onto the field as we were already champions, then proceeded to stuff us 1-4. We were presented with the trophy, a shield I think, on the field at the end of the game. The only time I have actually seen City win anything, in person anyway. Was taken to my first match about then, but don't remember it very well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
marbelladave Posted 15 April 2013 Share Posted 15 April 2013 Was taken to my first match about then, but don't remember it very well. Same here, I do remember the bits mentioned from the Orient game, though none of the game itself. I would have been about 7 I think, my old man had a season ticket in the Wing stand, about level with the edge of the 'D' at the double decker end. Next thing I remember is going in a group and sitting om the wall in the Popular side, would have been about 10 or 11 I would think. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Corky Posted 15 April 2013 Share Posted 15 April 2013 How the hell have I managed to go 34 years without knowing Revie started his career at Leicester? Too busy staring at your Nigel Pearson posters to research it, no doubt Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
smudger63 Posted 15 April 2013 Share Posted 15 April 2013 These things happen Babble on. He missed the 1949 Cup Final against Wolves due to injury. Some things never change. Revie had a bang on the nose and burst a blood vessel, very nearly cost him his life.His place was taken by Jimmy Harrison who was a full back, and so played out of position, rather than Sep, who seemed the natural replacement for Revie, but who was retiring from playing at the end of the season. The fact that Jimmy Harrison was getting married to Len Shipmans daughter helped him get the nod, according to my family anyway. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Langley Posted 15 April 2013 Share Posted 15 April 2013 How the hell have I managed to go 34 years without knowing Revie started his career at Leicester? Just one of those I guess. Like a lot don't know that Lineker started at City too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Iwan is a Welshman Posted 15 April 2013 Share Posted 15 April 2013 Not often I say this about FT, especially when we're off form, but what a cracking thread. Smith, Chandler, Black, Cross, Rowley, Lineker, Weller - where are the statues for these people? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bilo Posted 15 April 2013 Author Share Posted 15 April 2013 Not often I say this about FT, especially when we're off form, but what a cracking thread. Smith, Chandler, Black, Cross, Rowley, Lineker, Weller - where are the statues for these people? Wasn't Adam Black the bloke who had a 17 year old wife when he was pushing 60? I agree though, we've enough players who've contributed hugely to the English game to warrant at least one statue. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Langley Posted 15 April 2013 Share Posted 15 April 2013 Not often I say this about FT, especially when we're off form, but what a cracking thread. Smith, Chandler, Black, Cross, Rowley, Lineker, Weller - where are the statues for these people? All of this without Banks & Shilton being mentioned. Oh wait... Here's Rowley's obit from the Guardian: Arthur Rowley, who has died at the age of 76, had one of the most explosive left foots in postwar English football. Though he never quite achieved the stature of his older brother Jack, himself a formidable left-footed goal scorer for Manchester United and England, Arthur was astonishingly prolific over many seasons. Altogether, he scored 434 goals in 619 Football League games for four different clubs.Born, like his brother, in Wolverhampton, his first club was not Wolves - where Jack was so quickly and rashly discarded - but West Bromwich Albion. Powerfully built, standing 5ft 11in and weighing 13st 6lb, he was only a little better appreciated at the Hawthorns than was Jack at Molineux. Making a couple of league appearances in the first postwar season, 21 the next, for just four goals, and just one in 1948-49, he was sold that season to Fulham - and, at once, flourished. Albion lived to rue the day they let him go, for his 19 goals in only 22 games, from centre-forward, won Fulham the second division championship and promotion to the first. Albion, however, went up too, finishing a single point behind Fulham. In the second division, Rowley's left foot was a deadly weapon, from either close or long range, but the first division was far less fruitful for him. He scored only eight times in his 34 matches, which suggests the gulf between his talents as a centre-forward, and those of brother Jack, a regular scorer for Manchester United in the top division. Fulham seemed of that opinion too, since, at the end of his second season at Craven Cottage, they transferred Arthur to Leicester City, where he would stay for the next eight, hugely productive seasons. At Filbert Street, the gulf would narrow, for when Rowley eventually returned to the first division, he would be just as dangerous a striker as he had been in division two. His first four seasons at Filbert Street, in the second division, saw him score no fewer than 115 goals, 30 of them in Leicester's 1953-54 promotion season, when they won the second division title on goal average from Everton. Returning at last to the top division, he would score 23 times in 36 games. It was hardly Rowley's fault that Leicester went straight back to the second division. In season 1956-57, however, the club bounced back again, and this time there was no question of their winning the second division title on mere goal average. With Rowley contributing another quite remarkable haul of 44 goals in 42 games, Leicester finished fully seven points ahead of their east midland rivals, Nottingham Forest. Now Rowley was back in the first division again, with an honourable booty of 20 goals in his 25 games. This time, Leicester stayed up, but, at the end of the season, a still fully functional Arthur Rowley left them to become player- manager of Shrewsbury Town, arriving at what was then hardly a Gay Meadow, for the club had just finished 17th in the old third division (south), having scored a parsimonious 49 goals. Rowley would soon change all that. Banging away with that famous left foot, he scored 38 goals in 43 games, enabling the club to win promotion from the newly-formed fourth division. Though steadily gaining weight, Rowley continued to score prodigiously - 32, 28, 23 and 24 goals in the ensuing four seasons. Only then, his last couple of years, would he fall away, with just five goals in season 1963-64, and two in a dozen games in his last season at Gay Meadow, 1964-65. A short spell at Sheffield United, as joint manager with John Harris, the former Chelsea centre-half who had been at Bramall Lane for years, was ill-augured. Harris did not want anyone to share his authority, and Rowley himself was known as a forceful, uncompromising, even perhaps, authoritarian character. He was much happier when, in 1970, he became manager, for the next six years, of Southend United. In season 1971-72, Southend came second in the fourth division, and were thus promoted to the third, though in season 1975-76, Rowley's last in charge, the club was relegated again. He subsequently pursued a business career. His wife and son survive him. · Arthur Rowley, footballer, born April 21 1926; died December 19 2002. I think that it would be fitting homage to such legends to have some sort of home where we call 'home'. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jonthefox Posted 15 April 2013 Share Posted 15 April 2013 Wasn't Adam Black the bloke who had a 17 year old wife when he was pushing 60? I agree though, we've enough players who've contributed hugely to the English game to warrant at least one statue. Trouble is that we can't agree on one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DANGEROUS TIGER Posted 16 April 2013 Share Posted 16 April 2013 Revie had a bang on the nose and burst a blood vessel, very nearly cost him his life. His place was taken by Jimmy Harrison who was a full back, and so played out of position, rather than Sep, who seemed the natural replacement for Revie, but who was retiring from playing at the end of the season. The fact that Jimmy Harrison was getting married to Len Shipmans daughter helped him get the nod, according to my family anyway. Interesting. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
allotment-fox Posted 16 April 2013 Share Posted 16 April 2013 As a youngster I was coached by Arthur Rowley in the mid 60's on Vicky Park & Saffron lane The man was a top bloke, from my best memory a true gent and a I'm glad to have known / met him Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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