Danny Blanchflower

Danny Blanchflower

Personal information
Full name	Robert Dennis Blanchflower
Date of birth	10 February 1926(1926-02-10)
Place of birth	Belfast, Northern Ireland
Date of death	9 December 1993(1993-12-09) (aged 67)
Place of death	London, England
Playing position	Midfielder
Youth career
194?–1949	Glentoran
Senior career*
Years	Team	Apps†	(Gls)†
1949–1951	Barnsley	68	(2)
1951–1954	Aston Villa	148	(10)
1954–1964	Tottenham Hotspur	337	(15)
1961	→ Toronto City (loan)
National team
1949–1963	Northern Ireland	56	(2)
Teams managed
1978–1979?	Northern Ireland
1978?–1979	Chelsea
* Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only. † Appearances (Goals).

Robert Dennis "Danny" Blanchflower (10 February 1926 – 9 December 1993) was a Northern Irish footballer, football manager, and journalist who captained Tottenham Hotspur F.C. during its double-winning season of 1961. He was ranked as the greatest player in Spurs history by The Times in 2009.^[1] He is remembered as one of the great tacticians in the history of the game, renowned for his passing, and as an outstanding right-half.

Early years

Blanchflower was born on 10 February 1926 in the Bloomfield district of Belfast. His mother had played as a centre-forward on a women's football team. He was educated at Ravenscroft public elementary school and was awarded a scholarship to Belfast College of Technology.^[2] His younger brother, Jackie, played for Manchester United.

He left early to become an apprentice electrician at Gallaher's cigarette factory in Belfast. He also joined the Air Raid Precautions (ARP) and in 1943 lied about his age in order to join the RAF. As a trainee navigator he was sent on a course to St Andrews University (where he acquired a lifelong love of golf) and in the spring of 1945 was posted to Canada for further training. By 1946, aged 20, he was back in Belfast, back at Gallaher's, and building a reputation as an outstanding footballer.^[2]

Playing career

He began his professional football career at the end of the Second World War when he was signed by Belfast side Glentoran. In 1949, Barnsley paid £6,000 to transfer him to England, and two years later Aston Villa bought him for £15,000. He played 148 times for Villa in the League,^[3] captaining the side on many occasions. He grew disenchanted with the club and the way training was conducted, becoming one of the first to propose that players should train with a ball as opposed to merely undertaking physical exercise.

In 1954 he was bought by Tottenham Hotspur for the huge fee of £30,000, and during his ten years at White Hart Lane he made 337 League appearances,^[3] and 382 total appearances (scoring 21 goals).^[1]

The highlight of his time at Spurs came with the 1960–61 season. With Blanchflower as captain Spurs won their first 11 games, still a record for the top flight of English football and eventually won the league by 8 points. They then beat Leicester City in the final of the FA Cup to become the first team in the 20th century to win the League and Cup double, not achieved since Aston Villa in 1897.

In 1962 he again captained the Spurs team to victory in the FA Cup (scoring a penalty in the final against Burnley), only narrowly missing out on a second double when they finished a close third in the league behind Ipswich Town and Burnley, and in 1963 he captained his side to victory over Atlético Madrid in the final of the European Cup Winners' Cup. During his time with Spurs he also had a short spell with Toronto City, alongside fellow Football League players Stanley Matthews and Johnny Haynes.^[4]

Between 1949 and 1963, he earned 56 caps for Northern Ireland, often playing alongside his brother Jackie, and in 1958 captained his country when they reached the quarter-finals of the World Cup. On 4 December 1957 he captained the Northern Ireland team against Italy in Belfast, in a bad tempered game that came to be known as the "Battle of Belfast"; Blanchflower attempted to keep the peace as the game turned nasty.^[5]

International goals

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

#	Date	Venue	Opponent	Result	Competition
1	4 June 1960	Wrexham, Wales	Wales	2-3	1960 British Home Championship
2	11 September 1960	Glasgow, Scotland	Scotland	2-5	1961 British Home Championship

Career as manager

He became manager of Northern Ireland for a brief spell in 1978, and was then appointed as Chelsea boss. However, he won only three of his 15 games in charge and he left them in September 1979.^[2]

Off the field

He was one of only a handful of players to have been awarded the title of English Footballer of the Year on two occasions, winning in both 1958 and 1961. On 6 February 1961, he also became the first person to turn down the invitation to appear on This Is Your Life, simply walking away from host Eamonn Andrews live on air. "I consider this programme to be an invasion of privacy", he explained. "Nobody is going to press gang me into anything."

Blanchflower commentated on a match for ITV as early as 3 January 1956 - the final of the Southern Junior Floodlit Cup between West Ham and Chelsea.^[6] He was the colour commentator for the CBS television network broadcasts of National Professional Soccer League matches in the United States in 1967.^[7] His candour about the fledgling league's shortcomings distressed network executives, as he recounted in a 10 June 1968 Sports Illustrated article he authored.^[8] In the 1968-69 season he was the regular commentator for Yorkshire Television.^[9]

Anton Weinberg's 1985 Channel 4 documentary film The Keller Instinct featured an appearance by Blanchflower, who spoke approvingly of his late friend musicologist Hans Keller's advocacy of inventive, tactically creative football.

He died at his home in London on 9 December 1993, having suffered from Alzheimer's disease.^[2]

Honours

• English League Championship (1961)
• FA Cup (1961) (1962)
• European Cup Winners Cup (1963)
• Football Writers Player of the Year (1958) (1961)

Filmography

• Those Glory Glory Days (1983)

References

1. ^ ^{a b} Myers, Phil (17 March 2009). "The 50 greatest Tottenham Hotspur players (Page 12 of 12)". London: timesonline.co.uk. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/football/premier_league/tottenham/article5920090.ece?token=null&offset=132&page=12. Retrieved 31 July 2010. 
2. ^ ^{a b c d} "Danny Blanchflower - fact file". mehstg.com. http://archive.mehstg.com/fact_blanchflower.htm. Retrieved 31 July 2010. 
3. ^ ^{a b} Football League Career Stats at Neil Brown
4. ^ Lance Hornby. "All the King's men: Real Madrid makes way to T.O.". Slam Sports. slam.canoe.ca. http://slam.canoe.ca/Slam/Soccer/TorontoFC/2009/08/04/10355821-sun.html. Retrieved 31 July 2010. 
5. ^ Malcolm Brodie (5 December 2007). "Down Memory Lane: Battle of Belfast was far from a golden moment". Belfast Telegraph. http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/sport/football/international/down-memory-lane-battle-of-belfast-was-far-from-a-golden-moment-13499897.html?startindex=-1. Retrieved 31 July 2010. 
6. ^ TV Times, 30 December 1955
7. ^ Maule, Tex. "Kickoff For A Babel Of Booters," Sports Illustrated, 24 April 1967.
8. ^ Blanchflower, Danny. "Just One Truth For Me," Sports Illustrated, 10 June 1968.
9. ^ Yorkshire ITV Football Highlights 1968-1983

Bibliography

• David Bowler (1997). Danny Blanchflower: The Biography of a Visionary. Orion. ISBN 0-575-06504-4. 
• Danny Blanchflower (1961). The Double and Before. Nicholas Kaye. 
• Danny Blanchflower (1959). Danny Blanchflower's Soccer Book. Frederick Muller. 

Persondata
Name	Blanchflower, Danny
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	10 February 1926
Place of birth	Belfast, Northern Ireland
Date of death	9 December 1993
Place of death	London, England