TOMMY SMITH WASN’T BORN , HE WAS QUARRIED
HIS nickname was the Anfield Iron, for very good reason. Tommy Smith, who has died aged 74, was a true Liverpool legend before overuse made the phrase meaningless. Along with Ian Callaghan, he formed the girders on which Bill Shankly’s Anfield revolution was built. He joined the club he loved as a wide-eyed 14-year-old schoolboy, taken to meet the new manager Mr Shankly by his mum, and very quickly learned a lesson that was to remain with him throughout his career. “I was only 15, playing in a five-aside game, and nutmegged (England full-back) Gerry Byrne to score. A couple of minutes later a ball dropped between us, I went to head it, Gerry headed me,’’ he had said.
“As I lay on the ground covered in blood, Bill Shankly looked down at me and said ‘Lesson number one, son, never nutmeg Gerry Byrne and think you can get away with it’.”
Shankly famously said of Smith: “He wasn’t born, he was quarried.”
He was the heartbeat of the first great side Shankly fashioned, the FA Cup victory in 1965 the first in the club’s history, with another title following a year later.
After a trophyless spell, he and Callaghan were the only survivors when ‘the boss’, as Shankly was always called, dismantled that side and built another, significantly making him captain in 1970.
It was as a no-nonsense leader that Smith led Liverpool to their first double in 1973 of league and UEFA Cup, a feat he repeated in 1976 when Bob Paisley was manager.
After announcing his retirement in 1977, and even securing a testimonial, Smith revelled in the greatest double of all, the league and European Cup. Shankly’s philosophy was always based on the intimidation of reputation. He changed Liverpool’s kit to all red to make them more intimidating, and used to get staff to hand out toilet rolls to visiting players, implying that they would need them. For Smith, his reputation had to be that of the Anfield Iron.
“Shanks always wanted us to find an edge, and I make no bones about it,” the former Liverpool captain once explained. “That’s what I was good at. Some players were good dribblers, others good headers, I was a hard tackler and I used it to gain that edge that Shanks was always looking for.”
It served him well. He had only just turned 18 when Shankly promoted him to the first-team squad in 1963 and, even though he didn’t feature regularly until the 196465 season, he was with the squad that won the title a year later.
His nickname was the
Anfield Iron but he was the steel frame on which the building of the modern club we now know Liverpool to be was erected.
So many honours were to follow; four league titles, two European Cups, two FA Cups, two UEFA Cups and a European Super Cup. He was also part of the England team, alongside Ron ‘Chopper’ Harris, which won the Junior World Cup in 1963.
In total, he played 638 games for Liverpool, scoring 48 goals, though he will always be remembered for one in particular – on that night in Rome in 1977 when his near-post header against Borussia Monchengladbach set the Reds on course for their firstever European Cup triumph.
It is a goal that went down in legend, but the tough guy, who was a far better player than most remember, joked: “The way they talked about it, it was as though everyone in the Liverpool team scored goals apart from me!” He had lost his place that season and played only because of injury to Phil Thompson. It was widely thought to be his last game, but he stayed at Anfield for another season, picking up a second European Cup winner’s medal, despite missing the final.
He also earned one England cap, against Wales in 1971, and went on to play for Swansea and LA Aztecs, but Anfield was always his spiritual home. Post-football, Smith was a successful after-dinner speaker and wrote a popular column in the Liverpool Echo.
But he also courted controversy and marred his reputation when branded a racist after some shameful comments – recorded on tape – to an author about black team-mates and neighbours.
His health deteriorated in recent years, after the loss four years ago (following a battle with Alzheimer’s) of his beloved wife Susanne, who he married in 1965.
He was diagnosed with the same condition in 2014, and became increasingly frail in recent months.
He leaves a daughter Janette, son Darren, and four grandchildren: Matthew, William, Jessica and Imogen.
Asked once to sum up his legendary Liverpool career, Anfield Iron Smith replied with a fitting epitaph. “Shanks gave me some advice early on which I clung on to throughout my career.
“He told me never to take any shit from anyone.
“I never did.”