Gordan Banks, OBE: 1937-2019
Born in Tinsley, Sheffield on the 30th of December 1937, Gordon represented Sheffield & District Schools and played junior football for Millspaugh Steelworks FC/Sheffield (2 spells) and Rawmarsh Welfare (for two years from August 1952 before joining Chesterfield as an amateur in April 1954, turning professional in September 1955.
In May 1959 he signed for Leicester City in a £7,000 deal and eight years later moved across the Midlands to Stoke City for £52,000 (April 1967). He then had a spell in the USA with Fort Lauderdale Strikers (March-November 1977) and played briefly for the Irish club St Patrick’s Athletic before returning to Stoke City as a coach in May 1978. Six months later he took up a similar position with Port Vale, also acting as reserve team manager of the Potteries’ club from OctoberDecember 1979. Thereafter he served with Telford United (scout, coach and general manager, season 1980-81), Leicester City (fund raising committee, 1986) and Stoke City again (as club president). He also ran his own Sports Promotion Agency.
Unquestionably the best England goalkeeper of all-time, ‘Banksy’ was dependable, brave, unruffled, a superb handler of the ball with outstanding reflexes. His ‘blinding’ save from Pele's downward header in a temperature of 98 degrees in the Mexico World Cup finals of 1970, is still rated as the greatest ever and people and players are still trying to work out how he did it!
The save came in the 11th minute from a Jairzinho cross. ‘Banksy’ was on his line, and flung himself across his goal to flip Pele’s powerful header over the bar. It was quite an amazing stop, and some years later Pele himself agreed it was the ‘finest save he has ever witnessed.’
But Gordon himself said it wasn’t the best save he ever made.
The one he placed top of his list came from a bullet header from the Newcastle United striker Wyn Davies when he was playing for Stoke in December 1968. Somehow he managed to tip the ball over the bar from two yards to earn the Potters a 1-0 win
Gordon’s consistent performances led to the re-wording of a common English idiom used in everyday speech to ‘Safe as the Banks of England.’
Taking over from Ron Springett, he suffered a 2-1 home defeat by Scotland in April 1963 in his first international and after his second game, a 1-1 draw with Brazil, he received a rollicking from manager Alf Ramsey for ‘falling for Pepe’s threecard trick’ when he curled in a beauty from outside the area.
Gordon took note (he always did) and went on to win a total of 73 caps in ten years.
In fact, he was the first ‘new’ goalkeeper chosen by Alf Ramsey and after playing very well in a 1-1 draw with Brazil and likewise in a 4-2 victory over Czechoslovakia soon after the Scotland match, he said: “The foundations for a club-style spirit have been laid.”
However, Gordon didn’t always get on with ‘Sir Alf ’. They had several arguments and following a 4-3 victory over Portugal in Lisbon in May 1964, Ramsey blamed Gordon for two of the goals and promptly dropped him for the next match against the Republic of Ireland, bringing in the untried Tony Waiters.
But Gordon was soon back in the team and produced some brilliant displays, playing a major part in the 1966 World Cup triumph when he conceded only three goals overall. However, like all goalkeepers, he had his off days!
He knew he had an indifferent game against Scotland at Wembley in April 1967 when he allowed Jim McCalliog’s shot to squeeze past him inside his near post; he gave away a ‘silly’ goal in the 2-2 draw with the Soviet Union eight months later, and was certainly at fault (on his own admission) for Switzerland’s two equalisers in England’s 3-2 win in Basle in October 1971
He also ‘slipped on the treacherous mud and ice surface’ at Hampden Park to allow Scotland’s John Hughes to equalise at 1-1 in February 1968. In between times, however, he was brilliant, especially when Wales were whipped 3-0 at Ninian Park. He next pulled off a stunning save from Amancio’s lightning back-heeler in the 1-0 win over Spain in April 1968 and followed up by saving Carlos Alberto’s penalty in a 2-1 defeat by Brazil in front of 160,000 fans in the Maracana Stadium in Rio de Janeiro in June 1969
In the 1970 World Cup, he was again ‘quite outstanding’ and it was a pity that a stomach bug (Montezumah’s revenge had never been harsher on him than it had on other players) ruled him out the quarter-final clash with West Germany, because one felt – and no disrespect to his replacement Peter Bonetti – that if he had played England would probably have repeated their 1966 final victory and gone on to retain the trophy. We shall never know.
Boss man Ramsey said: “Of all the players to lose, we had to lose him.”
An interesting snippet concerning Gordon materialized from the game against Malta at Wembley in May 1971. England won comfortably by 5-0 but Gordon only touched the ball four times in the entire game, all from back passes.
Gordon has the best ‘goals against’ average in World Cup finals for his country, with only 0.43 goals conceded per 90 minutes played covering nine matches at the 1966 and 1970 finals.
Peter Shilton’s record was 0.56.
Besides winning over 70 caps, Gordon also represented his country in two U23 internationals and played for the Football League six times before his England career came to a premature end in 1972 when he was being pushed all the way by Ray Clemence and Peter Shilton.
Twice a League Cup winner, in 1964 with Leicester City and 1972 with Stoke City, Gordon was named both ‘Footballer of the Year’ and ‘Sportsman of the Year’ in 1972 and was awarded the OBE in 1970. He made over 600 club and international appearances during his lengthy career .... Magnificent for a goalkeeper.
In 2004, Gordon was named by Pelé as one of the top 125 greatest living footballers and was also elected in a poll by the IFFHS as the second best goalkeeper of the 20th Century, behind the giant Russian Lev Yashin and ahead of Italy’s Dino Zoff… and soon afterwards he sold his World Cup winner’s medal at Christies for just £124.
Having seen Gordon play many times, all I can say he was certainly one of the best ‘keepers ever to play football. A true legend.
R.I.P. G.B. Top man.