WHEN VILLANS BECAME HEROES
We started the season so badly… but that made Graham Taylor more convinced we would go up!
MARTIN KEOWN is catching up with two of his former teammates, Garry Thompson and Tony Daley, three decades after they were in the last Aston Villa team to win promotion to the top flight in 1988.
The trio have been chatting for half an hour when Keown brings up the holiday in Majorca which chairman Doug Ellis arranged for the players to celebrate.
‘Do you remember the banana boat?’ asks Keown. ‘I was on it with Nigel Spink, Alan McInally and Warren Aspinall. We all fell off and there was a fight just to get back on. You realised then just how big and strong everyone was! It was a team of men.’
Twelve months earlier, Villa had been sinking. Relegated from the First Division only five years after being crowned champions of Europe, the club were going nowhere fast and there was a fear of falling further.
It all changed in May 1987 when, with his players still smarting from relegation, Ellis introduced them to new manager Graham Taylor. Thompson picks up the story…
THOMPSON:
Graham walked in, threw Doug out of the meeting and slaughtered a few people — and I was one of the last. He said to me: ‘You run around with your socks around your ankles, you get booked more times than you score, you’re useless!’ KEOWN:
You could not have choreographed it better. He said, ‘I’m a successful person. We are guaranteed to win promotion if you follow me.’ I was convinced. He pointed to the door and said, ‘If you want to go, now’s the time to do so.’ Eleven players left that summer and another 11 came in. Graham had to take control. DALEY:
Do you remember pre-season? He used to run and run. He bombed off and we had to keep up with him. We’d go for an hour and 25 minutes with no water. You could see Jim Paul, the kit man, with the water 200 yards in the distance — then Graham would turn off to the right! I like running but I was broken. KEOWN:
It was four miles around the training ground and we had to finish ahead of him. I used to annoy him because I would run past him and go, ‘I’ve done you again!’ It was like we had joined the army. THOMPSON:
I didn’t play until November. I had a groin strain but they couldn’t find out what the problem was. Doug said, ‘This isn’t working out. We could give you £20,000 if you retire.’ We had been relegated and I didn’t want to retire. I couldn’t go out like that. FOUR games into the season and Villa are winless with only two points on the board. It is clear that this would be no quick fix. Taylor set about changing the whole culture of the club. THOMPSON:
I turned up at Villa the year we got relegated. I had known Gary Shaw for years and he said, ‘You’re five years too late. The place is gone.’ The way we trained, the penny-pinching with the chairman, you could see it was only going one way. KEOWN:
We signed together. I remember returning to our hotel and thinking, ‘No one wants to be here.’ The stadium was impressive but behind the scenes! THOMPSON:
I was told that Billy McNeill, the previous manager, would pick the team on the Thursday, then Doug would try to make alterations. In the end, they stopped speaking. How can you run a club like that? DALEY:
I was a youngster and I didn’t know any different. It was rancid. There was a culture of drinking. I never used to drink but I would drive the lads around. I remember Graham pulling me
into his office, sitting me down and looking at me for two minutes, not saying a word. Then he said, ‘You’ve been going out getting drunk with Shawsy, Tommo, whoever. You’re 18. If I catch you out again, you’ll be finished.’ And I hadn’t even been drinking! THOMPSON:
He did the same with David Platt, didn’t he? DALEY:
He kept you on your toes all the time. Your worst enemy is your comfort zone. KEOWN:
Do you remember all that business about washing our own kit? Jim, the kit man, had nothing to do all week. I tried to do a deal with Jim to wash my kit. Graham caught me and asked what I was doing. I said I was helping Jim with the crossword! THOMPSON:
I used to come to training dressed like the Fonz from
Happy Days. Graham said to me, ‘What do you think your neighbours think when they see you every morning?’ I go, ‘It’s Tommo off on his way to work.’ He goes, ‘No. There’s that scruffy so-andso. Don’t ever come in like that again. You dress for work.’ KEOWN:
We started the season so badly, but Graham got us all together and told us he was even more convinced we would go up! THOMPSON:
The fans were expecting us to win but the expectation was too much. I’m sitting in the stands watching seasoned players wilt. Graham said there was a disconnect between players and fans. He told us to get into the community to bring them back in. KEOWN:
We couldn’t win at home but we won 13 away games. This division is really difficult to get out of. People would try to beat you up. DALEY:
Being a winger, I was getting whacked. Tommo, you were the enforcer. You were a good protector on the field. KEOWN: Tommo’s pincer tackle! THOMPSON:
I would catch them with one leg and bring the other in. A friend showed me a video from that year, playing Oldham. I’ve done the most horrendous tackle and the ref has only given me a talking to! KEOWN:
Graham built a team of solid characters but with good ability. I don’t remember a winger getting past Kevin Gage and Mark Lillis was as hard as nails. THOMPSON:
I remember winning 4-2 at Bradford in November and we’d just signed the two Grays, Stuart and Andy. Stuart scored two goals. The second one, he picked it up, played two one-twos and bent it in the corner. I knew we had the final piece of the jigsaw. VILLA were top at Christmas but a run of four wins in 13 meant they travelled to Swindon on the final day with their automatic promotion hopes hanging by a thread. KEOWN:
On the Friday before the Swindon game, Graham served us all champagne. He said we might as well drink this now and prepare for the play-offs. DALEY:
I still believed we were going up automatically. THOMPSON:
He still believed we were going to do it. He was relaxing us. I have watched the Swindon game back. I hit the bar, we had a couple more chances to score, it ended 0-0. Then we had to wait 10 minutes to find out if we were going up. But for me, there was never any doubt. KEOWN:
I missed the last two through injury. They were the most agonising I’ve ever watched. With 10 minutes to go at Swindon, I couldn’t take it. I left the ground. I was pacing around outside and only went back in when I thought it was over. The journey back on the coach — I never wanted it to end. Then Doug took us to Majorca. What a trip that was! DALEY:
We’d heard so much about this boat — his ‘yacht’. KEOWN:
It wasn’t a yacht in the Abramovich sense. We could barely all fit on board! THOMPSON:
I was a local boy. It was a great season with the club I support. We got back to where we belonged. KEOWN:
That is how the current Villa players will feel if they get the job done. I was fortunate to win titles with Arsenal but promotion with Villa is the most satisfying moment of my career.