Tragedy of Ireland’s Cup Final Saint
AH, little Austin,’ former Southampton manager Lawrie McMenemy says fondly. ‘He had a great heart, real determination. He was small so maybe if my mate Jack Charlton had been the Ireland manager Austin might not have been picked. It’s still so sad how everything ended. A tragedy.’
Thankfully for Austin Hayes, Johnny Giles was player-manager and he caught the eye of the international boss when the two men faced each in the North American Soccer League.
Hayes had joined Southampton as a 16-year-old with fellow Londoner Steve Williams who recalls their bus journeys to and from training as the pair tried to make their way in professional football.
‘Austin would always fall asleep coming back,’ Williams, who went on to play for Arsenal, recalls. ‘After a while I told him I’d leave him on the bus because I wanted to sleep, too. He smiled and next time he was asleep straight away, so I left him on. Our landlady, Mrs Jones, asked where Austin was and I told her what happened. He ended up at the depot and was two hours late for his tea,’ Williams laughs, before a solemnness takes over.
‘Even to this day I still think about him, I still have the heart pin his family gave me. It doesn’t make sense what happened to him.’
Still only 19, Hayes had a brief spell on loan with Los Angeles Aztecs – who also had George Best on their books – when McMenemy sent him there to regain fitness following a knee cartilage injury in 1978.
Giles was winding down with Philadelphia Fury and on May 2, 1979, Hayes followed in the footsteps of another Londoner, Tony Grealish, as one of the originals who benefited from the eligibility rules when he made his only Ireland appearance in a European Championship qualifier against Denmark. He showed his class, too, with a deft cross for Gerry Daly to score the opener in a 2-0 win at Lansdowne Road.
‘Austin was a game lad, clever and brave with a good touch,’ Giles adds. ‘What happened to him is extremely sad. Terrible. Dreadful.’
Austin Hayes (right) died on December 3, 1983, three weeks after he had been diagnosed with lung cancer on returning to London from Sweden where he had been playing for Friska Viljor. He never smoked and only drank half a lager on nights out.
Six weeks before his death he suffered a head injury while on duty with his final club He was 28-years-old. Austin’s twin brothers Stephen and Tony sit at the dining table in their mother’s two-bedroomed terraced house in Staines, a few miles from Heathrow Airport.
This was never where the family were supposed to end up, tragedy brought them here, but they have made it a home and inside are some hidden gems.
You’re greeted by mementos of a cherished career and a life cut short. In one corner is an imposing man-of-the-match trophy from Hayes’ time in LA and draped on top is his Ireland cap. ‘When I heard that the FAI were interested in me I didn’t hesitate in saying that I’d be proud to declare for Ireland,’ Hayes said ahead of his debut. ‘There was no way that I’d consider England, even if they were to approach me.’ On another living room wall is a framed copy of the match programme with signatures of those who played. O’Leary. Giles. Brady. Stapleton. Hayes’ Southampton shirt from the 1979 League Cup final, played on St Patrick’s Day when he lined out with his friend Williams, is folded neatly on the table and like his family’s memories, the bright yellow hasn’t faded. ‘The day of the final, we all had our rosettes pinned on and there were such a sense of excitement,’ Tony says. ‘He would wear Puma boots usually but for the cup final, Stylo paid him £1,000 to wear their boots,’ Stephen remembers. ‘Really? I never knew that. £1,000?!,’ Tony shoots back. ‘Yeah, not bad, eh Tone,’ Stephen adds. ‘No one ever told me about the money, see,’ Tony fumes with mock disgust as the conversation turns to music. ‘I’m a rock boy,’ Tony, wearing the straw fedora he has worn travelling around the world supporting Ireland over the last 20 years, explains. ‘I’m a soul man,’ Stephen continues. ‘But poor Austin, he was a Phil Collins fan,’ Tony deadpans, as the two brothers burst into laughter.
Their sprightly, fiercely independent mother Patsy turns 91 next month and would be here joining in only she is waiting for an operation in hospital. A Limerick native, she moved to Chiswick in west London in the early 1950s with husband Cecil where they raised their four children – Grace, Austin, Stephen and Tony.
Once the kids had all grown up, Patsy and Cecil (who helped to set up Janesboro Football Club back home before emigrating) planned to move to Brighton and enjoy retirement by the seaside.
It didn’t come to that. Aged 58, Cecil went to the hospital for a biopsy and suffered a fatal heartattack.
‘I remember coming out of the room and Austin was running up the escalator to see dad,’ Stephen begins. ‘I had to stop him and tell him what had happened.’
Just 12 months later, Austin passed away as Patsy and the family were dealt another cruel hand.
‘They say the head injury he suffered in Sweden probably triggered something else in his body,’ Tony says. ‘On occasions like this, with Southampton being in the news, we’ll just be sitting there and she will suddenly come out and say, “I still don’t know what he died of”.
‘I find that very troubling. Although we have the diagnosis and it’s on a piece of paper… to me it’s just words, to her it’s just words. To her she still doesn’t know why it happened.’
For Patsy it was about surviving two great devastations. ‘She never left the hospital in all the weeks that Austin was in there,’ Stephen recalls. ‘The nurses were fantastic, there was a family from Israel in the same room, going through the same emotions and we got to know them.
‘I’ll never forget it when the doctor came back in to say Austin had passed. It was so cold. Just “he’s dead”. That poleaxed mum.’
But Patsy was soon back on her feet. ‘She’s strong-willed,’ Tony says. ‘She couldn’t cave in because if she did we all would. She’s the rock, of any family, any Irish family. She’s very positive despite the adverse stuff that’s happened. To lose your husband, the father of your children, your best friend, then a year later lose your oldest son under those circumstances, it’s staggering. She knew there was the rest of us she had to live for.’
Beside that man-of-the-match trophy in Patsy’s front room is a small framed photograph of her eldest son, the Ireland international, wearing his country’s pre-match tracksuit before that Denmark game.
Patsy waited 30 years to see a photograph of him in Ireland colours and when she contacted the FAI to source one, she was informed that their archive didn’t stretch that far back.
Ever-resourceful, she wrote to the Irish Post newspaper who were eventually able to come good for her last year.
Since her son’s passing, Patsy has carried a folded up cut-out of a newspaper article which has the headline ‘The Unknown Player’, a small piece about how there was no official acknowledgment of Austin’s death by the FAI.
‘We’ve got by, we’ve got great memories and had some great days, great times,’ Tony says. ‘Austin did what he did because he loved it. He was proud of his family and we were proud of him. Big time.’