When I was at primary school I used to get the annual
football sticker book. You bought a strip of hard chewing gum and some random stickers
came with it. At the top of each page was a space for the manager and a few
remain in my mind - Tommy Docherty (Man Utd), Brian
Clough (Nottingham), Bob Paisley (Liverpool) and Malcolm Allison (Manchester
City). I remember Malcolm as he wore a fedora and sheepskin coats and looked
like a dodgy car salesman.
In the sixties and seventies when football ruled the world
Big Mal was a character who dated Playboy bunnies, loved champagne, chomped on
cigars, was outspoken and didn’t care for the opinions of others. I thought I’d
visit the place where the nursing home where life finally puttered out and the
crematorium where he was turned to dust – also the old Maine Road area where City’s
stadium stood for decades (now redeveloped.)
A
quick summary: this bright lad who was born in Kent was heading to grammar
school but he deliberately failed the exam as the school played rugby not
football. He was obsessed with football and after some menial jobs he joined
Charlton Rovers and then Charlton Athletic.
After seven seasons he was shown the door after telling club coaches
know that their training method of making players run up and down the field was
useless. He started staying behind after training to work on new tactics and
training methods. He moved to West Ham but life as a footballer was suddenly
over. He was ill after a game against Sheffield United, contracted tuberculosis
and had a lung removed. Thinking the dream was over he left football altogether
and worked as a car salesman, professional gambler and nightclub owner. However
football was in the veins and he returned to play a final season for non-league
Romford in 1963.
The
old training sessions he’d instigated years before proved to be a golden egg.
He coached for Cambridge and then moved into management at Bath City. He
doubled the number of training sessions to four even though the players had
full-time jobs. This reaped successful results and other football clubs took
interest in him. He soon moved to Manchester City where he became well known to
the wider public. Their manager Joe Mercer was hampered by ill-health and
needed a sparky assistant. Sparky Malcolm got the job. The Mercer/Allison
chapter is probably the strongest in Manchester City's history (even I can
remember it.) Results came fast: at something like 200-to-1 odds they were the
shock winners of the First Division in 1967–68 and in the following seasons
they won the 1969 FA Cup, the 1970 League Cup and Cup Winners' Cup. Stubbornly
Joe Mercer refused to step down and their relationship soured. Eventually
Malcolm became manager but it was too late to save the relationship. Joe left,
the team struggled and Malcolm resigned in March 1973.
He
went to manage Crystal Palace and this flamboyant character whose colourful
life was often on the front pages than the back pages gave the supporters a
rollercoaster ride. After loses he implemented profound changes in style on and
off the field (the sweeper system was unknown at that time), made countless
media appearances, re-branded the club's rather homely nickname (they went from
'The Glaziers' to 'The Eagles') and - after a 68 year history - changed the
home strip colours. This larger-than-life splash of colour put Palace on the
map and increased the number of supporters.
Fortunes rose though and the 1975–76 season was the most successful
season for years. At this time Malcolm’s fedora hat started making an
appearance and the media made much print out of the flamboyant man under it. He
resigned in May 1976 and three years later was back at Manchester City. With a
decent war chest Malcolm built a new team but success was patchy. His off-field
life was more interesting than his football life. The tabloid newspapers liked
his quotes, unpredictable nature, politically incorrect outspoken nature and
womanising. Among the many women he associated with were some known faces -
Christine Keeler (Profumo scandal), singer Dorothy
Squires and two Miss United Kingdom beauty queens.
He
managed clubs in Turkey and Portugal but seemed to fade away after that. Life
had brimmed. There were six children in total. He had four by his first wife
Beth who he was married to for 22 years, a daughter from a lady from the
Playboy Club (who he proposed to after they had been in a car crash) and
another daughter from long-term partner Lynn Salton who he was with for
seventeen years (this relationship ended too.) There were 13 grandchildren and
three great grandchildren.
What
had happened to him? After a colourful but bumpy career he did a touring chat
show with Tommy Docherty and seem to fade away after that. Malcolm’s son
revealed his 74-year-old dad was an alcoholic and a few years later it was
reported he was suffering from depression and dementia. He spent the last few
years in a nursing home in Urmston on the outskirts of Manchester and died
there. At the funeral there was a lap of the Etihad Stadium for the fans who
turned out. A Manchester City scarf was draped over the coffin next to an ice
bucket containing a bottle of Moet et Chandon
champagne. He was cremated at Southern Cemetery in Manchester.
As
I can still remember this champagne-swigging, bunny-girl-banging flamboyant
character who brought more light that darkness to football I thought I’d visit
the church where at Southern Cemetery where the funeral service was held (I was
hoping he might have been buried near Sir Matt Busby). I had to park some
distance up the road on that Sunday afternoon as there was a burial/funeral in
the Jewish part of the cemetery next door. I walked among the dark-dressed
mourners and received some odd looks.
Next
I drove fifteen minutes to Moss Side where the old Maine Road football stadium
once stood; surely this was where Malcolm’s golden days were lived out – not
the Etihad. The last time I went to the Maine Road stadium was in the 1990s to
see Rod Stewart (supported by Belinda Carlisle and Paul Carrick.) I can
remember walking up the rabbit-warren of Victorian terraced houses and the
stadium appeared. I got out of the car and had a walk around the new rather
dull housing development. Most of the houses looked the same and the streets
looked the same too. Drab Developments Limited had missed a chance to create
something better. It’s surrounded by old Coronation-Street-style terraced
streets whose Victoriana dumbs down the new development a little. I had a walk
around and only saw one person. Everyone seemed to be indoors watching huge
50”+ televisions. There were no chimneys, just flues (I like a nice bold
chimney stack.) I stood on the central patch of grass assuming this had been
the middle of the football pitch once.
Light
was fading but I made my way to Urmston to the nursing home where Malcolm’s
life ended. I found it down a quiet single-traffic road next to a car park and
Trafford Football Club. I took a few photos before the sun finally went to bed.
I sat in the car and had a coffee, a peanut sandwich and some crisps. Bursting
for a wee I got out and slashed in some bushes. Suddenly a woman appeared with
a dog and I turned away so quickly a thorny bush took purchase of my manhood.
Pulling it out I got a couple of thorns stuck in it. As I sat in the car
pulling them out I thought, “Well….Malcolm’s worth a thorny manservant. They
don’t make ‘em like that anymore.”
Around the back…
Next door is the
Jewish section of the cemetery. I mingle around the mourners and got some odd
looks…
Malcolm’s
cortege went round the new stadium…but I went round the site of the old Maine
Road stadium…
Central to the
development is this patch of grass…
The development
at the end of the street is where the stadium once stood…
From that….to
this…
Oasis played
there in 1996…
The nursing home
where Malcolm died…