The Way It Was My Autobiography eBook Sir Stanley Matthews
Download As PDF : The Way It Was My Autobiography eBook Sir Stanley Matthews 
The classic football memoir, now available as an ebook
‘An absolute magical player. I loved him’ Sir Bobby Charlton
‘A god to those of us who aspired to play the game’ Brian Clough
‘The man who taught us the way football should be played’ Pelé
Sir Stanley Matthews was the most popular footballer of his era and the game’s first global superstar. He was the first footballer to be knighted, the first European Footballer of the Year (aged 41), and he played in the top division until he was 50. His performance in the ‘Matthews final’ of 1953, when he inspired Blackpool to victory over Bolton, is widely considered the finest in FA Cup history.
Here, in his own words, and showcasing his unique humour, is a sporting gentleman who epitomised a generation of legendary players Sir Tom Finney, Nat Lofthouse, Billy Wright and many more. The Way It Was My Autobiography is filled with characters, camaraderie, drama and insight, and is essential reading for anyone who wants to understand how football, and society, have changed over the last century. It is a fascinating memoir of a great footballer, and the remarkable story of an extraordinary life.
Praise for The Way it Was
‘A ticket to a different era, when the game wasn't saturated with money and men like Sir Stanley upheld sporting ideals’ The Times
‘There is a heartfelt, elegiac quality [to] The Way It Was… it is only a pity he is not here to see it published’ Independent
‘Brings vividly to life some of the greatest games of the time and features his perceptive analysis of the characters who illuminated the age’ Independent
‘A gracefully crafted autobiography filled with entertaining anecdotes reflecting an age when the game was uncorrupted by greed’ Birmingham Post
‘A fascinating and amusing insight into the inner workings of football during its golden era’ Daily Telegraph
‘It is impossible to imagine any of today’s football stars ever producing a memoir half so interesting’ Mail on Sunday
The Way It Was My Autobiography eBook Sir Stanley Matthews
This is a wonderful insight into an age when footballers rubbed shoulders on the bus with the folk who paid their meagre wages, and had extra jobs as butchers, bakers and candlestick makers: of necessity, as the footballer’s maximum wage was only £12 a week.Stanley Matthews was a football colossus who only retired after his 50th birthday: the first footballer to be knighted while still playing, he made 783 league and cup games and 84 matches for England.
And this despite missing out on the prime playing years of his career, aged 24 to 31, because of the Second World War.
Although he still played friendly matches and exhibition games, our Stan was on duty with the RAF and didn’t return to competitive games until the 1946-7 season: at the seemingly veteran age of 31. Little did we know then that he wasn’t to retire for another 20 years!
One of the secrets of Matthews’ longevity was his strict dietary and fitness regime: in this sense he was truly ahead of his time. He rose early and went for a run, was virtually a vegetarian and only once touched alcohol: a sip of champagne from the FA Cup after Blackpool’s victory in 1953.
There are some fantastic anecdotes in the autobiography which will be treasured by any football fan who grew up loving the game in the Sixties or Seventies: when defenders were harder than nine inch nails, and pitches and footballs were heavy and muddy.
There was the time he joined Denis Law and George Best at a soccer school in Australia... along with a tubby Hungarian none of the kids recognised, called Ferenc Puskas... a three time European Cup winner with Real Madrid.
Coaching in Soweto, in apartheid South Africa, in 1955, and turning up at the team hotel a few hours before the first game of the season.
Blackpool boss Joe Smith asked: “Where the bloody hell have you been?”
“South Africa,” I replied. “I rang and told you but you never listen.”
“When did you get back?”
“Last night.”
“Are you match fit?”
“Yes.”
Joe turned to reserve team player John McKenna who had been sitting alongside him and said:
“You’re not playing.”
Meeting a young Brian Clough: “My first impression was that he was arrogant because he came across as someone who, for all his youth, knew it all. Yet as our conversation progressed, I came to the conclusion that under that swagger and self-assertiveness, he had some great ideas about football. When the conversation turned to the FA and what they were doing for football and players in general, he didn’t mince his words. “They do bugger all” he said with a wag of his finger “and they don’t start til noon”.
Some of the most vivid moments in the book are accounts of his run-ins with the authorities: not surprisingly, as a strong-minded working man with a great sense of justice and decency, in an age when footballers were treated as chattels.
As a young England player, he was given a dressing-down for claiming a cup of tea and a cake on expenses during his train back from an international game. Yes, in the 40s and 50s international footballers had to make their own way home from international games back to their clubs.
England deigned to enter their first World Cup in 1950, having ignored the competition as a foreign frippery for the previous 20 years. After elimination and an ignominious defeat against the USA (a modern day comparison would be losing to San Marino), it was on the plane home.
Stan recalls: “No one from the FA or the England management stayed on to watch the remainder of the World Cup. .. The pompous and ill-conceived idea that nothing could be learned from those teams has been our undoing on the international front. England were left behind and that state of affairs lasted until 1966, and has done intermittently ever since.”
He reveals his account of the notorious Nazi salute given by England players before the 1938 game against Germany in Berlin.
“As the players were getting changed, an FA official came into our dressing room and informed us that when our national anthem was played the German team would salute as a mark of respect. The FA wanted us to reciprocate by giving the raised arm Nazi salute during the playing of their German national anthem. The dressing room erupted. There was bedlam. All the England players were livid... Eddie Hapgood, normally a respectful and devoted captain, wagged his finger at the official and told him what he could do with the Nazi salute, which involved putting it where the sun doesn’t shine.... The beleaguered FA official left only to return some minutes later saying he had a direct order from Sir Neville Henderson, the British ambasaador in Berlin.”
Returning to his home-town club of Stoke City in the twilight of his career, Matthews was astonished to discover that Blackpool wouldn’t give him a free transfer, but were demanding a transfer fee for this veteran of 46.
“I respectfully asked the Blackpool board if there was any way, given my years of service to the club, they could waive the fee, but was told in no uncertain terms: “No”. One director, Mr Marshall, enraged me. Drawing himself up in his chair he admonished me for asking as if I were an impertinent schoolboy, concluding by saying: “You forget, as a player we made you.”
“You- made- ME?” I said totally flabbergasted. “As a small boy I was getting up at six in the morning to train and practice my skills, and I continue to do so to this day. When I came here this club had only a few hundred season tickets holders. Now it has over 12,000. My presence in the team made Blackpool become, for a number of years, the biggest draw on the road. With their share of the gate revenues, this club has done very well out of that financially. So don’t you sit there and tell me, YOU made ME.”
Blackpool stuck out for the fee.
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The Way It Was My Autobiography eBook Sir Stanley Matthews Reviews
What a wonderful memoir.
Stanley Matthews was one of the greatest footballers ever, and in this book tells his story with humour, but without the bravado of our era.
He gives us lovely images of the players of his time, and the games they played.
Makes one wish that one could go back in time.
Stanley Matthews memoir is filled with meticulous details of a bygone era. I'm under the impression that Matthews in British sport must hold a place similar to the way we see some of our baseball legends, something like that. The breadth of detail is in fact a bit cumbersome and at times, maybe dry, I really think the book should be read alongside Matthews' contemporaryTom Finney Autobiography which has a nice easygoing flow to it and is highly readable compared to this one. Still, it easily merits a top rating.
Matthews accounts are of the utmost intimate matters, as an example playing a Match against Nazi Germany in May, 1938 before a crowd of over 100,000 people in Berlin. The English players actually gave a Nazi salute before the game and there is a famous photograph of this. In this book, you will find out what was going on behind the scenes and I will say here, it was for diplomatic reasons, maybe a bit in the "peace in our time" vein.
You will find out in those early days of International soccer, these fixtures were regarded comparable to the World Cup or Olympic games, whereas some tournaments were boycotted back then or not even attended at all with the ominous signs of war growing in Europe and around the world (One source, Wangerin's "Soccer in a football world" states that the latter is precisely why the USA did not go to the 1938 World Cup). Qualifying for these tournaments must not have been fully developed at this time.
The summer of 1939 saw a similar incident, as the English team went into Milan to play the Italian team, the streets were filled with thousands of well-wishers. In the hotel lobby was a contingent of Maltese fans expressing their support for the 3 Lions buoyed it seems by an uneasy feeling of vulnerability to the Axis powers, Germany and Italy. In this famous game at the San Siro stadium, just like in the 1934 World Cup where referees were suspended for aiding Italy in its wins, this game again, saw farcical refereeing by a German to aid the host team (expounded on brilliantly in articles by the BBC). In reference, the movie Victorywith Pele and Stallone is not really far from the truth in that game it portrays. The game ended 2-2 and the Crown Prince of Italy even sent the English FA a letter offering to reverse the result, there was some sort of controversial goal but the FA accepted the original result without further actions.
Matthews playing in the service during World War II, Matthews receiving a bit more than a pick me up from a doctor during his career when the flu bug bit (sounded like he was describing an amphetamine like product which he claims was done only one time or so) and in fact, even Matthews playing until he was seventy years old and yes, retiring due to injury are all covered in this book along with apparently Matthews being a bit of a health nut way back in the day, maintaining a healthy diet and not drinking. One will also read of other major sports figures of the day, Dixie Dean the scoring-machine and of course, one reads of Matthews professional career mainly with Stoke City and Blackpool
The editorial reviews above reads "'A gracefully crafted autobiography filled with entertaining anecdotes reflecting an age when the game was uncorrupted by greed and hooliganism' -- Birmingham Post
Okay, basically right but it was not uncorrupted as before a players' union was set up in England, the owners were the benefactors of much of the revenue and players were largely chattel
An extraordinary memoir found in these pages is the account of the Burnden (fire) stadium tragedy which demonstrates that events like Hillborough were not the first time events like this that had marred the sports scene though it seems to largely be the last time an event of that magnitude happened. A need for change was seen necessary for the general safety of the public.
I upped this to 5 stars because though, it is long and detailed, it really serves also as a very valuable reference in addition to being the autobiography of a man who Pele says "showed us how to do it."
This is a wonderful insight into an age when footballers rubbed shoulders on the bus with the folk who paid their meagre wages, and had extra jobs as butchers, bakers and candlestick makers of necessity, as the footballer’s maximum wage was only £12 a week.
Stanley Matthews was a football colossus who only retired after his 50th birthday the first footballer to be knighted while still playing, he made 783 league and cup games and 84 matches for England.
And this despite missing out on the prime playing years of his career, aged 24 to 31, because of the Second World War.
Although he still played friendly matches and exhibition games, our Stan was on duty with the RAF and didn’t return to competitive games until the 1946-7 season at the seemingly veteran age of 31. Little did we know then that he wasn’t to retire for another 20 years!
One of the secrets of Matthews’ longevity was his strict dietary and fitness regime in this sense he was truly ahead of his time. He rose early and went for a run, was virtually a vegetarian and only once touched alcohol a sip of champagne from the FA Cup after Blackpool’s victory in 1953.
There are some fantastic anecdotes in the autobiography which will be treasured by any football fan who grew up loving the game in the Sixties or Seventies when defenders were harder than nine inch nails, and pitches and footballs were heavy and muddy.
There was the time he joined Denis Law and George Best at a soccer school in Australia... along with a tubby Hungarian none of the kids recognised, called Ferenc Puskas... a three time European Cup winner with Real Madrid.
Coaching in Soweto, in apartheid South Africa, in 1955, and turning up at the team hotel a few hours before the first game of the season.
Blackpool boss Joe Smith asked “Where the bloody hell have you been?”
“South Africa,” I replied. “I rang and told you but you never listen.”
“When did you get back?”
“Last night.”
“Are you match fit?”
“Yes.”
Joe turned to reserve team player John McKenna who had been sitting alongside him and said
“You’re not playing.”
Meeting a young Brian Clough “My first impression was that he was arrogant because he came across as someone who, for all his youth, knew it all. Yet as our conversation progressed, I came to the conclusion that under that swagger and self-assertiveness, he had some great ideas about football. When the conversation turned to the FA and what they were doing for football and players in general, he didn’t mince his words. “They do bugger all” he said with a wag of his finger “and they don’t start til noon”.
Some of the most vivid moments in the book are accounts of his run-ins with the authorities not surprisingly, as a strong-minded working man with a great sense of justice and decency, in an age when footballers were treated as chattels.
As a young England player, he was given a dressing-down for claiming a cup of tea and a cake on expenses during his train back from an international game. Yes, in the 40s and 50s international footballers had to make their own way home from international games back to their clubs.
England deigned to enter their first World Cup in 1950, having ignored the competition as a foreign frippery for the previous 20 years. After elimination and an ignominious defeat against the USA (a modern day comparison would be losing to San Marino), it was on the plane home.
Stan recalls “No one from the FA or the England management stayed on to watch the remainder of the World Cup. .. The pompous and ill-conceived idea that nothing could be learned from those teams has been our undoing on the international front. England were left behind and that state of affairs lasted until 1966, and has done intermittently ever since.”
He reveals his account of the notorious Nazi salute given by England players before the 1938 game against Germany in Berlin.
“As the players were getting changed, an FA official came into our dressing room and informed us that when our national anthem was played the German team would salute as a mark of respect. The FA wanted us to reciprocate by giving the raised arm Nazi salute during the playing of their German national anthem. The dressing room erupted. There was bedlam. All the England players were livid... Eddie Hapgood, normally a respectful and devoted captain, wagged his finger at the official and told him what he could do with the Nazi salute, which involved putting it where the sun doesn’t shine.... The beleaguered FA official left only to return some minutes later saying he had a direct order from Sir Neville Henderson, the British ambasaador in Berlin.”
Returning to his home-town club of Stoke City in the twilight of his career, Matthews was astonished to discover that Blackpool wouldn’t give him a free transfer, but were demanding a transfer fee for this veteran of 46.
“I respectfully asked the Blackpool board if there was any way, given my years of service to the club, they could waive the fee, but was told in no uncertain terms “No”. One director, Mr Marshall, enraged me. Drawing himself up in his chair he admonished me for asking as if I were an impertinent schoolboy, concluding by saying “You forget, as a player we made you.”
“You- made- ME?” I said totally flabbergasted. “As a small boy I was getting up at six in the morning to train and practice my skills, and I continue to do so to this day. When I came here this club had only a few hundred season tickets holders. Now it has over 12,000. My presence in the team made Blackpool become, for a number of years, the biggest draw on the road. With their share of the gate revenues, this club has done very well out of that financially. So don’t you sit there and tell me, YOU made ME.”
Blackpool stuck out for the fee.
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