Jimmy Murphy (footballer)

James Patrick "Jimmy" Murphy (27 October 1910, Pentre, Rhondda - 14 November 1989, Manchester) was a football player and later a manager.

Career

He played more than 200 times for West Bromwich Albion and made an appearance in the 1935 FA Cup Final. He also briefly played for Swindon Town. He was also called up to the Welsh national football team during the 1930s.

During the Second World War, Murphy was giving a speech about football to a band of troops, and in attendance was Matt Busby. Busby was so impressed by Murphy's speech that, upon his appointment as manager of Manchester United, he made Murphy the first signing of his tenure at the club. [cite video |year2=2002 |title=Manchester United: Official History 1878–2002 |medium=DVD |publisher=Video Collection International |location=London, England |accessdate=2008-07-28 ] In his role as assistant manager, it was Murphy's responsibility to scout and train the young footballers who were to become the "Busby Babes", which included the likes of Duncan Edwards and Bobby Charlton. Prior to this the larger teams had mainly bought rather than developed their players but instead Busby decided to slowly replace the older and more experienced players in his team with their youth players. Jimmy, as assistant coach, was responsible for developing these young boys into the world class professionals that they became.He would spend hours with a player if he believed that they were capable of becoming a first team player. He was a very dedicated and passionate teacher whose tactical and technical lessons helped some of the worlds best ever players to reach their full potential. After the Munich air disaster of 6 February, 1958, he temporarily took over as manager while Matt Busby recovered from his injuries and, having assembled a substitute team, steered United to the FA Cup final. Murphy had not been on the fatal flight because he had been away managing the Welsh team in a World Cup qualifying game. Murphy managed Wales at the 1958 FIFA World Cup Finals, when they reached the quarter-finals in their only appearance in a World Cup. They lost 0-1 to Brazil (the eventual winners), to a goal by the young Pelé.

Despite being approached to manage Brazil, Juventus and Arsenal, he remained as assistant manager at Old Trafford until 1971. Murphy choose never to became manager of the club because of his hate of the limelight, he loved working in the background but never aspired to fulfil the job of manager. He died in 1989 aged 79.

Quotes

"When I used to hear Muhammed Ali proclaim to the world he was the greatest I used to smile. You see, the greatest of them all was an English footballer named Duncan Edwards"

References