CCFC’s Manager, Noel Cantwell
On this day (May 12th) in 1970 the Sky Blues, managed by Noel Cantwell, were four games into their close season tour of the United States of America. Their third season in the top flight had seen them finish in a heady sixth position qualifying for Eurpean competition for the first time ever. The club had arranged an eight game tour of the States as a reward for a successful season and the arranged games would take in games in several parts of the country including St.Louis, Kansas, Atlanta, Chicago, Detroit, Washington and Rochester against, not only USA clubs, but two games against German club Hertha FC of Berlin. We covered City’s 3-1 wins against both Kansas City Spurs and Dallas Tornadoes seven and four days ago on this site. Details of some of the future games will follow in subsequent posts.
Brian in 1970
The 23 day tour had kicked off on May 3rd with a 2-1 warm-up defeat at St Louis Stars where our Scottish striker (and CCFPA member) Neil Martin got City’s goal in front of 3,700 fans. A week previously against Kansas City Spurs, Neil had notched a penalty to add to goals from ‘Ernie’ Hunt and John O’Rourke and Neil netted again four days previously against the Dallas side with Brian Joicey getting a brace.
Dennis in the Sky Blue
Today’s opponents were drawn from another different part of the USA, Atlanta in Georgia. The Sky Blues registered their third win, this time against the Atlanta Chiefs by the odd goal in three in front of a slightly larger crowd than in the earlier games, 5,604. Now Dennis Mortimer came into the midfield giving (now CCFPA committee member) Dietmar Bruck a rest and Ernie Machin* made way for Trevor Gould (all four later Association members).
Trevor in the Sky Blue
We have sparse details about the game to hand but know the Sky Blues team and scorers as the Sky Blues’ Geordie striker Brian Joicey, again making an impact off the bench, got his second successive brace!
Brian’s late double came seven minutes from time to equalise and then the winner 47 seconds from the final whistle! Interestingly, the Sky Blues were playing this game under lights in an all seater stadium and they had gone down to a first minute goal to the Chiefs who City Secretary Eddie Plumley described as the best side the Sky Blues had met so far on the USA tour!
Noel Cantwell‘s Sky Blues lined up as follows:-
Bill Glazier, Mick Coop, Chris Cattlin, ‘Ernie’ Hunt*, Jeff Blockley, Dennis Mortimer, Trevor Gould (sub. Brian Joicey), Willie Carr, Neil Martin, John O’Rourke* and Dave Clements.
Sadly (*) ‘Ernie’ as well as John have since passed away (along with their ‘gaffer’ Noel). We are delighted to say every single member of this team later joined CCFPA!
CCFC 1969-70
The Sky Blues went on to win all but one of their remaining four games on their U.S.A. tour. Look out for more coverage in subsequent posts on their 55th anniversary!
Thanks to CCFPA’s Mike Young for sourcing the images.
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