Harry as City Manager 1951
On this day (March 24th) during Easter in 1951 Coventry City were in their penultimate season before being relegated from the old Division Two and in their second full season being managed by legendary ‘gaffer’ Harry Storer in his second stint with the club.
The previous day the Easter programme was kicked off with a welcome 2-1 victory in Cleethorpes at Grimsby Town. CCFC’s goalscorers that day had been Bryn Allen and Ted Roberts. Today, there was a bumper crowd of 21,881 at Highfield Road to watch the Bantams take on West Ham United. Despite being a poor game, much hampered by wind and the muddy pitch, CCFC got another welcome win – this time by the only goal of the game, a close range strike after a dribble, scored just before half-time by outside left Jimmy Hill, his debut goal for the Bantams. There was a pretty decent Highfield Road crowd of 21,881!
The Bantams had narrowly lost to the Hammers at the Boleyn by the odd goal in five the day before Bonfire Night earlier in the season (our goals coming from Bryn Allen and Ted Roberts).
Jimmy Hill, CCFC winger
Our goalscorer today was not the man who over 25 years later became the club’s saviour. The second CCFC JH, of course, transmuted a run-of-the-mill Third Division outfit via his ‘Sky Blue Revolution‘ through two promotions (between 1961-67) into an innovative Division One club who would stay in the top flight for 34 years.
This first JH was a young winger who came through the club’s nursery side, Modern Machine Tools to debut in November 1949 in a 2-1 defeat at Hull City. He was with CCFC for eight seasons, mainly as an understudy, and made 68 first team appearances and scored eight goals in total before moving to Millwall in June 1956. He also sadly failed to establish himself there and played subsequently at Wisbech Town (March 1957) and Shrewsbury Town for 1957-58.
Jimmy, along with his surnamesake, young inside man Peter Hill had been junior stars for the club, but it was Peter of the two who really made the grade becoming a great club servant as both player and coach -and later kitman (and CCFPA member before his death). This season, Jimmy (understudying first choice Norman Lockhart) got four outings from the Reserves and his goal today!
Ted Roberts
Dudley in the sixties Sky Blue
Storer’s full team was:-
Alf Wood, Terry Springthorpe & Dick Mason; Jimmy Alderton, Martin McDonnell & Les Cook; Les ‘Plum’ Warner, Bryn Allen, Ted Roberts, Harry Hart & Jimmy Hill
Alf was another great club servant later becoming CCFC’s trainer and even coming out of retirement for a spell well into his forties to help the club cover an goalkeeping injury crisis in 1958-59 with some success. Ted was the father of another Sky Blue centre forward of the sixties, CCFPA member (the late) Dudley Roberts.
Benny Fenton‘s Hammers side lined up as follows:-
George Taylor; Steve Forde & T.Henry Kinsell; Derek Parker, Malcolm Allison & Frank O’Farrell; Harry Hooper, Jim Barrett, Dick Walker, Gerry Gazzard & Terry Woodgate Referee:- W.J.Edwards (Yeovil)
The Hammers team that year had at least a couple of future League Managers in their ranks. Both Malcolm Allison (City) and Frank O’Farrell (United) found fame with Manchester clubs. Also former CCFC player Eric Betts was in their squad.
CCFC 1950-51
Three days later the Bantams completed an Easter win treble beating Grimsby Town at Highfield Road, again by 1-0.
CCFC had a quite good season under Storer in 1950-51 finishing in seventh spot in Division Two. West Ham United finished thirteenth.
Preston North End were Divisional champions and went up with runners up Manchester City whilst Chesterfield Town and Grimsby Town (bottom) were relegated from Division Two.
Thanks to CCFPA’s Mike Young for sourcing the images.
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