Freddie Cox

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Freddie Cox
Personnel
Surname Frederick James Arthur Cox
birthday November 1, 1920
place of birth Reading ,  England
date of death 7th August 1973
Place of death Bournemouth ,  England
position Right winger
Juniors
Years station
St George's Lads Club
1936-1938 Tottenham Hotspur
1936-1938 → Northfleet United (loan)
Men's
Years station Games (goals) 1
1938-1949 Tottenham Hotspur 99 (15)
1949-1953 Arsenal FC 79 0(9)
1953-1954 West Bromwich Albion 4 0(1)
Stations as a trainer
Years station
1956-1958 Bournemouth & Boscombe Athletic
1958-1961 Portsmouth FC
1962-1965 Gillingham FC
1965-1970 Bournemouth & Boscombe Athletic
1 Only league games are given.

Frederick James Arthur "Freddie" Cox DFC (born November 1, 1920 in Reading , † August 7, 1973 in Bournemouth ) was an English football player and coach . As a right winger, he was active for Tottenham Hotspur before and after World War II before joining local rivals Arsenal and winning the FA Cup there in 1950 . Between 1956 and 1970 he then worked as head coach in Bournemouth, Portsmouth and Gillingham.

Athletic career

Career as an active footballer

Cox attended Redlands Senior School in Reading and learned to play football at St George's Lads Club . There, talent scouts from Tottenham Hotspur discovered him and took him in 1936 into their own youth department. To get match practice he was first loaned to Northfleet United , a kind of farm team for Tottenham at the time. In August 1938, Cox signed the first professional contract with the "Spurs" and on November 11, 1938, it debuted as an 18-year-old in a 1-1 draw against Swansea Town . The course for an imminent sporting breakthrough seemed set, but the outbreak of the Second World War caused a long interruption in normal league play. During the war, Cox served as a fighter pilot in the Royal Air Force and was awarded the DFC medal as a flight lieutenant . On the football field he was in the course of the fighting as a guest player for Fulham FC , the Reading FC , Manchester City and Swindon Town active. After the resumption of everyday life in the league in 1946, he was a constant as a fast winger on the right side of Tottenham before he lost his regular place at the end of the three years to Sonny Walters and moved to local rivals Arsenal for £ 12,000 in September 1949 .

Shortly after his arrival, Cox gave his debut for the "Gunners" against West Bromwich Albion on September 7, 1949 and was immediately "set" on the right. The first highlight was the season of the FA Cup when Cox for semi-final duel against Chelsea at the White Hart Lane - Tottenham's usually home ground - returned. There he scored a goal for a 2-2 draw in the first game and even the only hit to make it 1-0 in the subsequent replay, which secured the final. In the final, Cox prepared a goal from Reg Lewis ; finally Arsenal won 2-0 against Liverpool . Two years later the duel in the FA Cup was again called Arsenal against Chelsea at White Hart Lane and again it was Cox who contributed a goal in the first game (now to a 1-1); in the new edition two days later, he even scored twice in the course of the 3-0 victory. In the final, however, he was now defeated with his men 0-1 against Newcastle United , with Arsenal playing just under an hour due to a serious injury to Walley Barnes .

Regardless of the cup successes, Cox has never been undisputed on the right wing position at Arsenal. So he first had to face competitor Ian McPherson and later Arthur Milton . When Arsenal won the English championship in the 1952/53 season , Cox completed only nine of 42 league games. So he went looking for a new job and hired in July 1953 at the first division competitor West Bromwich Albion. At "WBA", however, it was only enough for a handful of games, so that Cox, who was already working in parallel on the coaching staff , began to serve as an assistant under coach Vic Buckingham at the end of the 1953/54 season .

Coaching career

After the first coaching experience under Buckingham, Cox took over the head coach role at the third division club Bournemouth & Boscombe Athletic in 1956 . There he lived up to his reputation as a "cup scare" and surprisingly defeated Wolverhampton Wanderers and Tottenham with his team in the FA Cup 1956/57 , before losing 2-1 to Manchester United in the sixth round . In 1958 he accepted an offer from the first division club Portsmouth FC , but could not prevent relegation there in 1959 . In the following years it was mixed and shortly before the further fall in the third division after the end of the 1960/61 season, Cox's engagement in Portsmouth had already come to an end in February 1961.

After his resignation in Portsmouth, he stayed away from football for a short time and ran a newspaper kiosk before he was coach of the fourth division Gillingham FC in 1962 . He formed a team from the "Gills" that worked their way up from 20th place the following year to fifth place , won the fourth division championship in 1964 and thus rose to the third division. The defensive stability in the team of Cox found particular recognition with only 30 goals conceded in 46 league games. Also in the following third division season 1964/65 it looked like a possible march into the second division before the club slipped to seventh place. Just before Christmas 1965, Cox resigned from his post at Gillingham to rejoin his old club in Bournemouth. Bournemouth was still on the road as a third division and in his second term of office, fourth place in the 1968/69 season was the sporting highlight. A year later, Cox was relegated to the fourth division with Bournemouth , whereupon he was sacked in the summer of 1970. This marked the end of his coaching career and only three years later Cox passed away at the age of just 52.

Title / Awards

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Freddie Cox (Arsenal.com)
  2. ↑ a b Bob Goodwin: The Spurs Alphabet . Robwin Publishing House, 2017, page 104, ISBN 9780954043421 .
personal data
SURNAME Cox, Freddie
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Cox, Frederick James Arthur (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION English soccer player and coach
DATE OF BIRTH November 1, 1920
PLACE OF BIRTH Reading
DATE OF DEATH 7th August 1973
Place of death Bournemouth