Joe Mercer

Joe Mercer
Personnel
Surname	Joseph Mercer
birthday	August 9, 1914
place of birth	Ellesmere Port ,  England
date of death	August 9, 1990
Place of death	Manchester ,  England
position	Outrunner
Men's
Years	station	Games (goals) 1
	Elton Green
	Shell Mex
	FC Runcorn
	Ellesmere Port Town
1932-1946	Everton FC	170 (1)
1946-1954	Arsenal FC	247 (2)
National team
Years	selection	Games (goals)
1938-1939	England	5 (0)
Stations as a trainer
Years	station
1955-1958	Sheffield United
1958-1964	Aston Villa
1965-1971	Manchester City
1971-1974	Coventry City
1974	England (interim)
1 Only league games are given.

Joseph "Joe" Mercer , OBE (born August 9, 1914 in Ellesmere Port , Cheshire , † August 9, 1990 in Manchester ) was an English football player and coach . He was able to win the English championship as a player at Everton and Arsenal as well as coach of Manchester City . In addition, he completed five international matches for the English national team , which he was also to oversee briefly in his later coaching life.

Player career

Mercer first played in his home country for the club Ellesmere Port Town and was trained as a half-left defender . His strengths lay in an above-average combat strength and in the ability to anticipate the opposing game. In September 1932, at the age of 18, he joined Everton and earned a place in the team in the 1935/36 season. In a total of 186 games he was used for this club, scored two goals and won his first English championship in the 1938/39 season. In this phase he also came to his five international matches between November 1938 and May 1939 in the English national team .

As with many players of his generation, the outbreak of World War II disrupted Mercer's career for seven seasons. Although he was a sergeant major in the army , he came into 26 international football encounters (so-called "Wartime internationals") during the war - mostly even as a team captain . After the resumption of play, Mercer's liaison with Everton FC quickly came to an end when he fell out with coach Theo Kelly , who was then employed there . There was disagreement over the severity of a cartilage injury from which Mercer was suffering. Even when Mercer underwent an operation after an in-depth examination by an orthopedic surgeon , the club's management failed to support him, so the player had to pay for the operation himself. Mercer was so angry - after fourteen years at Everton - that he moved to Arsenal for a transfer fee of 9,000 pounds , although there had previously been largely agreement on a transfer to Liverpool . The inglorious chapter at Everton ended with Kelly bringing Mercer's boots to negotiations to deny the player the opportunity to say goodbye to his former teammates.

At Arsenal FC Mercer moved from the wing to the central defensive position and quickly became the captain of his new team. In addition to winning the FA Cup in 1950, he was able to win two other championships in 1948 and 1953 and decided in May 1953 to retire from active sport. This was followed by a quick comeback for the 1953/54 season, which finally came to an end after a complicated double leg break in a game against Liverpool on April 10, 1954 (as a result of a collision with teammate Joe Wade ). In total, he played for Arsenal FC in 275 games and was voted England's Footballer of the Year by local journalists in 1950 - the year he won the Cup and at the age of 36 .

Coaching career

Two days before the first game against Newcastle United , Mercer was the new coach of Sheffield United on August 18, 1955 as the successor to the recently deceased Reg Freeman . His entry into the coaching business was initially ominous and the team was relegated from the top English league with the very inexperienced Mercer. In the following years he supervised the team in the second division Second Division and in December 1957 signed Derek Pace from Aston Villa for 12,000 pounds, a player who was to be the best club scorer in the following six years.

In December 1958, Mercer expressed his desire to be able to coach a higher-ranking club. He then resigned in December 1958 as sporting director of Sheffield United and joined the Aston Villa club, which was bottom of the table in the First Division at that time . Although he immediately moved into the FA Cup semi-finals with his new club, he was relegated to the second division again. As a second division champion, however, he managed to return to the elite class in the immediately following season. With a new, young generation of games known as Mercer's Minors (German: Mercer's minors ), the club was able to assert itself respectably in the championship round and also won the first league cup in the 1960/61 season . Three years later, Mercer was removed from office due to increasing health problems.

Through the one-year break, Mercer recovered and then looked after the Manchester City club very successfully between 1965 and 1971 . Together with his co-trainer Malcolm Allison , who significantly shaped and shaped the team's offensive style, he led the club from Maine Road in 1966 to the second division championship and the associated promotion to the first division. Only two years later he won the English championship with Manchester City and the FA Cup the following year. He completed his trophy collection in 1970 when he won both the English League Cup and the European Cup Winners' Cup with the club , before Allison was promoted to head coach.

His last coaching position in club football was between 1971 and 1974 Coventry City . During this time, the now 60-year-old Mercer took over briefly as the successor to Sir Alf Ramsey in 1974 - as the first interim coach in England's national team history - to head the English national team. In Coventry he then changed to an official position and was employed there until 1981.

In 1976 he was awarded the Order of the British Empire as an OBE . After retiring from football in 1981, Mercer was only seen occasionally on TV shows and died in 1990 - on the day of his 76th birthday - as a result of Alzheimer's disease in Manchester. After his death in 2002 he was inducted into the English Hall of Fame of Football.

successes

As a player

• English champion: 1939, 1948, 1953
• FA Cup winner: 1950
• England's Footballer of the Year: 1950

As a trainer

• European Cup Winners' Cup: 1970
• English champion: 1968
• FA Cup winner: 1969
• English league cup winner: 1961
• British Home Championship winner: 1974 (split title)

Web links

• Profile on englandfootballonline.com

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Joe Wade Profile (Arsenal.com)