Mick Mills

Mick Mills
Personnel
Surname	Michael Denis Mills
birthday	January 4, 1949
place of birth	Godalming ,  England
size	1.70 m
position	Defender
Juniors
Years	station
1964-1966	Portsmouth FC
1966-1967	Ipswich Town
Men's
Years	station	Games (goals) 1
1966-1982	Ipswich Town	591 (22)
1982-1985	Southampton FC	103 0(3)
1985-1987	Stoke City	38 0(0)
National team
Years	selection	Games (goals)
1973-1983	England	42 0(0)
Stations as a trainer
Years	station
1985-1989	Stoke City
1990	Colchester United
1 Only league games are given.

Michael "Mick" Denis Mills (born January 4, 1949 in Godalming / Surrey , England ) is a former English soccer player who holds the record for most games at Ipswich Town and who was the captain of the England team at the 1982 World Cup .

Athletic career

Mills first joined Portsmouth FC as a student before the club dissolved its youth department and moved Mills to move. Ipswich Town took over the young talent and Mills made his debut in 1966, at the age of only 17, in a 5-2 win over Wolverhampton Wanderers .

As a full-back , who could basically be used on both sides, but mostly on the left, Mills had phases both inside and outside the team in his later teenage years, but then became a regular in 1969. In the same year the club completed its first season in the First Division after promotion the year before. Another milestone in the club's history was the arrival of the new coach Bobby Robson in 1969 .

Robson appointed Mills team captain in 1971 and a very intensive collaboration developed between the two, which should have a beneficial effect on the subsequent positive sporting development of Ipswich over the next ten years.

In 1973 Ipswich finished the First Division in fourth place, also won the Texaco Cup and qualified for the UEFA Cup . During the same season, coach Alf Ramsey enabled Mills' first international match in the 1-1 draw against Yugoslavia at Wembley Stadium . For England, contrary to his fixed left position at Ipswich, he should continue to play as a right defender, as in this game.

Ipswich played at this time almost completely in the upper table area of ​​the First Division and also took part in European competitions, where they were initially denied a significant success. Mills developed into an experienced captain within a mostly young team that was third in the 1977 championship. The year before, Mills returned to the national team after a long absence against Wales and by the end of the 1976/77 season had accumulated eleven internationals. The following season should bring the previously missing title in addition to a disappointment in the championship.

Ipswich finished the season on a weak 16th place, but the club reached the final of the FA Cup , where he was able to defeat the favorites Arsenal 1-0 at Wembley . Mills took as team captain the trophy, which meant Ipswich's first title win after 16 years of drought.

While he had now won a title with his club, Mills national team career stagnated. Under Don Revie he came to some international matches as a left defender, including the 4-1 win in the first qualifying game for the 1978 World Cup in Argentina against Finland and the following 2-0 defeat against Italy , although Mills had to fight with rivals in both full-back positions would have. After Ron Greenwood took over as coach, he initially preferred Phil Neal from Liverpool FC as right and Trevor Cherry from Leeds United as left defender and Mills was only intended as a substitute for both positions. In the remaining qualifying games for the World Cup, which England missed, Mills was not used in any game.

In the course of 1978, however, Mills returned regularly to the English team, although his position remained unclear. In his eight international matches that year he played six times on the left with Neal in the right position and twice himself on the right and Neal accordingly on the opposite. In the last game of the year against Czechoslovakia , he left his place the debutants Viv Anderson from Nottingham Forest , which became known as the first black player in the England team in history.

With Kenny Sansom sought another newcomer on the left-back position up and fueled the speculation that the future of Mills could be found more on the right side. Nevertheless, Mills established himself as a left defender during qualifying for the European Championship in Italy in 1980 . Sansom was also named to the squad for the European Championship by Greenwood, but by this point Sansom was becoming an established alternative and Greenwood chose Sansom in the first two group matches. After England had only played a draw against Belgium and lost to Italy, Mills returned to the team in the last group encounter against Spain . Despite a win there, England was eliminated from the tournament.

Ipswich continued to play at a high level and closed the seasons between 1978 and 1982 always among the top five teams and reached another high in 1981. After missing the championship and the FA Cup, the club won the UEFA Cup after beating AZ Alkmaar in the final.

Mills made four caps for England in 1981, all of which were qualifiers for the 1982 World Cup, with Greenwood building on the less experienced Anderson and Sansom in the friendlies. When England beat Hungary in the final qualifying round, making their first World Cup participation in twelve years, Mills made his 35th international match.

Mills, who continued to cast the national team between the two sides, was only used in two preparation games, but was nominated to replace the injured Kevin Keegan as captain and right defender for the World Cup tournament. In these roles, Mills came to the 3-1 win in the first game against France in Bilbao to use and was still in the team that won the next two group games, but moved to the left in the last game to Neal a use enable on the right lane.

Greenwood returned to Mills and Sansom as full-backs in the second round , with England eliminated after the two goalless draws against Germany and Spain, despite Keegan's comeback .

In the same year Robson informed the 33-year-old Mills that his expiring contract with Ipswich would not be renewed, so that Mills moved to Southampton FC in November 1982 for a transfer fee of 40,000 pounds . After Robson took over the office of national coach, Mill's international career was also over. For Ipswich Mills completed 741 games in 17 years and came to 42 international games, where he could not score there and only came to 22 goals in the club.

Despite his advancing age, Mills played regularly in Southampton for the next three years and was awarded the Order of the British Empire as an MBE for his service to the sport of football. In 1985, Mills moved to Stoke City to work as a player-coach for four years until he was fired.

Mills was then a talent scout at Sheffield Wednesday and then moved to Birmingham City to be Kotrainer there and temporarily head the team after the resignation of Trevor Francis .

successes

• UEFA Cup winners: 1981
• FA Cup winner: 1978

Web links

• Photo by Mick Mills