Ray Wilson (soccer player)

Ray Wilson
Personnel
Surname	Ramon Wilson
birthday	December 17, 1934
place of birth	Shirebrook ,  England
date of death	15th May 2018
size	173 cm
position	Left defender
Men's
Years	station	Games (goals) 1
1954-1964	Huddersfield Town	266 (6)
1964-1969	Everton FC	116 (0)
1969-1970	Oldham Athletic	25 (0)
1970-1971	Bradford City	2 (0)
National team
Years	selection	Games (goals)
1960-1968	England	63 (0)
1 Only league games are given.

Ramon "Ray" Wilson (born December 17, 1934 in Shirebrook , Derbyshire , England ; † May 15, 2018 ) was an English football player . The left defender was a member of the English national team , which won the 1966 World Cup in his own country .

Career

After finishing school, Wilson learned the trade of railroad worker and was discovered by a talent count from the Huddersfield Town club during an amateur game. In Huddersfield, Wilson trained during the day and worked on the tracks in the late hours before he was called up for military service.

His talent as a powerful and agile left-back with offensive qualities was quickly recognized by Huddersfield coach Bill Shankly and after two years in the army , Wilson made his debut in a game against Manchester United . After two more years he established himself as a regular player in his preferred position.

Wilson's first international match came in April 1960 when England played 1-1 against Scotland . During the following twelve months he was also a regular player there and then nominated by the FA in the squad for the 1962 World Cup in Chile . There Wilson played in all three group encounters and in the quarterfinals against Brazil when England was eliminated from the tournament.

He was able to defend his regular place even after the World Cup under the new coach Alf Ramsey , who now had the sole right to decide (and thus no longer the FA) over the national team appointments. Other players in this position, such as Gerry Byrne from Liverpool , also received their options and came to international matches, but Wilson should remain Ramsey's first choice, even though he played only a comparatively small club.

That all changed in 1964 when Wilson left Huddersfield to join Everton FC . At that time he already had 30 international appearances, which is a record for a player in the service of Huddersfield Town to this day. In his first game, Wilson suffered a torn muscle that put him out of action for both Everton and England for much of the remainder of the season.

As hosts of the 1966 World Cup, England did not have to play qualifying matches, so Ramsey experimented with multiple left-backs while building his squad. As the tournament got closer, Wilson won the FA Cup with Everton at Wembley Stadium .

In the final, Everton faced outsiders Sheffield Wednesday . The game itself got off to a bad start for Wilson when he deflected a direct shot from Sheffield's player Jim McCalliog into his own goal after just four minutes, although McCalliog later claimed the goal for himself. Sheffield Wednesday increased to 2-0 before Everton turned the game 3-2.

During the year Wilson played six more games at Wembley Stadium and was present in all games of the 1966 World Cup, when Ramsey's team reached the next round in the group with Uruguay , Mexico and France and after an aggressively run quarter-final match against Argentina as well reached the final with a semi-final win against Portugal . The semi-final was Wilson's 50th international match.

The final against Germany should then be an important chapter in English football. Wilson's weak header defense enabled German striker Helmut Haller to take the lead early, but after a few twists and turns in the game and especially after Geoff Hurst's historic three goals , England won 4-2. Wilson was the oldest member of the team at the age of 32 and the world title was the culmination of a successful season. Only Roger Hunt , who also won a club title with Liverpool, was also successful this year both in the club and in the national team .

Ramsey put Wilson on in the subsequent games to the EM 1968 , when England then failed in the semifinals and finished third. Wilson's 63rd and last international match was the game for third place against the Soviet Union . 1966 was Wilson's year of title wins, 1968 was a year of narrowly missed trophies. In addition to the missed European Championship, he lost with Everton in the final of the FA Cup against West Bromwich Albion .

A knee injury suffered by Wilson in the summer of 1968 and up-and-coming young full-back Terry Cooper of Leeds United saw the end of Wilson's national team career. Cooper should then, like Wilson in 1966 before, perform well, although England were eliminated from the tournament in the quarter-finals. At the same time as Wilson's end on the national team was sealed, his zenith at Everton was also passed. Although he was able to report back to health after recovering from an injury, he no longer had the speed of earlier days and was transferred to Oldham Athletic in 1969 and therefore missed Everton's championship title in the First Division in 1970. Only a year later he retired from football.

Undoubtedly, Wilson is the least well known 1966 world champion. Only shortly after his sporting career did he build a successful funeral home in Huddersfield . In 2000 he was awarded the Order of the British Empire as an MBE , along with four other national teammates from 1966 (Hunt, George Cohen , Nobby Stiles and Alan Ball ) for his services to English football . The award was preceded by a media campaign that expressed the surprise that the contributions made by these players to one of the greatest successes in English football had not yet been recognized. The other six players on the team, like Ramsey, had previously been honored.

Wilson retired from the funeral business in 1997 and lived in seclusion in Halifax . He died in May 2018 at the age of 83.

successes

• World Champion: 1966
• FA Cup Winner: 1966

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Richard Williams: Ray Wilson, England's 1966 World Cup-winning left-back, dies aged 83. In: The Guardian . May 16, 2018, accessed May 17, 2018 .