Roy Bentley

Roy Bentley
Personnel
Surname	Roy Thomas Frank Bentley
birthday	May 17, 1924
place of birth	Bristol ,  England
date of death	April 20, 2018
position	Striker , defender
Men's
Years	station	Games (goals) 1
1939-1946	Bristol City	0 00(0)
1946-1948	Newcastle United	48 00(2)
1948-1956	Chelsea FC	323 (150)
1956-1960	Fulham FC	142 0(23)
1960–1962	Queens Park Rangers	45 00(0)
National team
Years	selection	Games (goals)
1949-1955	England	12 00(9)
Stations as a trainer
Years	station
1963-1968	Reading FC
1969-1972	Swansea Town / City
1 Only league games are given.

Roy Thomas Frank Bentley (born May 17, 1924 in Bristol - † April 20, 2018 ) was an English football player who was best known as a striker in the first championship team of Chelsea and scored nine goals in his twelve international matches for the English national team . He then worked as a coach for almost a decade .

Athletic career

Bentley served in the British Royal Navy during World War II and played for both Bristol City and the Bristol Rovers in his home country until shortly after the war ended , before signing a contract with Newcastle United in 1946 . There he spent only two short seasons, but with Jackie Milburn , Len Shackleton and Charlie Wayman he formed one of the best offensive series in this era of English club football. Bentley moved in 1947 with Newcastle in the FA Cup semi-finals, but where the team lost 4-0 to eventual cup winners Charlton Athletic .

In January 1948 he moved to London for £ 12,500 to Chelsea, partly on the advice of his doctor, who suggested he move to the south and saw it as a cure for Bentley's occasional lung problems . At Chelsea, he was to replace Tommy Lawton - who ironically had once moved to London for the same health reasons - and Bentley was initially unable to follow in the big footsteps of his predecessor. Above all, he had difficulties with the changeover to the new game system practiced by Chelsea. On his first appearance, he lost 4-2 at home to Huddersfield Town and in the first four months Bentley only scored three goals at his new club.

After that, however, the tide turned in Bentley's favor and he was the club's top scorer in all eight years of his tenure at Chelsea. As one of the first players in English club football, he interpreted his position as a so-called "hanging striker", where the player runs from the attacking midfield into the attacking position, which at that time often meant that the opposing defensive formation could be broken. Supported by his headball and shooting strength, Bentley scored 23 goals in his first season for Chelsea FC, making him the club's top goalscorer straight away. In 1949 Bentley also came to his first international match for England. Although Chelsea FC subsequently stagnated in the championship, Bentley was still a key player in the best FA Cup round for Chelsea in decades. In the fifth round he scored two goals in a 3-0 win against Chesterfield FC and scored a long-range goal from almost 30 meters in the 2-0 win against Manchester United in the quarter-finals. In the semifinals, however, Chelsea were eliminated by Arsenal , although Bentley had already taken his team 2-0 ahead .

After another FA Cup semi-final defeat by Arsenal in 1952, Chelsea signed Ted Drake as the new coach. Over the next three seasons this led the club to its first championship in 1955, with Bentley leading the team as captain . Bentley also scored 21 goals this season, including two in a 4-3 win over Wolverhampton Wanderers , Chelsea's main rivals for the championship. After that success, Bentley stayed at Chelsea for just one more year and was one of the first to fall victim to Drake's rejuvenation process in the now significantly aged team. After 150 goals in 367 games - with which he currently ranks third in the all-time club scorer list shared with Peter Osgood - he was drawn to city rivals Fulham in 1956 .

Bentley's national team career lasted six years. He made his debut against Sweden and played for his country at the 1950 World Cup in Brazil , where he was also part of the team that sensationally lost 1-0 to the United States . He had previously only enabled qualification for the tournament when he had scored the winning goal against Scotland and was therefore often referred to as "the man who robbed Scotland of Rio " ("the man who robbed Scotland of Rio"). He scored three more goals against Wales in November 1954, the penultimate year of his international career .

In Fulham Bentley came in the conventional center forward position to the course and in 1958 again reached an FA Cup semi-finals, where he was once again on the losing side. After he went back to the central defensive position in October 1958, he left Fulham FC in 1960, but stayed in West London when he moved to the Queens Park Rangers and was active there for two years until the end of his playing career.

After his active career, Bentley switched to the coaching business and looked after Reading FC and Swansea Town (from 1970: "Swansea City"), where he rose with Swansea to the third division . He returned to Reading in 1977, where he became an official.

successes

• English champion: 1955

literature

• Turner, Dennis: Fulham - The Complete Record . Breedon Books, 2007, ISBN 978-1-85983-566-1 , pp. 145 .

Web links

• Profile on englandfootballonline.com

Individual evidence

1. ^ Roy Bentley: 1924-2018. In: chelseafc.com. Chelsea FC, April 20, 2018, accessed April 21, 2018 .