Former Liverpool and Scotland footballer Ron Yeats has died.

His arrival at the club, along with Ian St John, was credited by the legendary Bill Shankly as being the turning point to propel Liverpool to the top of the English game in the 1960s. Prior to their signings Liverpool had been jogging along as a middling Second Division club. So impressed was Shankly by Yeats that he immediately made him captain. Promotion followed straightaway, then two Championships sandwiched Liverpool’s first ever FA Cup win. Such was his stature that he was nicknamed “The Colossus”.

Given all that it now seems surprising that Yeats was only ever capped by Scotland twice.

Ronald (Ron) Yeats: 15/11/1937 – 6/9/2024. So it goes.

And so another name from that small number of Englishmen to grace a World Cup final, Roger Hunt, has finally left the pitch.

His 244 league goals remain Liverpool’s best ever. Only Ian Rush has scored more goals for the club overall. Hunt also scored 18 times for England in 34 appearances – including three in the group stages in 1966. When Jimmy Greaves was fit again for the final it seemed it might be Hunt who would make way for him but manager Alf Ramsey decided to stick with Hunt and Geoff Hurst. By raising his arms and turning away Hunt looked in no doubt that Hurst’s shot off the bar had crossed the line for his controversial strike in extra-time that in effect won the game.

That Liverpool supporters called him Sir Roger shows the esteem and affection in which he was held.

Roger Hunt: 20/7/1938 – 27/8/2021. So it goes.

So now it’s Ian St John who has died.

Having made his name at Motherwell he became an integral part of the first great Liverpool team of my lifetime, the first Shankly-managed one, and also played what now seems a paltry 21 games for Scotland, scoring nine goals for the national side, including two in that great sliding-doors match, the play-off with Czechoslovakia for the right to go to the World Cup in Chile in 1962. Scotland were ahead with a few minutes to go but lost a goal before the final whistle then two more in extra-time. Czechoslovakia went on to reach the World Cup final. What if indeed.

St John’s great years as a player were a bit before my time but I do remember the possibly apocryphal story of a Church billboard in Liverpool asking, “What would you do if Jesus came to Liverpool?” to which some wag had added below, “Move St John to inside-left.”

After his retirement I remember a TV competition to find a new commentator for televised football matches in the run-up to the 1970 World Cup. The competitors were anonymous before the voting. However I knew I recognised one of the voices but couldn’t place it. Then came the reveal of the runner-up (who I now see but hadn’t remembered till looking it up actually tied with the winner) – Ian St John. The winner was a Welshman named Idwal Robling who apparently did go on to commentate on games for Match of the Day (never broadcast at the time in Scotland so I never heard any of them) and later mostly for Welsh games.

But it was as co-presenter of Saint and Greavsie, an ITV equivalent of the Football Focus of today but with a more light-hearted approach (and which was broadcast in Scotland) that St John was more familiar to my generation. The banter between St John and the other presenter Jimmy Greaves was always good-natured and entertaining.

John (Ian) St John: 7/6/1938 – 1/3/2021. So it goes.

So 2020 continued to be a miserable sod right till the end, when it took Tommy Docherty away from us.

The Doc was probably most famous for being manager of Manchester Uinted though he had previous spells at Chelsea and other clubs, plus as Scotland manager. After Man U he managed seven more clubs.

His senior playing career began at Celtic but he could not displace Parkhead legend Bobby Evans from the team and moved south to Preston North End and later Chelsea.

He played for Scotland 25 times including in the 1954 World Cup (but we’ll swiftly draw a veil over the 7-0 defeat to Uruguay – I read once of a player’s recollection that the Scotland team were in heavy woollen jerseys as if playing in winter rather than the heat of a Swiss summer and were shod in big old-fashioned boots – with the Uruguayans in more modern footwear he described as like slippers in comparison. We were lucky it was only seven was the verdict.)

It was as a manager that The Doc made the most impact, taking over a very declined Man United and not able to turn the club’s fortunes round till after a relegation but leading them to a swift – one season – return to the top flight and then to an FA Cup win against Liverpool (denying that club what would have been a first ever treble by any English side.) Who knows what might have transpired if The Doc had not had an affair with the wife of the club’s physio Laurie Brown and as a consequence got the sack? (I note from the obituaries that Docherty was still married to Mary Brown when he died.)

Despite plying his trade mostly in England Docherty, like most of his ilk, remained a proud Scot.

There was a tale told – I think it was of Joe Donnelly, Dumbarton’s perennial substitute in the 1971-1972 season (only one sub allowed in those days and that for injury) that the player had once been involved in an altercation with an English team mate who had called him a “Scottish b*****d.” Docherty, as their manager, took them into his office, got them to settle the matter reasonably amicably then let the Englishman leave the room. Whereon he immediately turned to Donnelly and said, “You didn’t hit him hard enough.”

A character, then.

Thomas Henderson (Tommy) Docherty (The Doc): 24/4/1928 – 31/12/2020. So it goes.

I was sad to hear yesterday of the death of John le Carré. He dragged the spy novel into the post-Second World War world and elevated it to the status of literature. His early novels had all the relevance the Cold War gave to the genre and he illuminated that looking-glass world of the secret services. In George Smiley he gave the world the epitome of the enigmatic, taciturn thinker.

When the Soviet Union fell the spy novel lost a lot of its wider resonance but le Carré adapted to the new circumstances. A total of over 20 successful best selling novels speaks for itself.

My collection of his books – apart from the omnibus edition of his early works the good lady started to read – is on this shelf.

David John Moore Cornwell (John le Carré): 9/10/1931 – 12/12/2020. So it goes.

Also gone today is Gerard Houllier, one of Liverpool’s more successful managers of the “fallow” period. While he never achieved the holy grail (for Liverpool supporters) of a League Championship he still oversaw an impressive haul of trophies for the club.

Gérard Paul Francis Houllier: 3/9/1947 – 14/12/2020. So it goes.

On Friday I read the Guardian obituary of Otto Hutter. He was one of my lecturers when I briefly (one year only) studied Physiology at Glasgow University back in the day. I don’t think I realised at the time he had been one of those who came to Britain via the Kindertransport. What an incredible contribution to British life those children went on to make.

Otto Fred Hutter: 29/2/1924 – 22/11/2020. So it goes.

There is a cluster of memorials on the riverfront of the Mersey in Liverpool – all relating to World War 2.

The SS Arandora Star was torpedoed west of Donegal on 2/7/1940. Over 800 drowned:-

HMT Lancastria was sunk off St Nazaire 17/6/1940 while evacuating British servicemen and civilans. Up to 6,000 people lost their lives:-

Memorial to ranks and ratings who died on shore with no known grave:-

Repatriation Memorial, commemorating the return of Far East prisoners of war and detainees:-

“Dedicated to the men and women who gave their lives willingly for the freedom of others and have no grave but the sea,” followed by,
“They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old: Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn. At the going down of the sun and in the morning, We will remember them”:-

Reverse view. “1914-1918 and all 1939-1945.”
“This memorial dedicated to the Merchant Navy was donated to the people of Liverpool by the Liverpool Retired Merchant Seafarers and handed to the city by the Rt Honourable John Prescott Deputy Prime Minister 30th October 1998”:-

Cunard Building in background.

A statue on Liverpool waterfront of Captain F J Walker CB DSO***, Royal Navy, 1896-1944.

“In Memory of Captain F J Walker CB DSO***, Royal Navy, the men of his 36th Escort and 2nd Support Groups and all those who fought in the Battle of the Atlantic.”

(Museum of Liverpool in background with the Memorial to those lost at sea to right.)

By the River Mersey, Liverpool, lies this memorial to Merchant Navy personnel who died serving in the Royal Navy and have no known grave. The names are engraved on the brass panels:-

Central pedestal:-

Inscription. “These officers and men of the merchant navy died while serving with the Royal Navy and have no grave but the sea. 1939-1945”:-

Reverse view:-

On the west side of the Cunard Building in Liverpool lies this Memorial dedicated to Cunard employees who died in the Great War and World War 2. A figure of Victory atop a column with a depiction of a boat extending either side of the column halfway up. “Pro Patria 1914-1918, 1939-1945”:-