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Stuart Leary

He would have been 84 today

Wonderful to have the likes of Stuart Leary to remember

RIP
«13

Comments

  • Played in the fist game I saw at the Valley. Real nuisance of a centre-forward. Aggressive, bustling and skillful goalscorer.

    RIP
  • uie2
    uie2 Posts: 4,596
    One of my dad's all time favourite Charlton players, RIP
  • Never saw him play for us, but do remember him playing for Kent, great cricketer too.......
  • 25May98
    25May98 Posts: 712
    I remember the minutes silence at the first game of the season in 1988. I think it was against Liverpool. Some of their fans shouted and generally disrupted the minutes silence. Classy.
  • SoundAsa£
    SoundAsa£ Posts: 22,481
    Quite simply the finest player I have seen in an Addicks shirt!
    He was Colin Cameron's all time favourite too.
    Way ahead of his time......he was not only an outrageously talented footballer but also an entertainer......a clown prince in many ways. I could go on for a fair old while talking about Stuart Edward Leary....my all time sporting hero!
    Eddie Firmani always called him "The Governor"........that should tell you everything.
    Should have and most likely would have played for England but for The FA to change the eligibility rules just around the time fans and the media were calling for his inclusion.
  • dwb
    dwb Posts: 137
    Stuart Leary is my all time favourite Charlton player---incredibly skillful on the ball and although he had no real pace his brain was ahead of most of his opponents so he always made space in the box to score goals.
    As someone has already said he was an entertainer--I well remember him taking a penalty standing over the ball and sidefooting the ball into the corner. He also used to do a handstand on the halfway line facing a goal kick and kicking the ball back to the keeper.
    He was the original deep lying centre forward although Don Revie did it later and became more famous for it.
    I think I'm right in saying he committed suicide jumping from a cable car on Table Mountain in Cape Town.
  • I was behind that goal ........great memories.....
  • Tramp
    Tramp Posts: 202
    A huge fan, he was pure class, and a bloody good cricketer as well. I have my own personal tribute, phone and fuel passwords inscribed on my memory.
  • SoundAsa£
    SoundAsa£ Posts: 22,481

    I was behind that goal ........great memories.....

    I was there as well(White Hart Lane of course)......we deserved a draw.
  • RugbyAddick
    RugbyAddick Posts: 2,079
    My grandma went out with him after my grandad died young. Wanted to move back to a South Africa with my dad, aunt and grandma.

    Good player from all accounts!
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  • EveshamAddick
    EveshamAddick Posts: 7,015
    edited April 2017
    My late dad talked of Leary, Firmani, Summers and Bartram. I was brought up on these names as a halcyon era.
  • Welly
    Welly Posts: 493
    My favourite player great days going to the Valley we had some really good players.
  • RIP
  • GlassHalfFull
    GlassHalfFull Posts: 2,351

    Truly one of a kind.
  • daveaddick
    daveaddick Posts: 1,926
    Saw him a few times, although I was very young, and he was a terrific player
  • aitchyaddick
    aitchyaddick Posts: 200
    Was my favourite player as a young lad. Now it's Yann!
  • simonmatthews
    simonmatthews Posts: 698
    Highly rated by my uncle (who took me to my first game in 1967, and had watched the club since 1938). Reckoned he was as good a game changer and striker as Don Revie: who got the credit for being the 'first' deep lying forward and scooped up many England caps too.

    We wangled quite a significant fee out of QPR when he left in less than ideal circumstances in 1962.

    I met him once, at a Kent CC game in 1970.
  • Cant get Twitter at work.
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  • SoundAsa£
    SoundAsa£ Posts: 22,481
    edited September 2019
    I was there that day......went on my own (I was 12) and sat in front on the wall at the opposite end to the one where Leary scored......happy days, we deserved a draw but lost 3-2, South African Brian Tocknell hit the post with a few minutes left......Spurs went on to do the double.
    I think they were the first team ever to achieve that?
  • dwb said:
    Stuart Leary is my all time favourite Charlton player.
    Mine too.

    He was the original deep lying centre forward although Don Revie did it later and became more famous for it.

    Before Revie, certainly, but hardly the original. Hidegkuti of the great Hungarian side had made the strategy famous a few years earlier. But he did not invent it either. There were Austrian and South American players in the 1930s who had great success playing that way. Perhaps someone with a better memory than me could supply their names.

  • SoundAsa£
    SoundAsa£ Posts: 22,481
    As I have said many times on here, he was the best player I have ever seen in an Addicks shirt.
  • SoundAsa£
    SoundAsa£ Posts: 22,481
    edited September 2019
    Pretty sure the commentator is the legendary Kenneth Wolstenholme.
  • I was there that day......went on my own (I was 12) and sat in front on the wall at the opposite end to the one where Leary scored......happy days, we deserved a draw but lost 4-3, South African Brian Tocknell hit the post with a few minutes left......Spurs went on to do the double.
    I think they were the first team ever to achieve that?


    Final score was 3-2 Soundas, Leary and Lawrie for Charlton, just under 55,000were there..
  • Good to see that clip from that 3rd Round tie at the Lane
    Leary totally ran the game after the interval
    Spurs afterwards said that up until then they had not been so pushed.
    A truly wonderful player
  • SoundAsa£
    SoundAsa£ Posts: 22,481
    I was there that day......went on my own (I was 12) and sat in front on the wall at the opposite end to the one where Leary scored......happy days, we deserved a draw but lost 4-3, South African Brian Tocknell hit the post with a few minutes left......Spurs went on to do the double.
    I think they were the first team ever to achieve that?


    Final score was 3-2 Soundas, Leary and Lawrie for Charlton, just under 55,000were there..
    I was only12 and couldn’t count!  ;)
  • Covered End
    Covered End Posts: 52,013
    I was there that day......went on my own (I was 12) and sat in front on the wall at the opposite end to the one where Leary scored......happy days, we deserved a draw but lost 3-2, South African Brian Tocknell hit the post with a few minutes left......Spurs went on to do the double.
    I think they were the first team ever to achieve that?
    How many Charlton fans went ?
  • SoundAsa£
    SoundAsa£ Posts: 22,481
    edited September 2019
    I was there that day......went on my own (I was 12) and sat in front on the wall at the opposite end to the one where Leary scored......happy days, we deserved a draw but lost 3-2, South African Brian Tocknell hit the post with a few minutes left......Spurs went on to do the double.
    I think they were the first team ever to achieve that?
    How many Charlton fans went ?
    I have no idea......pure guess would be around 7000?
  • RedChaser
    RedChaser Posts: 19,885
    edited September 2019
    I was there that day......went on my own (I was 12) and sat in front on the wall at the opposite end to the one where Leary scored......happy days, we deserved a draw but lost 3-2, South African Brian Tocknell hit the post with a few minutes left......Spurs went on to do the double.
    I think they were the first team ever to achieve that?
    I was there also with my Dad, uncle and cousin. Sat in the corner on the cinder track surrounding the pitch with the police and St Johns ambulance first aider after my uncle asked the copper to remove his helmet as us youngsters couldn't see much. Said copper did no more than said 'Pass the lads over they can sit with me'. Top man because we had a worms eye view for nearly all the game.

    Very scary on the way back to the station as thought we'd would be crushed by the massive crowd as it poured out of the stadium. Feet never seemed to touch the ground as Dad and uncle shielded us between them and got us safely on the train. 

    No segregation in them days so absolutely impossible to say how many Charlton were there. Over six foot half back line, was Hewie, Jago and Tocknell in that game IIRC. We gave Spuds a good run for their money and one of my favourite forward lines of the last 60 years was Summers, Leary and Lawrie, first impressions and all that.