March 27 – Clem Retires | On This Football Day

March 27 – Clem Retires

GIVEN the unmistakable sound of barrel scraping that can be heard every time Fabio Capello tries to dig up three goalkeepers for each England squad you wouldn’t blame him for casting an envious glance back to former England managers who had the likes of Gordon Banks, Peter Shilton and Ray Clemence to choose from when picking their number one.

For long periods throughout the 1970s and 1980s Don Revie, Ron Greenwood and Bobby Robson had two of the outstanding goalkeepers of their time fighting it out to stand between the sticks for the Three Lions in Shilts and Clem.

On this day in 1988 Ray Clemence announced he was calling time on his long and illustrious career and would be hanging up his gloves at the end of the season.

Clemence was born in Skegness and was first signed up as a pro with Scunthorpe United before Bill Shankly snapped him up for Liverpool for £18,000 in 1967.

His stay at Anfield coincided with the club’s domination of English and European football and in 665 appearances for the Reds he helped them win enough trophies to sink a battle ship.

Five league titles, three European Cups, one FA Cup, one League Cup and two Uefa Cups were all gracing the Anfield trophy room while Clem kept goal for them under the management of Bill Shankly and Bob Paisley.

In 1981 the game was up for Clemence at Liverpool when the wobbly-legged Bruce Grobbelaar began to challenge him for his place. Rather than play second fiddle to the South African, Ray upped sticks and headed for North London when Tottenham Hotspur paid £300,000 to take him to White Hart Lane.

In his first season at Spurs the club reached the League Cup final where they met Liverpool. Clemence’s departure seemed to have no immediate effect on the winning machine that was Liverpool FC in those days and Spurs and Clemence were brushed aside 3-1.

Comfort came in the FA Cup which Spurs lifted the same season as Clemence added another medal to his vast collection, although it this would be his last of his career.

Despite sharing the England goalkeeping duties with Peter Shilton he still managed to amass 61 caps for his country, but his association with the national side would not end there.

After retiring as a player Clemence moved straight into coaching, first at Spurs, then Barnet, and then with England when his former Spurs teammate Glenn Hoddle brought him into the national set up as goalkeeping coach – a position he would retain until Capello came in with his Italian revolution.

Clem is one of a select band of footballers to have been honoured by the Queen with an MBE and also topped the magazine Total Football’s poll of the best ever goalkeeper, beating the likes of Shilton, Lev Yashin, Gordon Banks and Pat Jennings. Not too shabby at all, but given the recent performances of Paul Robinson and Scott Carson in the England goalkeeping jersey perhaps Clem was better at playing than he was coaching.

Come back tomorrow folks when we’ll be looking at a player who has admitted, with a degree of insight rare in a player these days, that he would probably be a virgin if he wasn’t as Premiership footballer.