«Breaking News» STEPHEN GLOVER: it is grossly unjust that Gordon Banks was never knighted

Earlier this week it was reported that a British footballer called Aaron Ramsey had signed a £400,000 a week contract with the Italian club Juventus. That’s nearly £21 million a year.

On Tuesday Gordon Banks, who was goalkeeper in England’s victorious team in the 1966 World Cup, died at the age of 81. As a footballer Banks never earned more than £100 a week.

For helping England win the World Cup — which surely remains the country’s greatest sporting achievement — he was paid a £1,000 bonus plus a £60 appearance fee. In modern money, that equates to £19,460.

'On Tuesday Gordon Banks [pictured in 1971 when England played Northern Ireland at Wembley], who was goalkeeper in England’s victorious team in the 1966 World Cup, died at the age of 81. As a footballer Banks never earned more than £100 a week'

So Aaron Ramsey, who plays for Arsenal and Wales, will in a mere few hours of his new contract with Juventus earn what Banks was paid after England had triumphed following a long and gruelling campaign.

Moreover, although Ramsey is obviously a very good player — Juventus aren’t stupid — he is unlikely ever to be remembered in the same breath as Gordon Banks, who was voted the world’s top goalkeeper by FIFA (football’s world governing body) for six consecutive years between 1966 and 1971.

And he also pulled off what experts say was the ‘greatest save ever’ in the 1970 World Cup, when he succeeded, with an incredible gymnastic lunge, in thwarting a header from the Brazilian superstar Pele that seemed bound for the back of the net.

What is one to make of this grotesque discrepancy in the rewards paid to these two men? I suppose, after a lot of huffing and puffing, one may end up by accepting that it is the result of market forces.

Professional footballers are paid many thousand times more than their counterparts of half a century ago because there is a lot more money in the game, largely as the result of people being prepared to pay to watch it on television.

England's goalkeeper Gordon Banks resplendent in yellow kit as he lifts the World Cup at Wembley Stadium back in 1966

All the same, I suspect that many will think that Gordon Banks and his like were underpaid, and that Aaron Ramsey and his ilk are overpaid. Although there’s nothing to be done about it, this is certainly what I believe.

Thank God, there are more important things than money — like honour and reputation. But here too Gordon Banks didn’t get his due. The difference is that the authorities could have done something about it.

The world’s greatest goalkeeper, and an England star in a nail-biting final the memory of which is still cherished by millions of people, was awarded an OBE in 1970. That’s not a derisory honour, of course. But many have got far more for much less.

'Aaron Ramsey, who plays for Arsenal and Wales, will in a mere few hours of his new contract with Juventus earn what Banks was paid after England had triumphed following a long and gruelling campaign'.

Even among the 11 players in England’s team, two men (Bobby Charlton and Geoff Hurst) were awarded knighthoods, in 1994 and 1998 respectively. Six other received MBEs, and three, including Banks, got the slightly higher OBE.

But why not a knighthood for him — and indeed for all of them? It may be true that 50 years ago football was not the national obsession it has become, lovingly nurtured and promoted as it is by the media. But winning the World Cup was nonetheless a very big deal at the time.

On the 50th anniversary of England’s victory Banks confided to feeling hurt that knighthoods had been awarded to only two of the 11. He didn’t begrudge the accolades, but thought it ‘unfair’ to single out anyone given that football is a team game.

Here was a man who had left school at 15, earning £3 a week bagging coal before becoming a bricklayer and then a poorly paid footballer. Slowly he achieved success for club and country. Then, at the age of 34, he lost an eye in a car crash, ending his football career.

And throughout it all, so friends and acquaintances aver, he was modest, decent and gentlemanly — in almost every way the opposite of so many of today’s cossetted, overpaid and preening stars.

I should like to live in a country in which true heroes like Banks were properly acknowledged. But I’m afraid the honours system has itself been dishonoured and debased by unscrupulous politicians.

Knighthoods and life peerages are showered on time-serving politicians while distinguished and hard-working people often receive no recognition.

When David Cameron left Downing Street in 2016, he love-bombed those who had worked for him with honours. No doubt there were some deserving recipients, but there was also Baroness Unheard-of and Sir Mediocre Crawler.

Let’s be honest: both Tony Blair and David Cameron each stuffed the Lords with hundreds of life peers, many of whom were not worthy to lace up Gordon Bank’s football boots.

Less controversial, perhaps, but still sticking in my gullet, are the damehoods and knighthoods that have been doled out by the dozen to sportsmen and sportswomen much less illustrious than Gordon Banks.

England's 1966 World Cup final triumph - in which they defeated West Germany 4-2 - remains the team's finest hour

I don’t want to start a fight by mentioning them by name, but these days prowess on the athletic or cycling track seems likely to lead to a pretty instant award much grander than Gordon Banks’ OBE.

Granted that Andy Murray is a brilliant tennis player, the conferring of a knighthood on his 30-year-old shoulders was surely premature. Wouldn’t it have been better to wait for him to hang up his racket?

The truth is that politicians hope to curry favour with the public by giving honours to glamorous young sports personalities — as well as pop stars and showbiz types.

Needless to say, the egregious Tony Blair accelerated the process. Even before he became prime minister, he strove to establish his ‘street cred’ by being photographed heading a ball with the footballer Kevin Keegan.

Egged on by his football-mad sidekick Alastair Campbell, Blair ensured that Manchester United’s Alex Ferguson was given a knighthood in 1999. As a hugely successful manager he richly deserved an eventual honour, but he was still very much in the saddle. Blair and Campbell should have waited.

Meanwhile nobody spared a thought for Gordon Banks, whose career was long over and who was living in relative poverty. He was of no use to anyone in power.

England's goalkeeper Gordon Banks resplendent in yellow kit as he lifts the World Cup at Wembley Stadium back in 1966

Like seven other members of the 1966 victorious team, Banks was forced to sell his winner’s medal in 2001 to keep the wolf from the door — or, more precisely, to help his children buy their first homes. He got £124,750 — about two days’ wages for the likes of Aaron Ramsey.

Isn’t it shaming that eight players of that legendary team, whose achievement hasn’t been equalled and probably never will be, were forced to sell their precious medals because they needed the money?

And it is no less discreditable that, while lesser sportsmen and showbiz stars and third-rate politicians are bombarded with honours, nine out of the 11 in the World Cup-winning team had to make do with lesser awards. It makes one long to get rid of the whole rotten and antiquated system.

Yet one can’t help thinking that Gordon Banks had the last laugh. He wasn’t ruined by money. He didn’t drive a Bentley, or go around with a dolly bird on each arm, or sniff cocaine, or embarrass anyone. He splendidly remained himself.

I’m afraid they don’t make people like him and his teammates any more. In the end it doesn’t really matter that blinkered politicians failed to honour him as they should have. Much of this nation does.

Link hienalouca.com

https://hienalouca.com/2019/02/14/stephen-glover-it-is-grossly-unjust-that-gordon-banks-was-never-knighted/
Main photo article Earlier this week it was reported that a British footballer called Aaron Ramsey had signed a £400,000 a week contract with the Italian club Juventus. That’s nearly £21 million a year.
On Tuesday Gordon Banks, who was goalkeeper in England’s victorious team in the 1966 World Cup, died at the age o...

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Dianne Reeves Online news HienaLouca





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