Bill Shankly

"'The only person whose picture was allowed to hang in our kitchen was Bill Shankly. I thought, Mark E Smith should be in here as well. But Sheila vetoed it. I bowed to a superior authority.' 11 November 2003"

William "Bill" Shankly OBE (2 September 1913 – 29 September 1981) was a Scottish footballer and manager who is best known for his time as manager of Liverpool.

Shankly came from a small Scottish mining community as one of five brothers who played football professionally. He played as a ball-winning right-half and was capped twelve times for Scotland, including seven wartime internationals. He spent one season at Carlisle United before spending the rest of his career at Preston North End, with whom he won the FA Cup in 1938. His playing career was interrupted by his service in the Royal Air Force during the Second World War. He became a manager after he retired from playing in 1949, returning to Carlisle United. He later managed Grimsby Town, Workington and Huddersfield Town before moving to become Liverpool manager in December 1959.

Shankly took charge of Liverpool when they were in the Second Division and rebuilt the team into a major force in English and European football. He led Liverpool to the Second Division Championship to gain promotion to the top-flight First Division in 1962, before going on to win three First Division Championships, two FA Cups, four Charity Shields and one UEFA Cup. Shankly announced his surprise retirement from football a few weeks after Liverpool won the 1974 FA Cup Final, having managed the club for fifteen years, and was succeeded by his long-time assistant Bob Paisley. He led the Liverpool team out for the last time at Wembley for the 1974 FA Charity Shield. He died seven years later at the age of 68.

Links To Peel
Peel was a fan of Liverpool Football Club and one of his heroes was Bill Shankly, who managed Liverpool in rebuilding the team into a major force in English and European football. In Margrave Of The Marshes, Peel described how he carried Shankly's bag in 1981:

''"At school, I was an old-fashioned right winger - you know, take the ball to the line, cross it, that sort of thing - although I would rather have played on the left wing in emulation of my boyhood idol, Billy Liddell. A portrait of Billy hangs to the present day in our dining-room and his was the first autograph I ever collected. On my first ever solo trip to Anfield, I had seen Billy getting off the bus - in those days players travelled on public transport - and had grabbed a flier for the Socialist weekly, Reynolds News, and asked him to sign it. I have this in a special place in my dad's old desk and it is perhaps the most sacred object I own. I had it on me when Liverpool beat Real Madrid in the European Cup Final in Paris, as I had when they beat Bruges at Wembley. I went to the Paris game with John Gorman out of the Scaffold, having managed to get a flight to France on the plane that carried the players' wives. John and I both contrived to wear red trousers. I can't say that either of us looked very good in them.''

''After the game, we found that we had become part of a group of about 20 or 30 scousers bent on celebrating. To this end, we went into what turned out to be a bikers' bar not far from the Champs-Elysees. As something of a coward, I was nervous about this, but it turned out that Parisian bikers, despite looking magnificent, all cheekbones and immaculate leathers - but did they have bikes, I wondered? - were prepared to yield to jubilant Liverpool supporters. The other French people in the bar defied the stereotypes and were generous and friendly. They joined in, as best they could, with our singing and with the beer fight that erupted at about two in the morning. After this, and drenched from head to toe, the bar emptied on to the street, we sang the most beautiful 'You'll Never Walk Alone' I've ever heard, and adjourned to our various hotels, cars, vans and campsites. Gorman and I were staying, entirely fortuitously, at the same hotel as the Liverpool squad and in the morning came down to breakfast to find Bill Shankly at reception, paying his bill.''

''As he prepared to leave for the coach outside, I darted forward and offered to carry his bags. Apparently, the great man didn't find this odd at all because he agreed at once. I regard this as being my greatest sporting achievement. A photograph of Bill is the only picture allowed to hang in our kitchen. It is before me - as they say - as I write and I have just walked across the room to check the caption. It reads, 'Liverpool manager Bill Shankly, supporting a campaign for more sports facilities in the city'.''

''The only other people in the picture are ordinary Liverpudlians and I often wonder who they are, especially the bloke on the left laughing at whatever Bill is saying. As they have been in our kitchen for twenty years or more, I feel as though I know them anyway. Our daughter Florence, recently graduated from Liverpool University, is named in tribute to Shanks. Florence Victoria Shankly Ravenscroft - now there's a name to reckon with."''

Peel enthusasim for Shankley led to naming his youngest child in 1982 as Florence Victoria Shankly Ravenscroft, one year after his hero died.

On Sounds Of The Suburbs: Lanarkshire, broadcast in 1999, Peel visited the memorial birthstone of Bill Shankley in Glenbuck, southern Scotland.