Frank Buckley (footballer)
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Franklin Charles ‘Frank’ Buckley (Major Frank Buckley) (October 3, 1882 – December 21, 1964) was, along with Herbert Chapman, one of the greatest managers in British football history. Apparently not qualified for a place as one of the 100 Football League legends, Buckley introduced Stan Cullis, Billy Wright, John Charles and, future World Cup winner, Jack Charlton to the British game and lead a whole host of clubs with his intuitive policies, shrewd approach to transfers and a rock solid disciplinarian ethos across nearly 50 years of management.
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[edit] Early life
Buckley was born in Urmston, Manchester joined the army and bought him self out in 1902 to join a football club. He went from Aston Villa F.C. to Brighton and Hove Albion F.C. to Manchester United F.C. and Manchester City F.C. all within 6 years and only found something approaching stability with Birmingham City F.C. (making 56 appearances). Soon after that he was on the move again, this time to the Baseball Ground (where he played in Steve Bloomer’s victorious Derby County F.C.) where he gained his sole England cap in 1914 against Ireland, before upping sticks, again, to join Bradford City F.C.; his stay in Yorkshire foreshortened by the start of World War I.
[edit] Introduction to Management
Buckley went back to War with the 17th Middlesex Regiment (where he commanded the ‘footballers’ battalion’) seeing action and receiving wounds to his lung and shoulder on the Somme and rose to the rank of Major. On his return Buckley was appointed manager of Norwich City F.C.. The Canaries had been so debt-ridden that the receivers had wound the club up but, following an extraordinary general meeting, the club was resurrected and Buckley was placed in charge in February 1919 and returned to the club to Southern League football. Once again Buckley’s stay was short, by the end of the 1919-1920 season he was gone; financial disputes precipitating a wholesale change of personnel. [1]
[edit] Managerial ideas
Prior to Buckley it was not unusual for clubs to create sides through purchases. Preston North End and Derby County of the 1880s and 1890s are good examples of teams that had gathered together players, en masse, from elsewhere; the famous Sunderland side of the 1890s ('the team of all talents') is another; Middlesbrough's controversial transfer policy of 1905 another. However, such a policy, of creating success through expenditure, will only be successful if there is success and money is generated as a result. Certain questions are always of importance: How do you best sustain income? How do you generate local interest in the club? How do you create a style of play synonymous with the club?
[edit] Character
Buckley comes across, in retrospect, as a character far removed from the unbending disciplinarian that he wished to portray himself as. The truth is, possibly, closer to him being a wily manipulator of whatever resources were available. Accordingly, his aims, which arose because of simple economics, boiled down to key principles. First he introduced youth programmes at the clubs where he worked and created club sides without bankrupting the directors by combining young 'home-grown' talent with experienced professionals. Second, he went into the transfer market with his eyes wide open. He bought players cheaply and sold others cleverly. Third, he insisted on using a scouting network throughout England and Wales, which is where a scout of Buckley's found John Charles. Fourth, he kept the press intrigued with rumour and innocent half-truths and, accordingly, kept the paying public interested and expectant in his clubs.
[edit] Influence
As a result Buckley's influence on the rise of the Blackpool and Wolves sides of the 1950s, of the Leeds United 'club culture' of the 1960s and 1970s should never be understated. His principles may not have been adopted directly by Busby, Shankly, Clough and Ferguson but they were innovative principles that are quite commonplace now. Buckley's financial acumen may well have come from his stint as a travelling salesman in the early 1920s but he returned to football management at Blackpool F.C. on October 6, 1923 and it was there that Buckley’s ideas started to come to the fore. He is credited with implementing a youth system and scouting scheme to the Seasiders as well as introducing the club's famous tangerine shirts. [2]. Such a marketing step (previously Albert Prince-Cox had altered Bristol Rovers kit in the 1930s) was followed in time by Herbert Chapman (white sleeve Arsenal jerseys), Bill Shankly ('all red' Liverpool kits) and Don Revie (Leeds' United's 'Real Madrid' strips).
[edit] Wolverhampton Wanderers
In July 1927, Buckley took up an appointment with Wolverhampton Wanderers F.C.. Stan Cullis wrote of him: "I soon realised that Major Buckley was one out of the top drawer. He didn't suffer fools gladly. His style of management in football was very similar to his attitude in the army. Major Buckley implanted into my mind the direct method of playing which did away with close interpassing and square-ball play. If you didn't like his style you'd very soon be on your bicycle to another club. He didn't like defenders over-elaborating in their defensive positions. Major Buckley also knew how to deal with the press". (Stan Cullis, quoted in Taylor and Ward, 1995, pp. 31-2). [3]
Buckley stay at Wolves can be taken two ways. On the face of it, he appeared to achieve only modest success with the club; they won the Second Division title in 1932 and finished runners-up in the Football League in 1938 and in both the Football League and F.A. Cup in 1939. An alternative view is that during his stay at Molineux, Buckley once made the club a £100,000 profit within one year purely on transfer deals; he toyed, provocatively, with the media (instigating the empty rumour that his players were using a monkey gland treatment to aid performance), he used psychologists to instill confidence in his players and was responsible for bringing through Stan Cullis and offering Billy Wright a start in professional football. [4]. After he had left the club, however, the full value of his vision, not least the Wolves youth programme, came to fruition and did so much to shape the Wolves side of the 1950's when they won three League Championships, and twice won the F.A. Cup and were one of few genuine challengers to Busby’s Babes
Buckley left Wolves, somewhat surprisingly, in 1944 and another non-committal couple of years followed at Notts County F.C. and Hull City F.C. before starting work at Elland Road where one of his first discoveries was John Charles just after Christmas 1948. He was not afraid to try all manner of ideas to induce Leeds United out of mediocrity: dancing songs broadcast through the public address system during training days, so-called 'shooting' boxes (a contraption designed to send the ball out at different speeds and angles to players), increasing admission costs, youth development programmes. John Charles did excel during the 1954-1955 season but the team failed to respond in kind. [5]
[edit] Influence on others
Buckley, a stern disciplinarian throughout his career, earned devotion and affection. He brought in Jack Charlton, who had this to say about him: "Unlike the pros, we got just two weeks' holidays in the summer, and while they were away, our job was to remove the weeds from the pitch and replace them with grass seed. I remember being sat out there one day with Keith Ripley, another ground staff boy, when Major Buckley came over to us. We must have looked pretty forlorn, the two of us, and to gee us up he said he'd give us five shillings for every bucket we filled with weeds. Now that was an offer we couldn't refuse. "By the time we were finished, we had filled six buckets, and cheeky bugger that I was, I marched straight up to the Major's office. And when he asked what I wanted, I told him I was there to claim my thirty bob for the weeds. He nearly blew a bloody gasket! 'Get out of here!' he bellowed. 'You're already getting paid to do that work - don't ever let me see you up here again with your buckets.'
"Yet beneath the gruff exterior, he was a kind man, as he demonstrated once when I met him. My shoes must have been a sight, for when he looked down at them, he asked me if they were the only pair I had. I nodded. The next morning, he summoned me to his office and handed me a pair of Irish brogues, the strongest, most beautiful shoes I'd ever seen. And I had them for years."
Buckley left Leeds United in April 1953, moving to Walsall, but leaving them in September 1955.
| Preceded by: Willis Edwards |
Leeds United AFC manager 1948–1953 |
Succeeded by: Raich Carter |
