OBITUARY: Joe Fagan
http://www.theguardian.com/football/2001/jul/03/newsstory.sport
Football manager who took Liverpool to triple cup triumph
Tuesday 3 July 2001 02.44 BST
Never, in his wildest fantasies, when he joined Liverpool towards the end of his playing career as a footballer, could Joe Fagan, who has died at the age of 80, have imagined the ultimate triumph he would enjoy. In his very first season as manager, in 1983-84, the club brought off the astonishing treble of European Cup, League Championship and Football League Cup. After the belligerent flamboyance of Bill Shankly, the true architect of Liverpool's postwar fortunes, and the wily, shrewd Bob Paisley, Fagan must have blinked in the light as he emerged from the boot room.
It was there, famously, that plans were hatched, tactics made and transfers discussed. Fagan was an invaluable contributor to those discussions, as he moved up the coaching and training hierarchy until, in 1983, Paisley retired, and he became manager. Liverpool, in those days, promoted consistently from the boot room.
After a couple of humiliating European Cup defeats at the hands of Red Star Belgrade, Fagan and the Liverpool hierarchy worked out a new strategy. Eschewing long ball tactics, the club would now put its emphasis on possession and the gradual build up.
Fagan himself was a Liverpudlian through and through; he was born in the city, though he came very late to the club. Almost all his professional career, interrupted by war service, was spent with Manchester City, which he joined in 1938. At first a wing-half, he was subsequently turned into a dependable centre-half, in the old stopper days, standing 5ft 10ins and weighing 11st 8lbs.
Seldom, in his time at Maine Road, did he miss a league match. Indeed, in season 1948-49, he made all 42 first division appearances; and another 39 the following season, when City were briefly relegated. He played just five times for City in the second division, before joining Liverpool and working his way through the coaching ranks.
Despite his great immediate success, Fagan never seemed happy as a manager, above all, when he came to dealing with the media. At press conferences, he would sometimes look uneasy, like a crab without a shell, though he was never less than honest and direct. When Dynamo Bucharest came to Anfield, and kicked remorselessly - though their own player Movila paid heavily for a foul on Graeme Souness - he mildly remarked: "I thought that, at this stage, the European Cup is supposed to be about ability and skill."
When it came to the final in Rome, where Liverpool were obliged to meet Roma in their own Olympic stadium, he planned his tactics with great practicality. Falcao, the elegant Brazilian midfielder, was the fulcrum of Roma's team, and Fagan successfully decreed, "whoever was close to Falcao should close him down." When it came, after extra time, to the nerve-racking expedient of penalties, he profitably told his eccentric keeper Bruce Grobbelaar to "try to put them off." This the keeper ebulliently did, swaying about on his line.
"You see," said Fagan, after Alan Kennedy had slotted home Liverpool's winning penalty, "we're rather coming to the stage where I'm talking simple, and it's a simple game. We close the space down on them."
There were endearing solecisms at times. "What do they say?" he asked, after Liverpool had beaten Lech Pozan 4-0 in the first round of the ensuing European Cup. "One robin doesn't make a summer." And, indeed, the Reds had dropped into the bottom three by October, and, although they recovered to finish runners-up, the league title went to their arch-rivals, Everton.
But, well before Liverpool had reached the ill-starred 1985 European Cup final at Heysel, where 39 Juventus fans died when a wall collapsed and Liverpool lost a match played in almost total silence, Fagan had had enough of the pressure, and had decided to retire. The events in Belgium clearly affected him, although he continued to help out, often showing up at Liverpool's training ground to offer his advice to players and coaches alike, who were always ready to listen.
That final was a sad coda to a short, but remarkable, managerial career. He is survived by his wife, Lil.
Joe Fagan, footballer and manager, born March 12 1921; died June 30 2001
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