Everyone in Wales
swells with pride to think of the amazing achievement of Bale, Allen, Ledley,
Ramsey and co. in getting to the semi-finals at Euro 2016. Hardcore Wales
football fans will also talk of the 1958 squad that included Ivor Allchurch and
Mel and John Charles and made it to the quarter-finals of the World Cup. But
what about the boys of 1976? Wales’ strangely unsung success of the 1976 European Championships is finally celebrated
in a new book by Nick Burnell – Trailing
Clouds of Glory: Welsh Football’s Forgotten Heroes of 1976, which
fêtes the success and achievement of a group of people who restored pride in
the Welsh football jersey. The book is also the Books Council of Wales’ Book of
the Month for
November 2019.
It was a time which Burnell describes as less complicated, “before
the onset of 24-hour saturation coverage and millionaire journeymen players. A
time before football was ‘invented’ in 1992, where television and radio closed
down when there was nothing more to say, and when footballers looked to the
future by doing their coaching badges or searching for local pubs that needed
new landlords. A time before VAR, podcasts and the gaudy vulgarity of the
Premier League, when you’d stand and watch the game in front of you for 90
minutes rather than film it on your mobile phone.”
And though 2016 and 1958 are legendary, the period following
Mike Smith’s appointment as manager on the heels of yet another failure to
qualify for a World Cup in 1974 has largely been forgotten.
Wales
had finished with the wooden spoon in the Home International tournament four years
in a row in the run-up to the 1976 European Championships, yet the continent’s
top international competition saw them turn things around drastically and reach
the quarter finals. Many contend that had it not been for terrible refeering,
the team of Terry Yorath and John Toshack, Leighton James and Leighton
Phillips, John Mahoney and Brian Flynn would have made it through to the
semi-finals. Mike Smith’s surprise appointment saw a squad that was low on
confidence and expectations transformed into a cohesive team, playing strong,
attacking football that got results. As Burnell says: “Rarely has the
togetherness in the squad been as strong.”
“The 1976 Wales
team was the team of my childhood, it’s the era in which I started following
the sport, attending games and supporting Wales. As more time passes, the
achievements of Mike Smith and the squad are being forgotten, even though Wales
have only a handful of similar achievements to remember! I wanted to record the
history and to bring it to the attention of the public – to remind those like
me who were there, following the team, or to show those too young to remember
that this was a side which deserves to be right up there with those of 1958 and
2016.”
“I think at the time the Welsh rugby team were so strong,
with heroes such as J.P.R. Williams and Gareth Edwards playing. Wales won the
1976 Five Nations Championship with a Grand Slam and the Triple Crown. The rugby
glory of the time received most of the press coverage and so the football
team’s success has disappeared from memory,” says Nick Burnell.
Trailing Clouds of
Glory is based on extensive research, and Nick Burnell has used
contemporary press reports and surviving TV match footage as well as
recollections collected during interviews with some of the protagonists
themselves. The book also paints a vivid picture of the 1970s, taking a
nostalgic and humorous look at the decade and its foibles – including a look at
the news headlines of the time, and one truly surreal real-life event involving
The Bay City Rollers, Tony Blackburn and a Womble.
