My time at Villa: Garry Thompson

Garry Thompson broke into tears in a hotel room in Watford when the reality of leaving his boyhood club Aston Villa hit him.

The striker had just signed for the Hornets in December 1988, ending an eventful two-and-a-half-year spell at Villa in which he endured the ignominy of relegation, the terrifying prospect of injury ending his career, the wrath of Graham Taylor, and the redemption of winning promotion.

Pulling on the claret and blue had been Thompson’s main aspiration since he first saw the club playing in the Third Division as a kid, a dream reaffirmed when he watched on in awe as Brazilian legend Pelé graced Villa Park with Santos in 1972.

Villa had tried to sign Thompson on three occasions by the time they eventually secured his services in June 1986, picking him up from Sheffield Wednesday for £450,000.

The Kings Heath native ignored the alarm bells that were ringing in his head – including the absence of manager Graham Turner and a warning from his wife not to be too hasty – when he put pen-to-paper at owner Doug Ellis’ house. The lure of playing for the club he supported proved too strong.

“I went to see Doug and I’m sitting in his house. I’m with Doug and Ron Wylie, the assistant manager, it’s about ten o’clock in the morning and they’re having a glass of sherry,” recalled Thompson.

“I said, ‘This is all well and good, but where’s the manager?’ He’s (Doug) offered me less than I’m on at Sheffield Wednesday, less signing on fee, and a Montego car. I just signed. Then I had to go and explain to my wife.”

The dream move quickly turned into a nightmare. After winning the European Cup in 1982, the club had been steadily declining on the pitch, with Gary Shaw remarking upon his arrival, ‘you’re three years too late’.

His former Wednesday teammates also predicted a season of struggle was in store when they came to see the striker play in a pre-season game against Port Vale

He said: “We came back from Italy and played Port Vale in a pre-season friendly. It was a dreadful game and I remember Gary Megson, Lee Chapman, Mark Chamberlain, Gary Shelton and Paul Hart came to watch me because I hadn’t had a chance to say goodbye to them all.

“After the game, Shelton went to me, ‘You’ll go down, you lot.’ I wouldn’t admit it to myself for a long time.”

Five defeats in their first six Division One matches, compounded by a 6-0 mauling by Nottingham Forest, spelt the end of Graham Turner. His successor, Billy McNeill, sparked an initial resurgence before their form tailed off towards the end of November, managing only three wins in their final 21 league games as they finished bottom of the table.

Being a Villa fan, relegation hit Thompson hard, especially as he felt he underperformed with seven goals in 37 games.

“When you’re a local lad, you’re new and you’re coming through the ranks, fans love you and they give you every opportunity,” he said.

“When you’re a local lad and you’ve been working to get back to the club, you just take dog’s abuse. I couldn’t argue with people because they were right – I was playing crap in a crap team.

“We were getting beat on a regular basis and showing no fight at all. It was hard to take, as a local lad, but it makes you stronger.”

Throughout his first campaign at the club, Thompson was hindered by what he and the physios believed to be a groin injury. He was struggling through games and battling the pain before things came to a head in the final months of the season.

The club wanted to send the forward to Germany for a surgical procedure that involved taking a graft from his hip to stabilise his pelvis. Thompson refused, leading Ellis to offer him a sum of money to retire because he wouldn’t accept treatment.

“I had my career-threatening injury and Doug offered me £20,000 to retire,” he said.

“I could have taken the money and bailed out. I thought, ‘I cannot come to my local club and have this hanging over me for the rest of my life. I’ve got to get fit and get back in the team.’”

Jim Walker joined the physiotherapy department after relegation and Thompson credits him with saving his career. Walker took him to see a doctor who diagnosed an inguinal ring hernia that had torn a hole in the wall of his stomach, sending him for surgery at Harley Street.

Eight weeks later and Thompson, who had been contemplating the end of his career, was back playing, making his comeback in a Simod Cup tie against Bradford. He now faced the challenge of impressing Graham Taylor, who had been installed as manager after the sacking of McNeill.

It proved to be an uphill struggle, quite literally.

He said: “By now, me and Graham Taylor have had three or four meetings that have not gone well. All he said was, ‘You’re loud, you think you’re funny, you think you’re running the club.’ Every meeting was like that.

“I get fit, play against Bradford and we get beat 5-0, but it’s my first game back. I played 70 minutes and then he told me we’re all in at Villa Park at 9am tomorrow. I thought we were coming in to have a walk around the park and a sauna.

“Gary Shaw said, ‘Big man, you’ve been out for so long you owe it yourself to have a little drink.' I got back home at four o’clock in the morning and I was back at Villa Park at 9am.

“Graham Taylor takes me over to Aston Park and he ran me all over the place. Graham was fit, so we’d run for half a mile then we’d get down for 100 sit-ups and 100 press-ups. As I was finishing the last thing, he’d shoot off and say, ‘You’ve got to catch me!’ He ran me for about 40 or 50 minutes and in the end, he said, ‘You’re a game lad, you’ll do for me.’”

Despite being favourites for an immediate return to the top flight, the early part of the 1987-88 season had its fair share of ups and downs. By the time Thompson made his first league start in a 4-2 win against Bradford in November, the club were fourth in Division Two.

“I missed the first two months of the season and watched grown men struggle under the expectation of playing for Aston Villa and getting promotion,” Thompson said.

“I came into the team, and the fans were still lukewarm but winning games wins them over. We won them over because we won games, worked hard and they could see we were a group.”

A team that included Alan McInally, Martin Keown, Warren Aspinall and Nigel Spink marched towards promotion during the winter months, sitting top of the table with seven games to play after beating Reading 2-0 in March 1988.

Three consecutive defeats followed and Villa fell over the line to clinch the second automatic promotion place with a 0-0 draw against Swindon Town on the final day. After finishing level on points and goal difference with Middlesbrough, Villa were promoted courtesy of goals scored, with Thompson accounting for ten.

“We deserved it because we were an excellent team, we just fell away at the wrong time,” he said.

“We were great mates because he (Taylor) made us hang together all the time. There were no phones in those days, we’d all go drinking with each other and we’d work hard together; we became like brothers. Even now, we’re all in contact with each other and we love each other because we came through something special.

“As much as I fell out with Graham, he was the perfect choice because we could have gone down again as the club was in a mess from the top down and we were struggling. Graham Taylor did a brilliant job and my relationship with those players is something special.”

Villa fans carried Thompson off the County Ground pitch on their shoulders before the striker headed inside to celebrate with his teammates. It was inside the dressing room, a matter of minutes after securing promotion, that Thompson felt Taylor began sizing up who would form part of his squad for their return to the First Division.

The striker made a handful of appearances at the start of the next campaign but events on and off the field led to his departure in December 1988.

He said: “This is the club that as a young kid I decided I wanted to play for, I wanted to be around, and this is my club. When the enormity of leaving hits me, and I’m just sat in a hotel in Watford, I started crying.

“If they’d have said, ‘Look, Thommo, just come back,’ I’d have been back like a shot. As I got older, I realised that I was playing at a very awkward time for the football club and we came through it and ended up back in the First Division.

“You can’t pick and choose your times. I had a heaven and hell time, but I wouldn’t change a minute of it. It was fantastic. I’m very proud of our team because we could have wilted, and it needed men to steer us through it.”

Thompson played 73 times for his boyhood club, scoring 19 goals. Today, his love for Villa still burns as brightly as ever, as listeners of BBC Radio WM can attest after a number of years covering the club’s games week-in-week-out.

A 20-year playing career saw Thompson spend time at nine clubs, and all of his escapades are covered in his book ‘Don’t Believe A Word’. The 62-year-old will be signing copies in the Holte Suite before this weekend’s game against Southampton, and after his eventful spell in claret and blue, it’s certain to be a fascinating read for any Villa fan.

“Everything I’d done in my career, I wanted to play for Aston Villa,” he said.

“I got here in the end, and we got relegated, and if I’d had to retire it would have killed me because I was part of that side and I wouldn’t have been able to change it.

“I managed to be part of the team that changed it. I loved every moment here. The peak of my career was playing for the club I wanted to play for.”

Catch Garry Thompson in the Holte Suite from 12pm on Saturday, 5 March, where he will be signing copies of his book.

You can purchase 'Don't Believe A Word' here.