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Gary Sprake Has Died:
reddragon6273
Posts: 23 Forum Member
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Former Leeds United and Wales goalkeeper Gary Sprake has died at the age of 71. He made over 500 appearances for Leeds United.
Remember going to see them in the 70's. Great goal keeper. But like Bonetti of Chelsea prone to horrendous errors.
Remember going to see them in the 70's. Great goal keeper. But like Bonetti of Chelsea prone to horrendous errors.
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Try as I might I can't or Won't forgive him. BUT as Eddie Gray sad last night he played 500 games for us and won e erything via the FA cup between 65/70.so in guess he must HD some good games
Rip
He was about to throw the ball out to one of the Leeds players, the last minute saw Ian Callaghan sprinting in, so tried to stop his throw unfortunately for him the ball slipped out of his hand & went in to the back of the net, the incident happened in the first half, so half time the PA played Careless Hands, only in the second half the Kop started signing Careless Hands, & that became Sprakes nickname from rival fans afterwards.:D
RIP
Ah, excellent - thanks for clarifying.
I have seen things in recent years tho that suggest that Leeds fans do not have a lot of regard for him which I think is a bit sad when you remember that he gave his all for the club for many years as the club became a force in English football and he was an automatic choice during that time.
The post below illustrates that
Harvey was as good if not better in the end but it was bold call by Revie to drop Sprake and even if he had lost his place from where I stand as a mere Liverpool fan I feel he did not deserve the stick he got. Mind you Leeds fans always come over to me as fair to their own so if they fell out with him there must have been good reason.
There is a Leeds fan called Ray Fell who is secretary of the supporters club or something like that and he is often on TV or radio when anything about Leeds and its fans is raised. I recall maybe 5 years ago TV setting up a meeting between him and Gary Sprake and they had not spoken for maybe 20 years and there had been a lot of bad blood on both sides during those years but their meeting was fairly cordial in the circumstances. What would all that have been about Robbedin? and can you comment on all this? (and try to be as fair minded as poss even if you are bit anti Sprake!!)
Am currently at work but I reply properly tomorrow to All your points too and truthfully as I can
Thanks mate - I look forward to it.
You are not Ray Fell are you
Actually the way that TV thing was done was a bit unfair and typical of the media as if I remember rightly Ray walked into a room and Gary was sat at a table (with some other people I think) and the reporter said you know who this is don't you Ray (as Gary looked older - not surprisingly!!). Ray said of course, they shook hands and spoke for a while with the cameras on - I felt as if that was a bit of a cheap shot by the media as the meeting should not have been televised - at least not at first but that is the way TV is sadly..
Ray fell was (as far as I know is still around ) but has now retried as he was the chairman of the Lufc supporters club for years and the meeting with Gary Sprake was an emotional one as ray can't or won't forgive Garys actions towards Don Revie (see below (.
As for the Gary Sprake allegations they are (as far as am aware this
When Gary sprake made several high profile errors there were many people fans media and even players saying thst David Harvey shoulabel given a chance he (Harvey) got his chance after sprake was injured in the 2nd leg of the European cup semi final against Celtic which we lost 2/1 also Harvey was in Gosl forc replay if the 70 replay with Chelsea and Harvey didn't do well so when sprske was fit .he returned hsrvey returned to reserves a further more high profile errors most notably Colchester in 71 I 5th round of cup when he failed to catch a simple cross and Ray Crawford scored so midway during the 72 FA cup run Don finally dropped Sprske and Harvey came in and did well sprske asked for transfer and in 1973 went to Birmingham for a then world record fee for a GK of 100.000 .
Week before we played Birmingham in December 73 sprake decided to go the mirrior about allegations about Don Revie (alledged) mate how fixing which was obviously timed tonget maximum publicity leeds were on unbeaten run of 29 games and got late equaliser to preserve it
Further allegations surfaced in this time about match fixing
Then in the late 90s sprske was unwell. With heart trouble and said we (lufc) refused to help no surprise which psper he went too with the story and as it was in late 90s when we wrre one top sides in country he knew he get maximum publicly
Then the controversial book he did in 2006 which got huge publicity atvthe about the allegations of match fixing
This outraged many of his former teammates most note able lorimer/Giles among others sprake was lthe blsckstuff sheep nobody wanted to know him is this justified??
Tbf I can't comment on something I no actual evidence
To prove it but two sides story are
1 despite playing 500 gsmes and winning 4 major honours athe the time when there was no Domination by nobody
Yet his high profile errors and allegations afterms Don Revie
Stuck by him leaves a very sour taste indeed
the fact he didn't (as far as I know unless t illness or otherwise ). Prevented them All Dons players attended his funeral in 1989 Except Sprake and that included Kevin Keegan and other players Don picked for England in fact KK said that in 69 he wanted to sign for Leeds But Didn't think he get in team Don wasn't sure we signed Clarke KK went to you in 71 and rest is history
That's about it really Alan but it will be very interesting to see who attends Garys funeral and more importantly who does Not those who are able to that is
Interview on focus few years ago
https://youtu.be/wS-lLLjUIbg
I think before reading what you said and seeing the clip I was a little bit on Sprake's side but now I can totally see why Leeds fans and the clubs big players from those days have an issue with him and what he did.
There may well have been some truth in the allegations (who can really prove it one way or another) but even so it was just not on that he should let his team mates down like that - and you can't help feeling that a part of it was the way he left the club having lost his place. The disappointing thing is that he does not seem to regret what he did but even so at least he stopped short of directly labelling Revie a cheat. Well done to the 3 Leeds fans in the cafe who were so civil to him which was probably hard in the circumstances but perhaps it would have been hard to be otherwise with it being filmed.
That Leeds side of the 60s and early 70s though I do remember and I do think of them as being a truly great team - if Revie had tried to fix matches there was no need to as they had the best team anyway. I think that team did have a special comradeship about it too with many of them still being connected to the club even now - Lorimer, Gray, Clarke, (who have all been manager) especially but also people like Hunter, Reaney, Cooper and of course the late great Bily Bremner. Many of them still go to Leeds home games i expect. They were Leeds legends when the team was one of the top teams in Europe and still all love the club even though apart from that short spell in the 90s the club has been nowhere near that level for years, which must hurt them a lot. Not many clubs would command such loyalty from their ex players if they fell from the top - fans yes, players no. So for Sprake to cast doubts on Revie's integrity and methods no wonder they take a dim view of it.
Knowing all this I would not expect many ex Leeds players to be at his funeral though in many ways I would like it and think it was to their credit if they were.