Focus On; Brian Labone

Bio:

Liverpool-born Labone chose to join Everton at 17 in July 1957 instead of going to university. His debut for the first team was in 1958.[1] He was widely regarded as one of the best central defenders of his era. He was a strong tackler, good in the air, adequately fast but he rarely used his left foot.

Labone made 451 League appearances for Everton and a total of 534 in all competitions. He scored two league goals and was booked only twice throughout his career. Manager Harry Catterick called him “the last of the Corinthians”. Labone played in the championship teams of 1962–63 and 1969–70, in the FA Cup winning team of 1966, and in the FA Cup final of 1968. He also won the FA Charity Shield in 1963 and 1970. Labone showed his high opinion of Everton in a simple quote “One Evertonian is worth twenty Liverpudlians”

Labone played 26 times for England between 1962 and 1970. He withdrew from England’s 1966 World Cup squad because of his imminent marriage but played in three of the four games in the World Cup in 1970 in Mexico.

In 1970–71 Labone sustained a serious injury to his Achilles tendon and retired from playing. A few years earlier he had announced, at the beginning of the season, his intention to retire at the end of that season, in typical fashion giving the club as much notice as possible so that he could be replaced. Such was the outcry however that he changed his mind and played on for two more seasons.

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