They`ve Played For Your Club…..Stourbridge

Series on well-known players who have represented the current clubs in the Southern Football League.

Colin Gordon was appointed as Stourbridge`s player-manager in May 1994.

It was hailed as something of a homecoming for the Stourbridge-born striker, who started out in West Midlands (Regional) League with Lye Town and then Oldbury United, where he was spotted by Swindon Town, who signed him in 1984 at the age of 21.

He went on to score 60 goals in 194 appearances in the Football League for Swindon, Wimbledon, Reading, Fulham, Birmingham City and Leicester City as well as having several loan spells, most notably with Bristol City in 1988 when he scored 4 goals in 8 games.

After leaving Leicester, Gordon spent a couple of seasons with Kidderminster Harriers and would later return to Aggborough in a slightly different role!

After a mixed start to the 1995/96 Southern Midland Division season, the Glassboys parted company with Gordon at Christmas.

And he concentrated on building up his business as a sports agent, representing several well-known footballers including David James and Theo Walcott.

In 2015 he returned to Kidderminster Harriers as their new football development director and he was soon back in the hot-seat as caretaker manager – a role he held three times in total after buying a majority stake in the club.

In October 2019, a new consortium bought up Gordon`s shares in Kidderminster and his reign at Aggborough came to an end.

Mark Bellingham was one of the most prolific goalscorers in non-League football in the late 1990s right through to the mid-2000s.

His early days were spent in the Essex Senior League with Stambridge and Great Wakering Rovers.

He joined Chelmsford City in 1995 and became an instant success in the Southern Premier Division.

He continued to play for the Clarets, despite gaining a place at Wolverhampton University.

However, he moved to league rivals Cheltenham Town in August 1996 for a hefty £10,000 fee.

He moved to another Southern Premier side, Halesowen Town, in a player/exchange deal involving Keith Knight in March 1997 following a successful loan spell with the Yeltz.

On leaving university, Bellingham joined the police force and it resulted with him featuring for West Midlands Police in the Midland Alliance.

He also had spells at Sutton Coldfield Town and Bromsgrove Rovers before signing for Stourbridge in 2005.

In the 2005/06 season alone, Bellingham netted 61 times as the Glassboys won promotion from the Midland Alliance as runners-up to Chasetown, shattering the previous league record of 40 goals.

He helped Stourbridge re-establish themselves as a Southern League club before being transferred to Leamington in the summer of 2008.

He had another astonishing record with the Brakes in the Southern Division One Midlands in 2008/09 as he scored 47 goals in 44 starts, and 3 sub appearances, helping Leamington to win the title in emphatic fashion with 101 points and 114 goals in 42 league games.

He was equally as prolific in the Premier Division the following campaign, netting 32 goals in 37 starts, and 3 sub appearances.

He had brief spells with Hednesford Town, Sutton Coldfield Town and back at Stourbridge and then short stays at Daventry Town and Bedworth United before returning to the Victoria Ground, but this time to sign for Bromsgrove Sporting where his 45 goals in just 36 games helped the Rouslers to promotion from the Midland Combination to the Midland Alliance.

He continued to play into his 40s with Midland League Division One sides Hinckley AFC and then Paget Rangers.

Phil `Chic` Bates

There`s no doubting Chic Bates` place in Stourbridge`s history.

He joined the club in 1969 when they members of the West Midlands (Regional) League Premier Division and helped them to finish in third place in his first season.

Stourbridge finished sixth in 1970/71 but were elected to the expanding Southern League and, after establishing themselves, in Division One North alongside big non-League names like Burton Albion, Cheltenham Town, King`s Lynn, Gloucester City and Kettering Town, who won the 71/72 title under new boss Ron Atkinson, the Glassboys soon enjoyed success themselves under manager Alan Grundy.

In the 1973/74 season they won the Division One North title, with Burton Albion in second and Cheltenham third and also won the Merit Cup for being the highest goalscorers in all three divisions.

Twin strikers Bates and his partner Ray Haywood were mostly responsible for Stourbridge winning the Merit Cup as each notched 50 goals in all competitions that season.

Another highlight in 1973/74 was a fine run in the Welsh Cup, in which the Glassboys disposed of both Swansea City and Wrexham on their own grounds and then faced Cardiff City in a two-leg final.

A record crowd of 5,726 at Amblecote saw Stourbridge lose the home leg 1-0 and then also go down 1-0 at Ninian Park.

Bates` took his total of goals scored for the Glassboys to 197 goals but former Derby and Wales midfielder Alan Durban, then in charge of Shrewsbury Town, needed strikers and in the summer of 1974, he surprised supporters by signing both Bates and his strike partner Haywood for a joint fee of around £10,000.

No-one realised though that it would lead to a 40-year relationship between Bates and Shrewsbury Town.

In his first season with the Shrews, Bates scored 17 goals as Durban`s side gained promotion to the Third Division.

He added another 7 to that total in the 1975/76 season and followed that up with 13 in the 76/77 campaign.

He started the 1977/78 season well and it attracted the attention of Swindon Town who eventually paid £30,000 for his services midway through that season.

However, that wasn’t the end of Bates’ relationship with Shrewsbury. He returned just three years later, this time from Bristol Rovers, for £20,000.

When he returned, Shrewsbury were now in the Second Division and were managed by Graham Turner.

Bates’ second spell with Town was certainly less productive in front of goal as he scored just 24 goals in all competitions, compared with the 52 goals in his first spell, but his role was no less important as he featured 160 times during six seasons.

Bates passed his coaching badges in July 1981 and it came as no surprise when he was lined-up as Graham Turner’s successor when Turner moved to Wolverhampton Wanderers in 1984.

Bates managed to guide Shrewsbury to their highest ever Football League finish of eighth in the Second Division in 1984/85.

But Bates left the club in 1987, a move which saw chairman at the time, Tim Yates, resign.

Bates returned to Swindon as assistant to Lou Macari and then followed the former Manchester United star to Stoke City and Celtic.

When Macari left Stoke for the second time in 1997, Bates took over as manager but that would only last a year.

And he returned once more to Shrewsbury in 1999 to become assistant manager and he twice took on the top role again on a caretaker basis, before eventually retiring from football.

Another rightly regarded as a Stourbridge `legend` is Leon Broadhurst.

He finally left the War Memorial Ground to sign for home-town club and then-new Southern Premier Central rivals Bromsgrove Sporting in June 2019. He left the Glassboys after making 780 appearances and scoring 154 goals in a 16-year spell.

He initially left Stourbridge for Leamington in May 2009 after originally joining way back in 2006 from Bromsgrove Rovers after starting out at Fairfield Villa.

Jason Lowe started his career as a YTS at Birmingham City.

A determined full back, after being released by the Blues he linked up with Kidderminster Harriers and played in the Conference under Graham Allner at Aggborough.

Following a spell in the Southern League with Moor Green, Lowe joined his home-town club Stourbridge at the start of the 1992/93 season and remained at Amblecote for several seasons.

Willie Carr certainly wasn`t with Stourbridge for as long as Jason Lowe.

But he was still a reasonably big name in the game when he signed for the club in 1987.

The Glaswegian started his career with Coventry City where he made 252 appearances and scored 33 goals.

However, it was a goal he set up that he will be forever remembered for!

In October 1970 against Everton at Highfield Road, Carr amazed everyone in the ground, on TV and, especially, the Everton players when he produced an amazing donkey flip when he gripped the ball between his ankles and flicked it up for Ernie Hunt to volley home.

It was a wonderful piece of improvisation – so good that the FA banned it`s further use!

Carr went to Wolverhampton Wanderers in 1975 and added a further 237 games and 21 goals to his tally.

He finished his professional career with an injury-hit spell with Millwall and returned to the Midlands in 1983 and firstly signed for Worcester City in the still relatively new Alliance Premier League.

He then turned out for Willenhall Town in the Southern Midland Division, had a return to the Alliance Premier with Maidstone United and then Stafford Rangers before signing for the Glassboys in 1987 at the age of 37 where his playing days ended.

Capped six times at full international level for Scotland, Carr worked in the aerospace industry after retiring from the full-time game and later became an engineering company representative in the Birmingham area.

Ben Billingham Moving a little more up to date, Ben Billingham served the Glassboys well for many seasons.

A talented midfielder initially featured for Stourbridge on a handful of occasions in 2007/08 and 2008/09 but he spent much of this time with Lye Town gaining experience in the West Midlands (Regional) League.

He linked up again with the Glassboys on a more permanent basis at the start of the 2009/10 campaign and quickly established himself as a regular in the side.

A serious ankle injury sustained in October 2014 ruled him out of the remainder of the 2014/15 season, but he chalked up his 300th appearance for the club in February 2016.

Since leaving Stourbridge he has had spells with Cradley Town and back at Lye in the Midland League Premier Division where he scored 41 goals in 114 matches in four seasons before signing for West Midlands (Regional) League Premier Division outfit Littleton in the summer of 2019.

Sean Geddes was a talented midfielder who had two spells with Stourbridge.

He returned to Amblecote in December 2015 for a small fee after spending 15 months with Worcester City.

Noted for his range of passing, he originally joined the Glassboys in July 2011 after impressing on trial following his release from Walsall.

He had previously had a loan spell with neighbours Redditch United on loan towards the end of the 2010/11 campaign.

He enjoyed three successful seasons with Stourbridge, making 159 appearances and scoring 64 goals, including 28 in 2013/14 when he was the club`s top scorer.

In September 2014 he transferred to Worcester where he played a key role in their memorable FA Cup run that included a 2-1 win at Coventry City, with Geddes scoring both goals.

He also hit the headlines with a remarkable `rabona` goal against Barrow.

After falling out of favour at Worcester, in decided to return to Stourbridge.

However, in the summer of 2016, he left the club again to spent six months at Hednesford Town.

Spells with Sutton Coldfield Town, Market Drayton Town, Quorn and Evesham United followed.

He was appointed as Evesham`s player-coach in the summer of 2019 but before he could take a training session, he accepted the offer to become manager of Black Country Rangers.

However, his spell with Rangers was also a brief one as he left to take over at one of his former clubs, Cradley Town, where he still turns out as player-manager.

John Chambers will be best remembered for his managerial achievements but he was also a very decent player.

Chambers started his career with Aston Villa. He made just a couple of first-team appearances for Villa before moving to Southend United in 1969.

He played 7 times in midfield for the Shrimpers before returning to the Midlands to sign for Bromsgrove Rovers.

He then helped Stourbridge to win the Southern Division One North title in 1973/74 before moving to Kidderminster Harriers.

He played for Harriers in the Southern League before becoming player/assistant manager to Alan Grundy.

Taking over in 1979 in the Southern League Midland Division from Grundy, Chambers started off as player-manager and went on to possess a 62.35%-win ratio from 324 games, which is a phenomenal record

He left Harriers and was replaced by Graham Allner, who of course went on to become a legendary figure at Aggborough.

Chambers continued in management with Alvechurch in 1984 and then, in April 1988, Stourbridge.

He was keen to resume his playing career, despite being in his late thirties, and did this with the Glassboys, who made steady progress under Chambers, culminating in winning the Southern Midland Division title in 1991, suffering only one defeat at home all season and dropping just five points, whilst conceding less than a goal a game.

But disappointment followed when Southern League officials refused promotion due to the shared use of the ground with the Cricket Club.

Season 1992/93 also proved to be a truly remarkable season. League form was inconsistent, however, following a memorable run in the Southern League Cup, Stourbridge reached the final, although Chambers resigned shortly before.

Chambers took over as manager of Southern Premier Division Halesowen Town in 1998 and finished 8th and 11th but resigned in September 2000 – the Yeltz were relegated at the end of the season.

Chambers later spent many years as manager of the Aston Villa `Old Boys` team.

Apart from those players who have represented Stourbridge in the Southern League, the club had some well-known names wearing their colours in their Birmingham League and West Midlands (Regional) League days prior to 1971.

Derek Kevan won 14 full international caps for England and scored 8 goals between 1957 and 1961 whilst on West Bromwich Albion`s books.

He made over 270 appearances for the Baggies and netted 157 goals and also scored 48 times in 67 games for Manchester City.

He turned out for the Glassboys in 1968/69 in the WMRL at the age of 35.

Another former West Brom favourite Ray Barlow also had a short spell with Stourbridge in the early 1960s.

Capped once for England against Northern Ireland in 1954, the left half played over 400 times for the Baggies and then, following a brief spell with Birmingham City, finished his playing days at the War Memorial Ground.

Stan Lynn was another West Midlands favourite, who actually started his career with Accrington Stanley.

Aston Villa paid £10,000 for him in March 1950 and, despite that being a relatively hefty fee at the time, it turned out to be a bargain!

The player, nicknamed `Stan the Wham` after his powerful kick, scored 38 goals in 323 games for Villa, including a hat trick against Sunderland in 1958.

After leaving Villa in 1961, he went on to play another 135 games for Birmingham in a five-year spell before finally quitting professional football and joining WMRL side Stourbridge for two years, taking a job as a storeman at Birmingham's Lucas factory until he retired.

Ray Westwood was a real local boy, born in Amblecote.

And he started his playing days with Stourbridge in the Birmingham League and also turned out for Brierley Hill Alliance before joining Bolton Wanderers as an amateur in the summer of 1928.

After turning professional, Westwood made his debut against Manchester City in March 1931 but Bolton were a struggling First Division side at the time and finished 21st in the 1932/33 season and was relegated.

Westwood remained in good form and he won his first international cap for England against Wales in September 1934.

In the 1934/35 season Bolton finished as runners-up to Brentford in the Second Division and so won promotion to the top-flight.

That season Westwood scored 30 goals in 38 games, including four in an 8-0 home win over Barnsley.

Westwood won his second international cap for England against Scotland in April 1935 and went on to play four more times for his country and also five times for the Football League XI before the war.

He continued to play for Bolton after the Second World War and by the time he left in 1947 to join Chester City he had scored 128 goals in 304 games.

After retiring from football in 1948 he worked as a newsagent in Brierley Hill but did turn out for Darwen in the Lancashire Combination until 1951 at the age of 39.

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