Mr West Ham, 47 England caps, and the quiet voice of English football
FootballSir Trevor Brooking is one of the very few footballers in the English game who can claim to have spent an entire playing career at one club, an entire broadcasting career at the BBC, and a knighthood for services to the game. Mr West Ham, and very much Mr English football.
Born in Barking in 1948, Brooking signed for West Ham as a schoolboy in 1965 and made 647 appearances for the club over 17 years. He played in two FA Cup Final wins, scoring the only goal of the 1980 final against Arsenal with a rare headed goal that still gets mentioned whenever anyone shows him footage.
For England he won 47 caps and scored five goals, including one of the most famous strikes at the Bernabeu in 1982 when he drove a shot through the Spanish goal stanchion. A graceful, two footed midfielder with the touch of a cleaner pitch player, he is remembered as one of the most technically accomplished English footballers of his era.
His second career is just as long. A BBC Radio and television pundit from the mid 1980s, he became the voice of English football for a generation, calm, careful and always fair. He served as Director of Football Development at the FA from 2004 to 2014 and was briefly caretaker manager at West Ham on two occasions, winning all five of the games he was in charge of.
Knighted in 2004 for services to sport, Sir Trevor remains a West Ham director and an elder statesman of the English game, respected in every dressing room he walks into.
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