IN the1930s, Jimmy Hogan, a British football coach from Lancashire and recognised widely throughout Europe as one of the founders of modern football, predicted, ‘I have watched continental football grow from a mere baby to a strong lad and develop into a strapping young man. The question is will it reach the stage of full-grown manhood and eventually deprive Britain of her football supremacy? That remains to be seen.’ [Norman Fox. Prophet or Traitor? The Jimmy Hogan Story. The Parrswood Press. Manchester. 2003 pp.96-97]
Eventually, that day came on a damp and misty day on 25 November 1953 at Wembley Stadium when the myth of English invincibility on their home soil against continental opposition was destroyed by Hungary. But what shocked the 100,000 spectators was not just the defeat but the brilliance with which the Magical Magyars had played the game. They had witnessed a new conception of football. On that day, reported The Times football correspondent Geoffrey Green, ‘Here, indeed, did we attend, all 100,000 of us, the twilight of the gods.’
But the 6-3 victory for the Hungarians had come as no surprise to the white-haired 70-year-old sitting in the stands. Jimmy Hogan had spent much of his life coaching abroad and had constantly warned that English football was about to be overtaken by the technically more proficient sides that he had spent time coaching. He was still coaching Aston Villa’s junior players and had organised a trip for them to see the game, promising that they would witness something out of the ordinary, although few would have guessed what he meant by that.
Hogan watched the game from the stands, not as the guest of the Football Association but of the Hungarian FA delegation. When the Hungarian officials were pressed by journalists after the match as to the secret of their team’s success, the journalists were astonished to be told that England’s defeat had been brought about by one of their own. The president of the Hungarian FA, Sandor Barcs, had replied, ‘Jimmy Hogan taught us everything we know about football.’ Later the Hungarian coach, Gustav Sebes, added, ‘We played football as Jimmy Hogan taught us. When our football history is told, his name should be written in gold letters.’ [FIFA.com. Nomadic Hogan led European Revolution.]
And yet, on that fateful day there were others who saw him in a much less generous light. As Billy Wright, the captain of the English team, commented, ‘There were people in England there that day who were of a mind to call him a traitor.’
Hogan was born in 1882 in Nelson, just north of Burnley, into an Irish Catholic family of 11 children. His parents had moved to Lancashire in the 1880s to find work in the cotton mills. He had a tough upbringing for the terrace house in which the family lived was often bitterly cold in winter and overcrowded all year round. He was given a strict Catholic education, first attending St Joseph’s Catholic Primary School, and later when the family moved to Burnley in 1891, St Mary Magdalene’s Secondary School.
His father, James, hoped that his son would enter the priesthood and having gained promotion at the cotton mill, he was sufficiently well off to send Jimmy when he was aged 14 to study as a boarder at the private school St Bede’s College Manchester (although it is possible that Jimmy may have been offered a free place at the school). The school had established a strong reputation for educating boys for the priesthood, some of whom would later become bishops or archbishops, and it also had excellent sporting facilities.
Jimmy excelled in sport – he captained both the football and cricket teams as well as being captain of the school itself. He was well aware of his father’s expectations and took his religion very seriously, but no sporting boy growing up in that part of Lancashire at that time would have been able to escape the passion for football erupting around him, and Hogan soon became hooked.
He gave up the idea of entering the priesthood and instead began to consider seriously the prospect of a career as a footballer. On leaving school he played amateur football for a while and then shortly before his 18th birthday, much to his father’s disappointment, he signed as a semi-professional with Nelson FC who played in the Lancashire Combination League. Hogan left after only one year because he felt he was not paid enough. This was not to be the last time in his career that he would get involved in a dispute over money.
From an early age it was apparent that Jimmy would develop into a gifted footballer. Although small in stature he was very competitive and with a lot of natural ability. He had excellent ball control, a skill which he attributed to having played as a youngster in clogs on the cinders of the backstreets and wastegrounds of Burnley. He modestly described himself as ‘a useful and studious inside-right’. Although his playing record was not outstanding, in fact he was far from mediocre, and sports historians have tended to underrate him. Ireland tried to recruit him as a player after he informed them he was Irish but when the Irish FA discovered he was born in England, the offer was withdrawn.
Jimmy may not have reached the heights as a player, but he would certainly do so as a coach. He had the right character for the job. He was a meticulous and determined individual with an obsessive eye for detail. He had a deep-rooted passion for self-improvement, constantly questioning what he could do to improve his own game. He set himself an extensive fitness and conditioning regime very unusual for the time. He bought his own ball because at the time players were still ordered not to train with one. To improve his fitness he rigged up a bike to a wooden stand in his garden shed and would cycle there for the equivalent of 30 miles until he was dropped from the team for ‘over-exercising’.
As a young professional he reached the opinion that success in the game, and especially the art of scoring a goal, was not a matter of luck but depended hugely on technique. ‘From that day I began to fathom things out for myself. I coupled this with seeking advice from the truly great players. It was through my constant delving into matters that I became a coach later in life. It seemed the obvious thing, for I coached myself as quite a young professional.’ [Wilson pp.]
His determination to achieve excellence at all costs would be the leitmotif of his distinguished coaching career. Above all, Hogan was a visionary, a deep thinker who formed clear ideas on how the game should be played. He was instinctively critical of the rather chaotic way too many English then played, with their emphasis on brute force and wild kicks down the ground. In contrast, he wanted teamwork more than individuality and the passing of the ball in a constructive way, preferably on the ground.
He remained a deeply religious man throughout his life with a priest-like persona. He never swore, and with good reason among some English players he would earn the nickname ‘The Parson’. Even at Celtic, a club with a strong Catholic tradition and where Hogan coached for a while, the players found his pre-match ritual of going around the dressing room and making the sign of the cross on their foreheads somewhat over the top. But he was not one to be pushed around. He was prepared to haggle and fight hard for what he thought right. He defied his father over his choice of career, and as a player and coach he fought hard to be better paid.
On leaving Nelson, Hogan had a brief spell at Rochdale before in November 1903 joining Burnley who played in the Second Division of the Football League, and at a far superior level than those of his previous clubs. However, he did not stay long at his new club. After a couple of years he argued that was being undervalued and wanted to be paid the minimum wage of £4 a week. The club refused on financial grounds, so once more he decided to find another one.
While at Burnley he had married Evelyn Coates whom he had known at junior school and whose family, like his own, had come from Ireland looking for work. Although Jimmy claimed that he and his wife and children were very close, and apart from the war years they were always with him, he was rarely seen with them by either his friends or relatives. Football was always going to take precedence in his life, to the point of an obsession. Johnny Paton, a Celtic and Scottish international winger, recalled, ‘He was soaked in football and talked about nothing else, his family friends or anything else…. We never met his wife. It was just football, football, football.’ [Fox pp.156-157]
In 1905 a former Burnley manager, Harry Bradshaw, persuaded Hogan at the age of 23 to leave Lancashire to play for Fulham. This was to prove a very significant move for Jimmy for a number of reasons. First, it broadened his horizons. Fulham were London’s oldest football club and Bradshaw was an ambitious manager. In 1907 the team won the right to join the Football League’s Second Division. And although Bradshaw was not himself a coach, he was always keen to recruit skilful players who were schooled in the close-passing game, particularly that favoured by Scottish professionals.
They were prominent in the Fulham side and Hogan was deeply impressed with their tricky skills and ball control. The experience of playing alongside them was going to be crucial to the development of his own philosophy as to how the game should be played and players coached. Finally, it was while Hogan was at Fulham that he unfortunately suffered a serious knee injury that would eventually result in his early retirement as a professional player. When Fulham decided not to retain him because of the injury, he was forced to think seriously about the possibility of building a long-term career as a coach.
He still entertained some hope that he was young and fit enough to continue to play reasonably well, maybe in the lower leagues. He briefly joined Swindon Town in the Southern League and then in 1908 he was given the opportunity to return to the north-west. Representatives of Bolton Wanderers lay in wait for him while he was attending an evening service at a Catholic church, and persuaded him to join their club. Mr Tate, one of the Bolton officials, remarked to Jimmy it was the first time he had signed anyone at church, but ‘it’s a good sign lad. I’m not of your faith, but I like to see it’. [Fox p.43]
In the event, Jimmy’s career at Bolton was disappointing and when they were relegated in 1910 the players had their wages cut. Jimmy refused to re-sign, and after 38 games he left the club. His time at Bolton had further convinced him that his future lay with coaching.
He began to think seriously about working overseas. A pre-season tour of the Netherlands in 1910 with Bolton had allowed Hogan to experience football on the continent for the first time. He spent only a short time there but he enjoyed every minute of it, especially as his side never scored less than six goals in any match they played. But what impressed him most was how eager the Dutch were to learn the game and improve key aspects of their game. Hogan admired their positive attitude and after Bolton beat FC Dordrecht by the embarrassing margin of ten goals, he vowed to himself that one day he would like to ‘go back and teach those fellows how to play properly’.
The opportunity to do just that came earlier than he had expected. A good friend of his, James Howcroft, a leading referee who regularly was asked to take charge of overseas games, mentioned to Hogan that Dordrecht, who Hogan had recently played against, were looking for a new coach with experience of the British game. Hogan applied and was offered the job. At the age of 28 he left England for the Netherlands and thereby became the youngest British coach in Europe at that time.
It proved to be an ideal opportunity for Hogan to experiment with ideas he had formed on coaching and football tactics. Dutch football at that time was rather primitive so he started with what was effectively a clean slate. Hogan revelled in his new environment. He now had a group of young enthusiastic players under his wing who were keen to embrace his views on the arts of the game – good preparation, ball control, quick passing and movement. Moreover, they were willing to learn, an attitude of mind which he contrasted with British players whom he accused of being too cocky and conceited, and once they got into the first team they were reluctant to buckle down and further to improve themselves.
Hogan had also come round to the view that there should be a greater emphasis placed on teamwork and that all players apart from the goalkeeper needed to be versatile enough to be comfortable in any position on the field – a concept at the heart of what became Total Football in later years. No aspect of the game would escape his attention. He stressed the importance of trapping which he believed was too often neglected by English footballers. He pioneered the use of classes and blackboards to illustrate tactics, positioning and movement.
The players’ personal fitness was also important to Jimmy and he quickly discovered that his Dordrecht players, many of whom were students and amateurs, were not as serious about the game as he would like. Drinking and smoking could be excessive. ‘They drank like fishes and smoked like factory chimneys but they were a jolly lot of fellows, intelligent and able to pick up the science of the game.’ [Fox p.53] But bad habits, he said, had to be curtailed from the outset.
Overall, the players came to respect him and he was a very popular coach. His methods proved so successful that he was asked to take charge of the Dutch national side for a match against Germany which they won 2-1. The result left the Dutch officials full of admiration for Hogan’s coaching expertise (Jimmy later admitted that the winning goal, which looked impressive, was a sheer fluke).
After two successful years in Holland, Hogan was keen to get back to English football and decided in 1912 to return home. He had enjoyed his overseas experience as a coach and hoped he could find a similar post in England. But at that time there were many well-known players competing for coaching jobs and his chances of getting one looked bleak.
He began to look for opportunities abroad, and once more it was James Howcroft who came up with one. Howcroft had been the referee for Austria’s important match with Hungary in 1912 which had ended in a 1-1 draw. Dr Hugo Meisl, the head of the Austrian Football Association, had been left dissatisfied with Austria’s performance against Hungary and asked Howcroft for his thoughts on how the team could be improved. Howcroft recommended that a professional coach was needed to improve the players’ basic technique, and moreover he knew just the man to provide it.
Meisl must have been impressed with what he heard for he promptly recruited Hogan to work for six weeks with leading Austrian clubs and to prepare the Austrian national squad for the forthcoming Stockholm Olympics. This was the beginning of a somewhat nomadic existence for Hogan and his family.
Hugo Meisl was probably the most influential figure in European football in the first half of the 20th century. The son of a Jewish banker, he travelled round Europe learning everything he could about football and had amassed great knowledge about the game. Importantly, his vision of how football should be played was remarkably similar to that of Hogan’s – a fluid, attractive style based on ball possession and the principle of movement.
When Hogan arrived in Vienna during the 1912 English close-season, his first day was a near disaster. The Austrian players found him difficult to understand and he was too concerned with broad principles rather than getting down to the teaching of new skills, prompting the disappointed Austrian captain to ask Hogan if that was the only kind of training done in English football.
Later, Hogan had a long chat with Meisl about what went wrong, and recalled, ‘It was on that vital day that I really became a football coach…I sat up half the night, working matters out and putting various trapping, heading, and control exercises together.’ [Brian Glanville, ed. The Footballer’s Companion. Eyre & Spottiswood. London.1962. p.463]
Since both men agreed on the style of football to be played, it is not surprising that their partnership flourished. The Austrian players soon warmed to Hogan’s coaching methods and his dedication to detail. They responded well to his insistence on letting the ball do the work, keeping possession by swift passing, and maximising the advantage of open space. That said, Hogan was pragmatic enough to emphasise the value of direct methods when necessary, such as using the long ball to unsettle defences, provided it was not just an aimless punt up the field.
His coaching soon bore fruit. Austria’s top club sides improved markedly. At the Stockholm Olympics in 1912 the Austrian national team recorded a 5-1 victory over the Germans but were subsequently knocked out by the Dutch 4-3, much to Hogan’s disappointment.
His experience in Holland and Austria finally convinced Hogan that his future coaching career lay on the continent rather than in England. Not short of self-confidence, he had business cards printed, and would sign his autographs ‘Jimmy Hogan, the World’s Number One Coach’.
He took pains to point out to clubs interested in his services, that he was no ordinary trainer but an intelligent and experienced teacher of the game. In 1913 he spotted an advertisement from the German FA inviting applications from English coaches, and was on the verge of getting the job. However, when his friend Hugo Meisl learned about the possible appointment, he stepped in quickly to offer Hogan a post to coach the Austrian International XI for the proposed Olympics to be held in Germany in 1916. For Hogan it was dream come true. ‘To leave my dark, gloomy, industrial Lancashire for gay Vienna was just like stepping into paradise.’ [Glanville p.462] Despite warnings that a war might not be not far off, he could not resist the opportunity and arranged for his wife and children to join him in Vienna.
Since the Austrian players were already familiar with Hogan’s views on how the game should be played, they responded well to the drills he taught at his meticulous coaching sessions. With playing skills and tactical understanding clearly improving, Hogan and Meisl were confident that their partnership was building a team that could revolutionise the future of football.
Between them they were perfecting a steady, rhythmic and fluid playing style that would later come to be known as the ‘Viennese School’ of football, and which would characterise the great Austrian ‘Wunderteam’ (Wonder Team) of the 1930s.
The outbreak of the First World War in 1914 put a sharp end to Hogan and Meisl’s plans. Shortly beforehand, Hogan had approached the British consul in Vienna and asked whether it was safe for him and his family to stay in Austria. He had been assured that it was, but it was bad advice. On the opening day of the war he was arrested and thrown into prison. He was released but interned. With the help of the American consul, Hogan’s wife and two children were allowed to get back to Britain in March 1915. However, Hogan only just managed to avoid being sent to a concentration camp in Germany.
At the last minute he was allowed to go and live with two British businessmen, the Blythe brothers, who were married to Austrians, and owned a department store in Vienna. They agreed to act as a guarantor for Hogan’s good behaviour and for two years he worked as an odd-job man, gardener and as tennis coach to the Blythe children.
Late in 1916, Baron Dirstay, vice-president of the Budapest football club MTK, on hearing of Hogan’s plight, pulled some strings to get him moved to Budapest, on the condition that he coached MTK players and reported regularly to the local police. Hogan was grateful for the opportunity to work again in football despite the restrictions.
MTK were a very ambitious club. The facilities were good and Hogan was given his own office at the stadium. But his task was not easy since most of the regular team players were in the army and not available regularly. He had no other choice but to build a new team mainly from Hungary’s most promising young players whom he had personally spotted. They were invariably clever, talented and keen to work hard. Hogan believed that they had the great advantage over British youngsters, of having been taught ‘in the art of football at a very tender age’. [Wilson. p.42]
Hogan coached MTK for three years before he was allowed to return to England at the end of the war. During his time at MTK they had flourished. They won two Hungarian league titles and after the war grew stronger every year and became virtually unbeatable. The team subsequently went on to win a sequence of ten titles in all. MTK’s success confirmed Hogan’s reputation on the continent as a coach and trainer of the highest order, and created an enthusiasm for football in a country where it had previously been largely ignored.
When he came back to England in 1919 there were still very few coaching jobs available and without a permanent job he struggled in the post-war years to make a living. With his family close to poverty he was advised to seek financial assistance from the Football Association which had established a fund to support professionals in financial difficulties as a result of the war.
It was through no fault of his own that he had been interned as a civilian in Austria and Hungary for four years but he was treated with disdain by the secretary of the FA, Frederick Wall, as little more than a deserter. His request was refused. Instead Wall’s response was to toss him a pair of khaki socks with the comment, ‘We sent these to the boys at the front and they were grateful for them’. [www.thecelticwiki.com/page/Hogan,+Jimmy] The message was clear – he was seen as a ‘traitor.’ Hogan was left distraught and incensed by the way he had been treated by the FA and never forgave them.
The experience convinced him that his talent as a coach would never be received favourably in his homeland, and he wrote to several continental clubs offering his assistance. In 1921 he managed to secure a coaching post at Young Boys in Berne, Switzerland, where he enjoyed two successful years and also trained the Swiss national team.
After a short spell with the French club Lausanne FC, Hogan was delighted in 1925 to receive an invitation from Hungaria FC, the new name of his former club MTK, to come back and coach for them. He would have been happy to stay there if it were not for the fact that in 1926 he was offered a lucrative contract by the Central German Football Association with more money than he had ever earned before. Like others on the continent, the German football authorities had become deeply impressed with Jimmy’s philosophy and methods.
As the senior coach, the post involved him travelling around central Germany and lecturing to players and coaches, as well as organising training matches. This was all very well, but Hogan’s German was limited and he ran into criticism from the other coaches. He was given an ultimatum to prove his worth by lecturing in German, unassisted, before an audience of 500.
He got off to what could have been a disastrous start, describing himself as a master of languages rather than a professor of football and making other trivial linguistic errors. He realised that his only option was to demonstrate what he really was good at – his football skills. He called for an intermission and went backstage to change into his football gear and returned to the stage for a demonstration of barefoot juggling, and then shooting accurately at a small panel in a wall so ferociously that his foot was left bleeding. The crowd roared its approval and he left the stage to thunderous applause.
Having restored his reputation as a first-class coach, Hogan embarked on a tour of central German towns and villages where his demonstrations were so popular that they became more like a successful travelling stage show. In a single month in Dresden he gave demonstrations to more than 5,000 players. When one local mayor expressed his disapproval of what amounted to a footballing crusade, Hogan’s response was to overcome the mayor’s reservations by showing how he could head the ball for 350 successive times. ‘The mayor was a football convert,’ the Daily Mail reported.
Hogan was also given the important task of restoring the fortunes of the important Dresden Sports Club and acted as manager and coach from 1928–32. During his time there Dresden became double champions of East Saxony and Central Germany, facilities were greatly expanded and the club became very popular.
In 1932 Hogan took the decision to leave Germany. The political situation in the country was growing worse, and, yet again, his request for more money had brought him into dispute with officials. He spent a while coaching in France while also accepting an invitation from his old friend Hugo Meisl to help him prepare the Austrian national side for a forthcoming game against England in December 1932.
Meisl regarded this match, although only a friendly, to be very important as it was widely regarded as the unofficial championship of Europe. He had assembled a talented group of players but they appeared somewhat naive and lacked confidence. Once more the partnership between the two men flourished – they brought stability to the side, strengthened the players’ tactical awareness, and encouraged them to play their natural fluid game built around a sound defensive formation. In effect, they were at the forefront of the brand of football associated with the Austrian Wunderteam of the 1930s.
Austria were to lose the game against England 4-3 in an exciting see-saw match but the real stars of the show were the Austrian players. The British press eulogised their exceptional passing football which was even likened to a Viennese Waltz. The Daily Herald reported, ‘Definitely and beyond all shadow of doubt, Austria played better football than England did. Making passes along the ground, moving into spaces and in control of the ball, never before has any Continental team succeeded in making England’s best defence look anxious.’
The Austrian national side went on to dominate continental football throughout the early 1930s. The team, managed by Hugo Meisl with Jimmy Hogan at his side, had a far-reaching influence on the development of football in Europe, and in many respects are justly recognised as the ‘godfathers of total football’. The Wunderteam were unbeaten in 14 internationals in 1931 and 1932, during which time they thrashed many of their greatest European rivals, including Scotland, Germany, Switzerland and Italy.
Their attractive, free-flowing and attacking style thrilled spectators. They reached the semi-final of the 1934 World Cup when they were knocked out by the eventual winners Italy in poor weather and on a heavy pitch which limited the movement of the ball. They also won the silver medal at the 1936 summer Olympics. But the team’s greatest achievement was the 14-game unbeaten run from 12 April 1931 to 23 October 1932, when they lost 8-2 to Hungary.
After his work in Austria was finished, Hogan, now aged 52, returned to England in 1934 still hoping he could pick up a coaching appointment. At last, an offer came from Fulham, a club that he had played for as a young man, to act as their manager-coach. The appointment unfortunately went badly wrong. The players did not, or could not, adapt to his coaching methods, and the directors lost confidence in him. It was his first attempt to convince his doubters in England of the value of his methods after all his success in Europe.
Much to his disappointment he was sacked after just one season while lying ill in hospital. He defended himself robustly, stating, ‘As my character was of the best and I was a conscientious workman in the bargain, I can only come to the conclusion, that I was sacked for teaching my ideas of football played in an intelligent manner.’ [Fox p.127]
Upon hearing the news, his long-standing friend Hugo Meisl was appalled at the way Jimmy had been treated. He asked him to share once more the coaching of the Austrian national team and to scout for good amateurs to play in the 1936 Olympic Games. Again, the partnership proved successful. The Austrian team went on to the Olympic final where they were narrowly beaten by Italy. And shortly before that, Austria’s national team beat England 2-1 in Vienna, a result that would have been immensely satisfying to Meisl but would have surely left Hogan with mixed feelings.
As the political situation in Europe further deteriorated, Hogan was determined not to be caught out again and after his work with the Austrian Olympic team, he returned to England, still hoping he might find a coaching job there.
In November 1936 he tasted success when he was appointed as the manager at Aston Villa on a well-paid three-year contract. However, he never succeeded in convincing the directors, and some of the players, that his theories were right for the club. Soon after the Second World War broke out he was dismissed.
Hogan did not help his cause by his persistent criticism of the playing standards in England. In an article for the Daily Mirror he wrote, ‘Since I returned to England and expressed my ideas about the game, it appears that I have stepped on somebody’s toes. Certain people have laughed me to scorn. Others regard me as a foreigner.’ [Barney Rooney. The Manager. Sphere. London.2009. p.46]
He was to endure criticisms in his short spell as a coach in the early 1950s with Celtic. Some of the players, especially the more senior, were sceptical about his appointment and at times mocked his methods. But that view was not shared by all. The young Tommy Docherty later praised the coaching he had received from Hogan, describing him as, ‘The finest coach the world had ever known’ and saying that his ‘arrival at Celtic Park was the best thing that ever happened to me’. [FIFA.com]
Despite his problems, Hogan remained deeply appreciative of the status and responsibility the Germans, Austrians, and Hungarians were prepared to bestow on their football coaches and the marked improvement he had observed in continental playing standards. He always maintained that it had given him no pleasure to point out to his British colleagues the threat posed by continental countries to their misguided conviction that British football had no superior.
He remained in the game as a youth coach as long as he could. He continued to travel around the north of England watching junior games, spotting promising players, and was a regular spectator at Turf Moor supporting Burnley. He finally gave up all his coaching activity in 1959 at the age of 77, and went to live back in Burnley.
Jimmy died in January 1974 aged 91. Tributes poured in, especially from Europe. Hans Passblack, head of the German FA, described him as, ‘The father of football in modern Germany.’ Heinz Geroe, head of the Austrian FA, praised the outstanding service Hogan had given to Austrian football and its development in that country. The Hungarians gave generous praise to him for laying the foundations of their success, and the president of MTK, the club where Jimmy had coached, said he was, ‘The founder and master of football in our Sport-Club and we shall pay the tribute of respect to his memory.’ [See Fox pp.225-228 for tributes to Hogan]
Official tributes from the English authorities were for the most part muted, and it was left to later British sportswriters such as his biographer, Norman Fox, and others such as Brian Glanville, Geoffrey Green and Ivan Sharpe to recognise the character of the man and his remarkable achievements. Hogan was undoubtedly a great football coach – a trailblazer from whom many of the modern ideas about tactics, techniques and physical conditioning have sprung.