Blog spot Fulham FC archives

Tuesday March 16, 2010

Morgan Phillips is the author of From St Andrew's to Craven Cottage, available for £5. Visit: www.standrewsfulham.com (opens new window).

Two Fulham players - Tim Coleman and Bob Dalrymple - were wrongly reported as killed in action in 1915 but lived to read their own obituaries.

Tim, who made his free-scoring reputation with Arsenal, is the subject of George Myerson's absorbing new book Fighting for Football (Aurum 2009).

Fulham encountered Tim in February 1904 when they played their first FA Cup match against a Football League side.

Coleman was just one of five Arsenal forwards tormenting the Whites' defence, and with any other keeper than Jack Fryer Fulham would have been humiliated. Jack kept the score down to 1-0. Arsenal won promotion and Tim demanded a pay rise.

Myerson describes the directors' incredulity that a man of his lowly status should need more than £3 a week to live on.

But the fans recognised his footballing talents and loved his irrepressible personality.

Tim was as adept with words as a ball. He would often put on a posh accent and one unsuspecting reporter mistook him for Arsenal's aristocratic captain Percy Sands.

Tim kept up the pretence throughout the interview and ended by nominating Coleman as Arsenal's best player.

For his talent to amuse and his indifference to authority, Myerson compares him to Rodney Marsh. Like Rodney (and Jimmy Bullard, a modern parallel) Tim was on the fringes of the England team.

In 1908 he moved to Everton only to become embroiled in controversy. The football authorities had ordered every professional to resign their union membership, and most obeyed, but Tim would not be pushed around.

He linked up with kindred spirits from Manchester United to form an Outcasts FC and together they held out until a players' union was recognised.

Coleman was vindicated but Everton promptly sold him to Sunderland. There he enjoyed one of his best seasons, scoring 19 goals.

He also pulled off another legendary stunt, playing the first half of a match wearing a false moustache.

In July 1911, after two years of trying, the Fulham manager Phil Kelso brought Tim to Craven Cottage.

He repaid Kelso's faith by netting five times in a pre-season trial match and then scoring a brilliant solo effort against West Ham.

Tim still loved playing the upper-class twit. He summed up Fulham's prospects thus: "(The FA Cup) is a beastly elusive goblet - at college we frequently said goblet instead of cup for the latter is a common word - but I think you will see us at the palace next year." Sadly Fulham continued to find the FA Cup 'beastly elusive', but, as we shall see, there was still plenty of excitement in Tim's three seasons at the Cottage.