“Has any player ever been made to shave his beard off by a manager or chairman?” asked Sam Holden last week.
As is frequently the case with questions like this, we begin with Brian Clough, who ordered striker Garry Birtles to defuzz his face before the 1979 European Cup final.
“The story goes that as the players congregated in the hotel foyer prior to boarding the coach to the stadium, ‘Ol Big Ead, in one of the many examples of his brilliant man-management, noticed that Birtles looked nervous,” writes Duncan Wilson. “Cloughie ordered him to go back to his room and shave before boarding the coach – the theory being that by concentrating on shaving, his mind would be taken off the upcoming match. Naturally the player did as he was instructed, and the team could then make their way to the Olympic Stadium in Munich to defeat Malmö, lift their first European Cup, and cement theirs and Clough’s place in folklore.”
Önder Susam reminds us that in 2014 Ilhan Cavcav, chairman of Turkish club Genclerbirligi, promised to fine any player wandering around like they ran a cereal cafe. “I am 80 years old, and I shave every single day,” boomed Cavcav. “Man, is this an Imam Hatip school? You are sportsmen. You should be a model for the youth.” He unsuccessfully attempted to convince the chairman of the Turkish FA, Yildirim Demiroren, to extend his beard ban across the league. “He [Demiroren] told me that they could not impose such a restriction because Uefa would not let them do it. I am fed up with this Uefa. I wish we had some other place to play our football.”
Daniel Passarella famously instructed his players to cut their hair when he was in charge of the Argentina team, but one of his predecessors did encourage the removal of facial fuzz. During the 1978 World Cup, César Luis Menotti suggested Mario Kempes have a shave, with impressive results. “I couldn’t be bothered with the whole shaving-every-couple-of-days routine,” Kempes said in 2007. “After nearly three weeks I had a pretty decent beard and moustache going. I played like that in our first two games, but shaved the beard off before our third. We were heading back to our camp after that match, thinking ahead to our next assignment in Rosario, when the coach said to me: ‘Mario, why don’t you get rid of the moustache and see if your luck changes?’” Kempes went on to score six goals in four games, including two in the final as Argentina won their first World Cup.
Florian Labrouche nominates Gaël Givet’s experience with Evian in 2014. Givet told Le Parisien: “Three days before my first game, I was called into the president’s office for something that seemed crazy and that had nothing to do with football. I was completely disgusted. The problem was that I let my beard grow. At Evian, they wanted to force me to shave because it was too long. At 33, you cannot treat me this way. They took me for a jihadist, while I haven’t even converted to Islam.” Givet made just one appearance for the Ligue 2 side.
David Poza nominates Roy Greenwood, who played at Sunderland from 1975 to 1978. “Bob Stokoe, then the manager of the team, asked Roy to shave his beard in order to appear in the team photo. Greenwood refused, and didn’t appear in any more team photographs.” Finally, there’s Celtic’s Danny McGrain, who nearly came a cropper of Albanian leader Enver Hoxha making beards illegal at the time of their 1979 European Cup first-round first leg tie against Partizan Tirana. McGrain’s tale was the subject of a Knowledge from way back when.
In the city
“With Madrid having a team in each European final,” begins Josh McGarry, “I wondered if both trophies have ever been won by teams from the same city in the same season before?”
Yes they have. In 1994 Milan was the place to be, with Fabio Capello’s side having won the Champions League by getting the better of Johan Cruyff’s Barcelona, while across town Inter beat the admittedly less glitzy Casino Salzburg to lift the Uefa Cup. If we throw the sadly departed Cup Winners’ Cup into the mix, no two teams from the same city have ever won that and one of the others in the same season, but if we spool back to 1989-90 then all three resided in northern Italy: Milan held the big pot, Sampdoria won the Cup Winners’ Cup and Juventus beat Fiorentina in the final of the Uefa Cup.
Knowledge archive
“If Edwin van der Sar plays for Manchester United in the Champions League final, it will be 13 years since he appeared for Ajax in the 1995 final,” wrote Firat Topal, this week back in 2008. “Is this the longest run between two finals for a player?”
“You have to look no further than the great Paolo Maldini,” wrote Rich Limb. “He first played in the Champions League final, or the old European Cup as it was then, with Milan in 1989. “His last appearance in the final was last year (and on both occasions he lifted the trophy). So his record, which is particularly amazing for an outfield player, is 18 years.” Lest we forget, Rich, the same applies to Alessandro Costacurta who, despite not playing in the 2007 final at the age of 41, received a winner’s medal.
Can you help?
“Virgil van Dijk started the season at Southampton, who could go down, and ends it with Liverpool who could be European champions. Has anyone played for a team that have gone down and won the European Cup in the same season?” asks Mike Coxon.
“Two players were sent off following a scuffle in Swindon’s win over Accrington” notes Paul Fulcher. “They were James Deane of Swindon and James (or Jimmy) Deane of Accrington. Have two namesakes been sent off together before?”
“If Tony Pulis gets Middlesbrough through the Championship play-offs, will he be the first manager to be promoted and relegated in the same season?” muses Dominic Piper.
“Due to the timing of Premier League kick-offs, the team in 19th place, Stoke, was relegated before the team below it in 20th. Has this ever happened before?” wonders Steven Higgins.
@TheKnowledge_GU Diego Simeone has to serve a touchline ban for the Europa League final. Any other examples of managers missing finals because of poor behaviour?
— Sam Carney (@samcarney19) May 5, 2018
He's the last person we should be thinking of ;-) Sounds like a question for @TheKnowledge_GU.
— Andrew Beasley (@BassTunedToRed) May 3, 2018
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