Geo was on the long list but didn’t make the cut. I’d imagine that as time goes by and we see replay after replay of the great goals, and some of the more uninterested performances are forgotten, he’ll be much more likely to be in there.
Payton was on the long list but just didn’t make the top 20. He got a decent number of votes though, and rightly so.
We discussed this for some time, namely whether the superstars who joined us at the end of their careers and gave us a few glimpses of what they could do should go in. The likes of Mortensen, Bremner, Hughes, Rocastle, Parlour and Jay-Jay provided a lot of excitement, but their contribution on the pitch wasn’t necessarily that huge. Had we gone with Jay-Jay in the long list and he’d displaced one of that 20, it would perhaps have dented the Hall of Fame’s credibility a little. With Ryan, I didn’t for a minute think he’d get in the top 20 but playing for the club in four divisions was worthy of some recognition.
There is one player who is never mentioned in these things who did the same as Dean Windass. Just imagine the legendary status of Waggy or Keith Edwards if they had scored the only goal at Wembley to fire us into the Premier League, not against irrelevant Bristol City but an old Yorkshire rival who's hordes outnumbered us on the day, in a match worth £163M, and a sensational strike as well, I'm talking about our forgotten man Mo Diame, not a legend?
On the contrary, I think he was great and a huge figure in our history. I just think that as time goes by the good is remembered much more than the bad, and the bad did exist with Geo as he could go missing for several games on the trot. But I did/do love him.
Bit of an off topic. But I'm told the only reason we didn't get in the first division in the 60's was cos the defence was so poor and our attack was brilliant. So how does that fit with jock as an all time great as he was part of that defence?
Because the members of HCSS voted for him, simple as that. I guess him being City’s highest appearance record holder was an influence.
We were promoted to Div 2 at the end of the '65-'66 season. Jock Davidson was injured just over a season later and was forced to retire, aged 35, after 16+ seasons playing for City. He was as hard as nails, broke his leg 3 times and captained the team for many years. In his last full season we conceded 72 and scored 77, finishing 12th. The problem was Cliff Britton didn't strengthen the defense once we had been promoted in'66. In no way could Jock be blamed for our defending woes - he was an all time City great & legend well before that season. Edit. It was rumoured after promotion in '66 that Harold Needler may have been reluctant to spend much money on new players given our potent attack, but it was also thought Britton persuaded him that it wouldn't be necessary. To be fair to them both, they refused to sell Waggy and Chris Chilton to the ambitious Brian Clough at Derby in '67, if the rumours were true.
Barmby would go into a Hull Hall Of Fame, but not a Hull City Hall Of Fame. I get he was born here, but other than his disappointing managerial spell, what differentiates his Hull City career from Ryan France’s? Adam Pearson should have an asterisk denoting this is for his first reign only. How somebody can watch his second reign (which, after bringing in the Allams will ultimately result in the demise of the club) and think he deserves to be in anything other than a Hall Of Shame baffles me.
One defender hardly makes a defence, though Ehab may think that as he brings in unproven Chelsea loans.
Brian Horton would be a contender in my book. Got us promoted as a manager and then highest Div 2 placing for decades, brought in Jobbo, Garry Parker, Alex Dyer for relative peanuts, then came back as assistant to Brown and helped us to our first ever promotion to Premier League
The period you are referring to Chazz was the twilight of Jock's 15-year playing career with us. I was fortunate to watch Jock at the height of his career in the '50s and he was the rock of our defense in that period. I recently saw the video of Alex Bruce's two successive crunching tackles but Jock made those routinely, game after game. No wonder he had three broken legs and played for quite a while with one of them. "Hard Men" is a term synonymous with Andy "Jock" Davidson. He was a one of a kind - unforgettable. His over-500 appearance record will be hard to beat. And he served the club in different capacities for close to 30-years. A true LEGEND.
Although not retired so not eligible for this, it's still a good point that he's a forgotten man now. I guess it's because of the overall feeling around the club - nothing that any player does for us during this spell has stirred up the same emotions that the likes of Windass and Geovanni did with their feats in 2008. Also it being Diame's last game for us doesn't help either, which again probably comes down to the state of the club. It's a shame. I think people like Diame and Snodgrass are some of the most exciting players we've had at that kind of level.