doctor must have put about ten needles all round my gash then inserted forty-eight stitches. When he put my giblets back in I must be honest, I really felt my career was over because he said I might have to have a skin graft.
All in all it was a miserable experience because once I went back to the hotel I was stuck in my room while all the other lads were splashing about having fun by the pool. Not long afterwards I was forced to go home rather than carrying onto
Mexico
. So once again I went off to see Dr Rose who in the end took the stitches out of my shin.
The doctor who stitched me up in
America
actually came over to
England
and was invited to watch a match. It was nice to see him again in better circumstances. “That’s not bad,” he remarked of my injury, “less than a dollar a stitch!”
So after just three weeks over there Stan Horne and I were forced to fly home. I felt so low as the rest of the squad had flown on to
Mexico
while I received treatment.
Anyway we were in the airport and Stan got me a wheelchair. So there we were with Stan in plaster up to his kneecap and me with a big bandage to protect my forty-eight stitches. We decided to go to the duty free department but we were forced to leave the wheelchair outside the shop. We were both hobbling around and totally forgot about time. Suddenly we realised we had twenty minutes to get to our gate. We went out of the shop and blow me, someone had knicked the wheelchair. So there we were, two very fit sportsmen, hopping about for ages to get to our gate and by the time we made it, we were pouring with sweat.
I must admit the air stewardesses were very good with us during the flight. It was in some of the papers that I was travelling home early and Dave Connor’s dad, who worked at the airport, was waiting with a wheelchair for me when I got off the plane. I never went through customs, he just wheeled me round the building straight into a taxi and off home I went. I picked up my case the next day.
Another strange thing I remember about travelling back then was that on the plane home we couldn’t get our duty free goods out until we were halfway over the
Atlantic
. You got a ticket from the duty free shop and you produced it on the plane to get your goods!
As a result of that injury I missed out on another chance of international honours. Jimmy Armfield , manager of the
England
‘B’ side, said he wanted me to go on their tour to
Mexico
which was to take place just before the start of the season. I think he wanted people to experience the conditions there with the World Cup just two years away but I thought: “I’m on my way back from the States now and even if I get fit I can’t bloody well fly back again!” My main focus was to concentrate on getting myself back in contention for the start of the season, so it was probably a final opportunity of international honours missed.
I feel I was very close to making the 1970 World Cup squad. I turned down England on that occasion and as a youngster when City were fighting relegation I was pulled out of an England Youth tour so now that was twice that I’d not gone onto further glory with my country – I suppose they were sick of me knocking them back, they never asked again!
Martin Peters was the striker on that tour and I would have played alongside him. When I think of what happened to him in ’66 it made me think once again of what could have happened to me. Peters wasn’t a prolific scorer by any means, but he was a London-based player and I think that counted for a great deal. The likes of Johnny Haynes, George Cohen, Bobby Moore, Geoff Hurst and Jimmy Greaves were all based down there and won a lot of caps.
It was funny because a few newspaper reporters told me you’ve always got a better chance of getting a cap if you play for a
London
club. Some even said that Sir Alf couldn’t be bothered driving up the M6!
On one occasion I scored the only goal in a win at
Derby
County
and
All in all it was a miserable experience because once I went back to the hotel I was stuck in my room while all the other lads were splashing about having fun by the pool. Not long afterwards I was forced to go home rather than carrying onto
Mexico
. So once again I went off to see Dr Rose who in the end took the stitches out of my shin.
The doctor who stitched me up in
America
actually came over to
England
and was invited to watch a match. It was nice to see him again in better circumstances. “That’s not bad,” he remarked of my injury, “less than a dollar a stitch!”
So after just three weeks over there Stan Horne and I were forced to fly home. I felt so low as the rest of the squad had flown on to
Mexico
while I received treatment.
Anyway we were in the airport and Stan got me a wheelchair. So there we were with Stan in plaster up to his kneecap and me with a big bandage to protect my forty-eight stitches. We decided to go to the duty free department but we were forced to leave the wheelchair outside the shop. We were both hobbling around and totally forgot about time. Suddenly we realised we had twenty minutes to get to our gate. We went out of the shop and blow me, someone had knicked the wheelchair. So there we were, two very fit sportsmen, hopping about for ages to get to our gate and by the time we made it, we were pouring with sweat.
I must admit the air stewardesses were very good with us during the flight. It was in some of the papers that I was travelling home early and Dave Connor’s dad, who worked at the airport, was waiting with a wheelchair for me when I got off the plane. I never went through customs, he just wheeled me round the building straight into a taxi and off home I went. I picked up my case the next day.
Another strange thing I remember about travelling back then was that on the plane home we couldn’t get our duty free goods out until we were halfway over the
Atlantic
. You got a ticket from the duty free shop and you produced it on the plane to get your goods!
As a result of that injury I missed out on another chance of international honours. Jimmy Armfield , manager of the
England
‘B’ side, said he wanted me to go on their tour to
Mexico
which was to take place just before the start of the season. I think he wanted people to experience the conditions there with the World Cup just two years away but I thought: “I’m on my way back from the States now and even if I get fit I can’t bloody well fly back again!” My main focus was to concentrate on getting myself back in contention for the start of the season, so it was probably a final opportunity of international honours missed.
I feel I was very close to making the 1970 World Cup squad. I turned down England on that occasion and as a youngster when City were fighting relegation I was pulled out of an England Youth tour so now that was twice that I’d not gone onto further glory with my country – I suppose they were sick of me knocking them back, they never asked again!
Martin Peters was the striker on that tour and I would have played alongside him. When I think of what happened to him in ’66 it made me think once again of what could have happened to me. Peters wasn’t a prolific scorer by any means, but he was a London-based player and I think that counted for a great deal. The likes of Johnny Haynes, George Cohen, Bobby Moore, Geoff Hurst and Jimmy Greaves were all based down there and won a lot of caps.
It was funny because a few newspaper reporters told me you’ve always got a better chance of getting a cap if you play for a
London
club. Some even said that Sir Alf couldn’t be bothered driving up the M6!
On one occasion I scored the only goal in a win at
Derby
County
and
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