Former Gunner Willie Young passed away this week. Jon Spurling remembers his time in red and white.
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In an Arsenal team often dubbed the ‘London Irish’ – due to the fact that the Gunners side in the late 1970s was managed by Ulsterman Terry Neill and included four Republic of Ireland internationals and three Northern Irish stars – the giant Scottish defender Willie Young continues to loom large in the memory.
‘Big Willie’ had suffered from dementia for years, but his death on Friday still came as a shock. For a significant number of us, the dramatic 3-2 FA Cup final win against Manchester United in ’79 was our first taste of Gunners glory, and Willie is the first member of the team to die. A piece of my childhood is now gone. Like many Arsenal stars of the era, including Alan Sunderland and Pat Jennings, Willie lived in the Broxbourne area. Top stars earned good, but not excessive, sums of money, and his shock of red hair was often sighted in that part of Hertfordshire, either in an inn or two, or opening school functions as he once did at John Warner School in Hoddesdon. His outspoken personality and physical approach to the game meant his time at Highbury was not only riddled with controversy and confrontation. “I had a great time,” he smiled during one of our interviews at the turn of the century. Willie Young’s incident-laden story saw him become perhaps the Gunners’ most unlikely cult hero of all.
Young was banned for life from playing for Scotland by the Scottish Football Association in 1975 after a drunken night out in Copenhagen during an Under 23 tour, and Young put in a series of impressive performances in Aberdeen alongside Martin Buchan. When Buchan left for Manchester United, Young was appointed club captain but eventually fell out with manager Willie Turnbull. The end of Young’s Scotland career came when, after his substitution against Dundee, Young tore his shirt to pieces, threw the shreds at Turnbull, stormed down the tunnel and stuck his boot through the dressing room door. Unsurprisingly, he never played for the Dons again, although ‘Willie’s door’ remained unfixed for a few seasons, a testament to Young’s fiery temper.
Young headed south in 1975 – not to Highbury but to White Hart Lane, where he played under Terry Neill, making 64 appearances in two seasons. Young was roped in to help Spurs stay clear of the relegation zone in 75-76. His Bruce Lee-style flying kick over Gunners striker Frank Stapleton during a spirited north London derby in December ’76, which Young (who had previously given Spurs the lead with a sweet header in a 2-2 draw) immediately gave away, gave Arsenal fans their first glimpse of the towering Scot. As he trotted off the pitch to a cacophony of boos from Arsenal fans, no one could have imagined that ‘Typhoon Willie’ would crash into Highbury within a few months.
With Arsenal struggling defensively in 76-77, Terry Neill, now Gunners manager, opted to bring Young to N5 for £80,000. It was hardly a popular move, and when Young made his debut against Ipswich Town in a 4-1 home defeat in March ’76, his performance was, in Young’s words, ‘complete rubbish, because I wasn’t match fit.’ On one occasion, Young completely misjudged the bounce of the ball, allowing John Wark to sneak in and snatch Ipswich’s second goal. ‘It was also for the cameras of Match Of The Day. A bloody disaster,” Young said.
In the car park afterwards, with his family in tow, Young was approached by some disgruntled Arsenal fans who, in Young’s words, ‘told me to go back to Spurs.’ Young stuck to his guns but admitted the confrontation ‘showed me I had a big job to win over the Arsenal supporters.’ Salvation came a few weeks later in the April ’77 North London derby at Highbury. Not only did Arsenal win 1-0 thanks to Malcolm Macdonald’s goal, but Young – ‘both groups of fans booed me when I touched the ball’ – showed his physical courage. After cutting his head open following an aerial duel, a bandaged Young returned to the fray to continue fighting. And fight he did. Young’s former teammates Ralph Coates and Chris Jones were swamped by fearsome Young challenges, with the home crowd oozing with appreciation. “The Arsenal fans loved it,” Young smiled. His partnership with the smoother and more fluid David O’Leary also started to work: ‘I headed the ball away, or clinched it, while Dave brought it out of defence. He was a great player.’ Young’s remarkable transformation from arch-enemy to cult hero was now underway.
Over the next few seasons, Arsenal fans enjoyed watching Willie not only smash the ball violently into row Z of the stands when trouble loomed, but also score the occasional quality goal. There was a beautifully lofty finish against Hajduk Split in the UEFA Cup in November 1978, and a header away against Wrexham in the FA Cup earlier that year. Critics wrongly attributed Young’s lack of mobility to Roger Osborne’s winner in the 1978 FA Cup final, but after 90 minutes of nail-biting aerial duels with the fearsome Manchester United striker Joe Jordan a year later, Young and his teammates came out on top at Wembley. “It was without doubt the greatest moment of my footballing life and a great game to be involved in,” Young said of winning the ’79 FA Cup final.
Now accepted as a true Arsenal man, Young (who was actually 6 feet tall) was serenaded with several chants. One of them was: ‘Six feet eight, blue eyes, Willie Young is after you.’ There was also the more simplistic ‘Willie, Willie, Willie’ whenever Arsenal won a corner. Young especially liked “We’ve Got the Biggest Willie in the Country,” sung to the tune of “The Whole World In Our Hands.” “That one always made me laugh,” Young said.
His relationship with Terry Neill was testy, with Young occasionally trying to get his hands on his manager. Alan Hudson recalled that during preseason training, Young crashed in the middle of a cornfield to take a huge shortcut during a dreaded cross country run. “Good job big man,” Neill told him after Young unexpectedly finished early. “Willie just gave him that funny grin of his,” Hudson recalled. There was also a spectacular row when Young refused to take part in a ‘balance and movement session’ during a workout with an aerobics instructor. After Neill threatened Young with a £50 fine – a considerable sum for a footballer at the time – if he refused to participate, the furious Young eventually relented. “Okay, okay, I’m dancing. Yippie!’ Forward Brian McDermott recalled: “His arms and legs were everywhere. Even the aerobics instructor almost committed suicide laughing.”
Willie Young had his supporters in the media. In The Times, Clive White spoke of ‘Young’s silky touch, almost unnatural for a big man’, during a European match. But for the neutrals, and perhaps even for some Arsenal fans, Young is best remembered for his cynical foul on Paul Allen in the 1980 FA Cup final, just as the 17-year-old West Ham striker was about to end the match in the dying stages with his side already winning 1-0. Young recalled: “Paul was put through, about twenty yards outside the box. He most likely would have scored. I had a split second to make a decision. So I thought, ‘Son, you gotta go.’ I just tapped his foot and he went down.” Young’s carefree reaction to George Courtney’s yellow card will live long in the memory. ‘I was a defender and I defended. I never lost any sleep over it,” explains Arsenal’s big bad Willie Young. The rules were changed shortly afterwards to a red card for such defensive cheating.
Willie left Highbury in October 1981 and signed for Nottingham Forest. “I got on worse with Brian Clough than I did with Terry Neill,” laughed Young, and immediately became embroiled in a protracted row over his relocation allowance. He later settled in the Nottingham era and for many years owned the Bramcote Manor pub, which always served a delicious selection of Sunday roasts.
Looking back over my notes from our interviews, Young talked a lot about his pride in his strength and prowess in the air, and he regaled me with stories of severed heads, concussions and headaches. “I wouldn’t change a thing,” he smiled. In an age when scientific research has shown that repetitive control of a football and air collisions can result in brain trauma and premature dementia, Young’s football war stories now have a distinctly cautionary ring.
They don’t make football players or defenders like Willie Young anymore. But for many Arsenal fans of over fifty, his uncompromising playing style and colorful personality epitomized the warrior footballer in a much more combative era.
Rest in peace big man.
Willie Young: November 25, 1951 – October 31, 2025
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