34 Facts About Joe Fagan

1.

Joseph Francis Fagan was an English footballer and manager.

2.

Joe Fagan was a coach and manager at Liverpool for twenty seven years under Bill Shankly and Bob Paisley.

3.

Joe Fagan played for Manchester City in the Football League First Division as a wing half.

4.

Joe Fagan had decided to retire at the end of his second season but his final match in charge was the 1985 European Cup Final which was the scene of the Heysel Stadium disaster, an event that caused him great distress.

5.

Joe Fagan was an uncomplicated man who believed in the simplicity of football, a devoted family man who preferred to just get on with his job and shun the limelight.

6.

Joe Fagan was one of the most respected figures in the game.

7.

Joe Fagan was born in Walton Hospital in Walton, Liverpool, on 12 March 1921 and lived in the Litherland and Scotland Road areas of the city during his childhood and youth.

8.

Joe Fagan's father has been recorded as something of a dubious character who was often absent for long periods and Fagan owed a happy childhood to his mother.

9.

Joe Fagan played a total of 26 games for Hyde and earned good reviews in the local press.

10.

Joe Fagan made his debut for City in the opening North Regional League match, which was a goalless draw at home to Everton and played five matches in all before he became due for military service.

11.

Joe Fagan opted to volunteer rather than wait to be called up as this gave him a choice of services and so he was able to join the Royal Navy.

12.

Joe Fagan had never been to sea previously and immediately discovered that he was prone to seasickness.

13.

Joe Fagan was sent to Egypt where he worked as a telegraphist with a minesweeping flotilla and remained there until 1946.

14.

Joe Fagan was very interested in boxing and was a useful practitioner during his naval career until he had his nose broken.

15.

Joe Fagan played football for various service teams in Alexandria, one of his teams winning a competition called the Chrystall Cup in January 1946, only a few days before he returned to Britain to be demobilised.

16.

When league football resumed after the war, Joe Fagan hoped to establish himself as a regular member of the Manchester City side.

17.

Joe Fagan was a popular figure at Maine Road due to his strong team ethic, loyalty to the cause and an ever-ready smile, qualities that were to serve him well in his later coaching and management career.

18.

Joe Fagan had played in 138 games for City and scored two goals.

19.

Joe Fagan decided to leave City and take up coaching.

20.

Joe Fagan moved on and made a brief return to the Football League as a player, making three appearances for Bradford Park Avenue in 1953 and then had a spell playing for Altrincham.

21.

Joe Fagan became assistant manager at Rochdale in 1954, serving under future Everton manager Harry Catterick until 1958.

22.

On his first day in charge, Shankly held a meeting with the coaching staff which consisted of Bob Paisley, Reuben Bennett and Joe Fagan to tell them that he was not bringing in his own coaches.

23.

Joe Fagan had been keen on training with the ball at Nelson and was, like Paisley and Bennett, delighted to implement Shankly's methods.

24.

Joe Fagan had advocated getting changed at Anfield before going via team bus to the club's training complex at Melwood.

25.

Joe Fagan is credited with converting a storage area at Anfield into a "common room" for the coaches and it became the now-legendary Boot Room.

26.

In 1971, Joe Fagan was promoted to work as a coach with the first team.

27.

Paisley had told the board that Joe Fagan was the right man because he knew the players and the game, though he admitted that Joe Fagan had never shown any ambition to take on the role.

28.

Joe Fagan had quickly expanded his squad with the signings of Michael Robinson and Gary Gillespie.

29.

On 29 May 1985, Joe Fagan announced he would retire and was succeeded by Kenny Dalglish.

30.

In Dalglish's autobiography, he claims that Joe Fagan was left a haunted man for the rest of his life after witnessing the Heysel Stadium disaster.

31.

Never one to court the limelight, Joe Fagan stepped back into anonymity following his retirement but continued to visit both Anfield and Melwood on a regular basis and was always on hand with words of advice for his successors.

32.

Joe Fagan praised Fagan's man management as he "knew when to kick backsides or when to put an arm around a player".

33.

Joe Fagan met his future wife Lillian Poke soon after he joined Manchester City in October 1938 and they were married two years later, during the war, before he joined the Navy.

34.

Joe Fagan was buried at Anfield Cemetery, near Liverpool's stadium.