How it all began
England’s WAGs stormed the scene during the World Cup back in 2006, but Leeds lass Christine Yorath was living that life long before, as she tells Emma Ryan Meet Leeds' original footballer's wife
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They met in the Catholic youth club in Beeston as teenagers.
Christine Kay was 15 and Cardiff born, Terry Yorath had just turned 16 and was an apprentice at Leeds United.
Their romance blossomed after he started talking to her while she waited for a bus home. She missed the bus.
Their romance led to a life of travel, parties, VIP entries to clubs, trips to Wembley, beautiful children and celebrations as Leeds United went on to enjoy a golden age of English football.
But in the early days it was far removed from the jaw-dropping £44,000 weekly wage that the average footballer in the Premier League now gets.
By the time they were engaged, two years after that meeting at that bus stop, Terry was earning £39 a week playing in the top flight of English football and Christine was “raking it in†at £2 an hour as a mobile beauty therapist.
It was long before the age of ‘career’ footballer’s wives.
As we meet at Christine’s luxury mansion in Shadwell - which has been her family home since returning to Leeds permanently in 1984 after Terry had spells in Vancouver and Lebabnon - the softly spoken 68-year-old exudes glamour, class and understated sophistication.
She recalls though, how it all started among the working class area of Beeston, just streets away from Leeds United ground Elland Road.
Humble beginnings
Her parents started married life in a two up, two down but moved to a three bedroom semi-detached in Beeston in 1956 where her mother still lives.
She said: “I was at the bus stop waiting to go home and he walked over to my stop. I missed the last bus and we walked around town until 3am and got a taxi home - he dropped me off.
“My mother was bolt upright asking ‘where have you been?’ I told them I had been with Terry Yorath. She said ‘alright darling, night night’.
Her parents already knew Terry.
Back then her mum ran a cafe near the ground where the young players would go for their meals after training and her father was a well-known bookie, also in the shadows of Elland Road.
Once news of his connection with a Leeds United player started doing the rounds, he kept getting asked for tickets and Terry would oblige.
And the demand for big games was high, Leeds United were dominating English football and Europe.
Living the high life
Players were treated like local heroes. Under the Don Revie era Leeds won two First Division titles, one FA Cup, one League Cup, two Inter-Cities Fairs Cups, the old Second Division title and one Charity Shield.
He also guided them to three more FA Cup Finals, two more FA Cup Semi-finals, a European Cup Winners' Cup Final and one European Cup Semi-final.
Christine says: “We were in the first division, it was the glory days. I used to buy my outfits for Wembley and the big finals in January and February, we knew we would be going.
“We never paid to get into nightclubs and we got the best tables in restaurants.
“We used to go to Pete Stringfellows Cinderella Rockerfella and to Nouveau nightclub, Peter Lorimer’s brother-in-law owned it. It was frequented by many of the big names appearing locally after their gigs, such as Tom Jones.
“If Terry was playing out of town, I would meet him there. If it was a home game, we would go home, get changed and then go out in Leeds. We were in our 20s, of course we were going out to nightclubs.â€
And as Leeds continued to dominate at home and on foreign turf, it made for a close knit group of wives and girlfriends at home keeping the family units together.
Family life
Terry and Christine had four children - Gabby, Louise, Daniel and Jordan.
Gabby, who married former Scotland international rugby union player Kenny Logan, is a well known TV broadcaster. She is no stranger to the spotlight. She was a former international rhythmic gymnast who now fronts sports coverage for the BBC and ITV.
The Yoraths were touched by tragedy in 1992 when their 15-year-old son, Daniel, collapsed and died during a kickabout in the garden of the family home in Shadwell.
Tests later revealed that the teenager suffered from the heart condition cardiomyopathy.
Family is hugely important to Christine and the many pictures scattered around her home are testament to this.
Over the years Christine developed close friendships with the other wives and they supported each other as their husbands were away for football.
Even when Leeds played at home, Revie would have the players stay over in a hotel so they could get a decent sleep before a Saturday game as so many of them had young babies at home.
Christine recalls that the fixture list coming out in June for the season ahead was eagerly anticipated as it would determine how they spent Christmas.
Christine said: “There were not so many transfers back then and players weren’t coming and going. The wives were a very close knit group - and a core of us still are.
“When the team was away, which was often, they were in Europe Monday to Thursday and away Friday for a Saturday game. We were young wives with a lot of children between us so we would have coffee mornings.
“Linda Gray had six children, Peter Lorimer’s wife Gill had two, Sandra Reaney had two and whilst we were at Leeds I had my first three. I would go to Makro and buy a huge tin of beans, enough for 12 children.
“When the fixture lists came out, the first thing you would do was look at the Christmas fixtures. They would train on Christmas day, report back at 3pm for a Boxing Day away game, we never had a proper Christmas Day.â€
During his time with Leeds, Terry Yorath made 120 appearances and scored ten goals. However, in 1976, he was sold from his beloved Leeds to Coventry City for £125,000.
He subsequently moved onto Tottenham Hotspur in 1979 for £300,000, and then briefly to Vancouver Whitecaps in 1981.
Stepping out alone
However, Christine was very different to other wives in that she worked for the entire time that she was married to Terry - and still continues to do so.
She started out as a beauty therapist, owning what was the first purely beauty salon in Yorkshire after starting her own mobile beauty business.
She recalls: “I am going back 45 years or more.
“The ladies who had treatments back then were wealthy women, the wives of captains of industry, their daughters were debutantes. I would drive over in my sports car and the butler would come and carry the equipment in.â€
When the family returned to the UK in 1984, Christine just wanted to stay in Leeds and has ever since.
She worked as a football agent and then started buying and selling property as investment or rental projects.
In 2003, the couple separated and decided to divorce four years later but have remained amicable.
Christine continued with her property business and ended up with a portfolio of a few dozen properties and formed Flats management company. At one point it had 1,000 properties on its books and she sold to Countrywide in 2013.
Christine Yorath's home in pictures
Since then she has concentrated on interior design, a passion she had been harbouring since doing an interior design course while in Vancouver.
Christine has several multi-million projects to her name including Clarence Dock apartments in Leeds, Black Swan Yard in Helmsley and is currently working at Scarborough View on Filey Road, in Scarborough and a new apartment scheme in Alwoodley.
WAGS then and now
Looking back over her life as a WAG Christine says she “didn’t know any different†but says it was very different to the modern day WAG.
Social media pressures weren’t an issue but feared ‘kiss and tells’ in national newspapers were rife in the 90s while nowadays the rise of ‘career footballer’s wives’ is more prevalent.
“In our day, the paper we dreaded was the News of the World. It always had stories about footballers and it was always someone that you knew,†she said.
“At 20 years old that makes you feel insecure - there were women out there that saw footballers as easy pickings. There were a few at Leeds United but we got through it.
“I never took it for granted but I was so young when I went into that world, I don’t think I realised that there was a different way. It was not something I aspired to, that generation of footballer in the 1960s were the first that had a bit more affluence I suppose.
“There were no career footballer’s wives but there are now - there are girls that go to get footballers.
“That was not something you heard of 40 years ago - we met in the Catholic Youth Club in Beeston and I asked him, “what’s your proper job?â€
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