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Promotion 2010

Ex-player: Arthur Graham
« på: November 10, 2018, 01:55:06 »
Leeds United Centurions: Arthur Graham was a much-cherished player in an era of little cheer

Jon Howe takes a look at the Scottish winger in the latest of our series looking back at some of Leeds United's greatest players



Graham spent six seasons at Elland Road in the late '70s and early '80s
Jon Howe takes a look at the Scottish winger in the latest of our series looking back at some of Leeds United's greatest players

Sometimes memories of a player are skewed by the quality of the team that they played in.

It is true that we hold certain players in high esteem, and perhaps more than we should, because of the plodding mediocrity that surrounded them.

When assessing Arthur Graham, it is fair to say he was an exciting player and a crowd favourite, just when we desperately needed one. But Graham’s legacy is not simply as a brief beacon of hope in dark seas, he made a telling impact on Leeds United’s history, just when the fates were conspiring to drag the club under, and when selfless grit and endeavour was the order of the day.

It is true that when making a list of the legends that demand their names are permanently carved into the Leeds United story, Graham’s name won’t appear on many, but playing over 250 games and being a first choice player for six straight seasons is no mean achievement.

Being the player to finally wrestle the number 11 shirt off Eddie Gray is certainly another. But sticking by the club in their hour of need, and beyond, is perhaps how Graham will be best remembered. Unglamorous and altruistic maybe, but when a football club has spent a large percentage of its 100 years gripped by a prosaic stasis, it needs people like Arthur Graham to prop it up.

Graham was a versatile player who could play anywhere along the attacking line, but he mainly forged himself a reputation as a very direct left winger with an eye for goal. Standards had dropped at an Elland Road stadium still echoing with the sound of gnarled cries at Don Revie’s departure, and a fanbase that had gorged itself on the finest luxuries was steeling itself for a diet of offal and gruel. In those circumstances, it is no surprise that Graham’s flair and enterprise caught the eye, and along with the swashbuckling magnetism of Tony Currie, there were at least some saviours on which you could hang your hat.

It could be said that Graham’s career choice in joining Leeds was more than a little unfortunate, and not simply because the attraction of joining one of the biggest clubs in the country brought only fruitless toil and eternal struggle. Graham had already notched up 250 games for Aberdeen by the time Jimmy Armfield bought him for £125,000 in July 1977, but had won only two domestic cups at Pittodrie. So he swapped European glory and the procession of league titles that Alex Ferguson delivered when he arrived a year later, for a frugal existence of mid-table cheerlessness in a toxic atmosphere of violence, racism and confused expectations.

Still, it wasn’t all bad.

Part of Graham’s charm was an infectious smile that became his identity. And he had good reason to smile; making an immediate impact on the Leeds team and settling in nicely with 47 appearances and 12 goals in his first season. He also made his full Scotland debut against East Germany within two months of joining Leeds. In his second season Jimmy Adamson’s side qualified for Europe, but behind the façade of dining again at the top table that Leeds fans felt was their birth right, lay a rudderless football club parched of any direction or resources to get there. The magic had long since left the building and when the critical sale of Tony Currie also went ahead in the summer of 1979, it was left to players like Arthur Graham to drag Leeds United through the gloom.

Graham did that with little fanfare and via three hat-tricks that carried different varieties of significance. In his first season he scored three goals in an astonishing spell of four second-half minutes in a 3-2 win away at Birmingham City. He then joined an elite list of Leeds United players in scoring a hat-trick in a European game.

In the club’s very first European tie since the trauma of Paris in 1975, Graham bagged a nonchalant hat-trick in a 4-0 rout of Valetta, in a bizarre game played on white sand against part-time Maltese opponents. Graham’s triple strike proved something of a false dawn as the flimsy charade that Leeds were still something of a European force was soon uncovered, but as shuddering anti-climaxes go, the flying Scotsman still had a Joker to play.

After suffering the ignominy of a 5-1 opening day defeat to newly-promoted Swansea, Leeds gained their first point of the 1981/82 season in a 1-1 draw at home to Everton, with Graham scoring the Leeds goal. Three days later and it seemed that the whiff of relegation that hung around Elland Road was just something blocking the drains in the reserve team dressing rooms, as Arthur Graham bagged a devastating hat-trick to beat Wolves 3-0, and everything seemed rosy. It was a status of iron-willed denial that would debilitate the club all season, and despite nobody acknowledging there was an issue, Leeds were duly relegated.

Despite the inclement air of financial fragility, even before relegation, Leeds managed to keep hold of players such as Trevor Cherry, Brian Flynn, Frank Gray, Frank Worthington and Eddie Gray. And Arthur Graham. Such experience couldn’t reverse the course of a tanker with such a resolute direction, however, and slowly the identity of a once-great club ebbed away to virtually nothing.

That Graham eventually signed for Manchester United after one season in Division Two is largely forgiven. Partly because he had little impact at Old Trafford and partly because Leeds fans had far bigger things to worry about.

Memories of Arthur Graham remain largely fond, not simply as a two-footed player with pace, skill and a tremendous work-rate, who defined the description of ‘a handful’, but as a player who could have moved on to pastures new when his ‘dream move’ clearly wasn’t working out as he’d hoped, but chose instead to become a much-cherished player in an era of little cheer.

« Siste redigering: November 10, 2018, 09:46:12 av Promotion 2010 »
Min første Leeds-kamp:
Strømsgodset vs Leeds, 19.september 1973

flynn

Sv: Ex-player: Arthur Graham
« Svar #1 på: November 10, 2018, 09:06:10 »
Ahhh, en av mine store helter dette!

flynn

Promotion 2010

Sv: Ex-player: Arthur Graham
« Svar #2 på: November 10, 2018, 09:48:11 »
Football Memrobilia

'Golden Goal' - Match Weekly
Arthur Graham for #LUFC v AVFC 3/9/80


Min første Leeds-kamp:
Strømsgodset vs Leeds, 19.september 1973

Promotion 2010

Sv: Ex-player: Arthur Graham
« Svar #3 på: November 10, 2018, 09:51:36 »
Min første Leeds-kamp:
Strømsgodset vs Leeds, 19.september 1973

Promotion 2010

Sv: Ex-player: Arthur Graham
« Svar #4 på: November 10, 2018, 09:54:58 »
Min første Leeds-kamp:
Strømsgodset vs Leeds, 19.september 1973

RoarG

Sv: Ex-player: Arthur Graham
« Svar #5 på: November 10, 2018, 13:24:17 »
Husker disse spillerprofilene i Shoot :).
"Jeg tror ikke på Gud, men etter Bielsas ansettelse må jeg nok revurdere", Roar Gustavsen, januar 2020

jaho

Sv: Ex-player: Arthur Graham
« Svar #6 på: November 10, 2018, 16:04:44 »
Husker disse spillerprofilene i Shoot :).

Herlig tid i barndommen med Shoot og Match blader. Tipper av de overnevnte spillerprofiler at Shoot nederst er eldst...at han fra å kjøre konas Escort, etterhvert fikk kjøpt seg en Celica...var litt å tjene i Leeds da.. ;D ..vokste etterhvert en kvart inch også..

berlin

Sv: Ex-player: Arthur Graham
« Svar #7 på: November 10, 2018, 16:59:43 »
Husker disse spillerprofilene i Shoot :).

Jepp. Pluss Fotballrevyen også. Det var tider. Var ikke mye innsyn i/antagelser om klubbens indre vi kunne diskutere da. Kun fotball og laget.  :)

Hallgeir *

Sv: Ex-player: Arthur Graham
« Svar #8 på: November 10, 2018, 17:34:01 »
Ahhh, en av mine store helter dette!

flynn

På den tida også en av mine helter.  8)
Super Leeds since 1968

berlin

Sv: Ex-player: Arthur Graham
« Svar #9 på: November 10, 2018, 17:40:32 »
Ahhh, en av mine store helter dette!

flynn

På den tida også en av mine helter.  8)

Arthur Graham var en god spiller. Konsistent god over mange år.

Husker jeg digget Ray Hankin og til dels John Hawley.
Men Hankin dro til Vancouver Whitecaps i en alder av 24 år, ganske uforståelig, men det var vel på den tiden "soccer" ble satstet på med New York Cosmos (Pele, Beckenbauer), så det var kanskje penger?

Hallgeir *

Sv: Ex-player: Arthur Graham
« Svar #10 på: November 10, 2018, 18:04:18 »
Ahhh, en av mine store helter dette!

flynn

På den tida også en av mine helter.  8)

Arthur Graham var en god spiller. Konsistent god over mange år.

Husker jeg digget Ray Hankin og til dels John Hawley.
Men Hankin dro til Vancouver Whitecaps i en alder av 24 år, ganske uforståelig, men det var vel på den tiden "soccer" ble satstet på med New York Cosmos (Pele, Beckenbauer), så det var kanskje penger?

Ja, Hankin var vel for meg en enda større helt enn Graham. Det er ofte målscorere man ser etter, og Hankin var ofte på den listen.
Super Leeds since 1968