wayne harrison

[boomer39]

for those old enough to remember, wayne was signed by joe in 1985 from oldham, 17 years old...looked to have a great future but sadly,had loads of injuries and was forced to pack in due to cruciate problems. never played for the 1st team but i saw him a few times for the reserves at maine road and old toilet. came from stockport and i knew his family very well . he went to work for robinsons brewery in stockport, but over the years became a bit of an alci...got sacked or left that job a few years ago and became worse.. he lived near me in stockport and looked a  wreck. just found out in my local, he passed away this morning in hospital in stockport, aged 45... rip wayne... a wasted talent...

[Bjornebye]

I don't remember him but RIP YNWA 

[Tj hooker]

I remember him signing for us seemed like a real talent sadly for one reason or another it never quite happened for him, very sad that it turned out like that for him RIP YNWA

 

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[chris71]

Yeah,remember him signing. Was meant to be the next big thing. Sad the way things panned out for him.

[Gym Beglin]

Sort of story that should be pinned to the walls of Melwood for all to see.

 

Never take your talent or your health for granted.

 

Sad story.

[Joey8FrogsLegs]

Sad story indeed.

 

Remember us signing him, he was regarded a great talent. He cost 250K I think, which was a huge amount (record?) for a teenager back then, and definitely for a 17 year old.

[Rico1304]

Whereabouts in Stockport did he live mate?

[Joso]

 

 

Philip on Saturday: A great career cut short

 

By Robert Philip

12:01AM GMT 02 Nov 2002

 

Boundary Park, March 1985, the telephone rings in the office of Oldham Athletic's manager Joe Royle and the conversation goes something like this . . .

"Hello, Joe? It's Joe Fagan here at Liverpool. About this kid of yours - Wayne Harrison - we'd be willing to offer you two hundred grand . . . "

"You're having me on," laughs Royle, the subject of discussion, after all, being a 17-year-old who has played only two Second Division first-team games.

"OK then, how about we make it a quarter of a million?"

"Done!"

And so Wayne Harrison became the world's most expensive teenage footballer, like Everton's latest wonderkid, Wayne Rooney ('tis spooky they should share the same first name, is it not?) a lad seemingly destined for stardom, England international caps, League championships, FA Cup winner's medals, who knows, European Footballer of the Year one day in the not too distant future?

Alas, here was a football fairytale without a happy ending; while Rooney, who also happens to be 17, will be training at Goodison this morning in preparation for tomorrow's Premiership fixture against Leeds United at Elland Road, Harrison, 35 in two weeks' time, was delivering beer kegs in his role of HGV driver for Robinson's Brewery in his home town of Stockport.

After being allowed to see out the 1984-85 season at Oldham, where he would leave with five first-team appearances under his slim-waisted belt, Harrison duly reported for duty at Anfield in the company of Graeme Souness, Alan Hansen and Ian Rush under the player-managership of Kenny Dalglish, who had replaced the late Fagan in the aftermath of the Heysel Stadium riots.

In the tradition laid down by Bill Shankly, Liverpool did not rush their protege into action, allowing him to mature slowly in the second team, where his performances were a source of quiet satisfaction to Dalglish. Assiduously protected from the media despite his 'world's most expensive teenager' label, Harrison was on the verge of a seat on the substitutes' bench when, in a bizarre accident, he crashed through a greenhouse and, with the local ambulance service on strike at the time, all but died through loss of blood before the back-up Army medics could rush him to hospital.

Ah, but fate was not finished with young master Harrison; thereafter he endured a series of serious injuries - double hernia, cartilage, knee, shoulder - returning from each new operation determined to fulfil his destiny. Then, in the last reserve game of the season against Bradford City in May 1990, he collided with the goalkeeper, shattering the cruciate ligaments in his knee; the damage was irrepairable. After 23 football-related operations, Dalglish's successor at Anfield, Graeme Souness, gently explained the details of the medical prognosis. At 22, and without playing a first-team game for Liverpool after his £250,000 transfer, Harrison's football career was over.

"The knee still gives me gyp," he explains, "and, in fact, it gets more painful with each passing year. But I console myself with the thought that nothing in life can ever be as bad again."

Liverpool have never forgotten Wayne Harrison, he was subsequently granted a testimonial game and remains a welcome visitor at Anfield to this day. And nor should we forget, for he was once the most treasured young talent in the land.

Moi et ma grande bouche as Arsene Wenger might say ('me and my big mouth' to you and I).

Hardly had the Frenchman uttered the fateful prediction - "I think we could win every game for the rest of the season" or some such - than we find Arsenal travelling to Fulham tomorrow attempting to avoid a fifth successive defeat, which would mark their worst run since February/March 1977, when they lost seven League games in a row and were knocked out in the fifth round of the FA Cup, humbled 4-1 at Middlesbrough.

Managed, or should that be mismanaged, by Terry Neill, the Arsenal of 25 years ago, like that of the now cosmopolitan squad at Wenger's disposal, bristled with star names such as Alan Ball, Liam Brady, Alan Hudson, David O'Leary, Frank Stapleton and Malcolm Macdonald, who, despite the club's travails, would finish the season as joint top scorer in the First Division beside Aston Villa's Andy Gray with 25 goals.

As a neutral who abhors the arrogance of Wenger's suggestion that Liverpool and Manchester United (never mind Everton and Blackburn Rovers in England, plus Auxerre and Borussia Dortmund in Europe) are only playing to make up the numbers in their respective competitions, I sincerely hope the Arsenal of 2002 suffer defeat No 5 at Fulham and go on to break the sorry 'eight-in-a-row record' set by Neill's side of '77.

I am weary of his litany of excuses. (Question: How do you know which Air France jet is carrying Arsene Wenger? Answer: You can still hear the whine after the engines have been shut down).

The one award Wenger most assuredly deserves is in the famous last words category where his 'we can win every game' proclamation now challenges the infamous prediction of Tony Greig: "If the West Indies are on top, they're magnificent. If they're down, they grovel. I intend to make them grovel." England lost the subsequent 1976 Test series 3-0.

Make the man grovel, Fulham, make him grovel.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/competitions/premier-league/3037207/Philip-on-Saturday-A-great-career-cut-short.html

 

[MLB]

Very sad news.

[JohnnyH]

That's very sad. I read a piece about him a while back. Sad story at the time and then ends in such a way.

[G Richards]

I never saw him play, but I remember the name. Sad news. RIP. 

[Barrington Womble]

Sad story indeed.

 

Remember us signing him, he was regarded a great talent. He cost 250K I think, which was a huge amount (record?) for a teenager back then, and definitely for a 17 year old.

Yeah it was a record for a teenager as I remember. It just shows you how thin that line between success and failure can be. He could be retired a wealthy Liverpool legend now if it wasn't for a couple of injuries and instead he has this fate. Sad news.

 

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[Jennings]

Sheesh. That's awful. I remember him signing and being in the reserves. It was around the time that Rushie was at his pomp.

 

Thoughts go out to Wayne's family.

[pauliescouse]

Remember him, must have been about 8 or 9 years old when he signed.

 

Very sad to read this, from someone who has gone from up to down, then up and down again I understand the logic in hitting the bottle, though I understand how that makes little sense to most.

 

God bless him, and thoughts are with his family.

 

45 is a shocking age to pass :(

[Stickman]

I can remember Joe Fagan signing him...very sad news hopefully a minutes silence at the very least for the cup game with his former club Oldham.

[Sangria]

Yeah remember him signing myself and as Barry says there is such a thin line between success and failure, be it injuries or other outside influences.

That young player Yesil I think it is has just done his cruciate for the second time and he may never come back from that or if he does, he may never be the same player.

 

Anyroads sad that about Wayne, too young to die.

[razor]

Very sad news.  Gutted.

 

Remember him signing, and also remember reading a piece on him last year (maybe posted by yourself, boomer).  I remember waiting for him to play his debut, then you'd just forget about him, then his name would come up again, then we'd forget.

 

Perhaps a man who couldn't come to terms with "what could have been".  Hardly surprising when you consider the ludicrous money sloshing around.  I bet watching players who weren't a patch on him poncing about like they're the bees knees because they've got a Bentley and a ludicrous contract didn't help.

 

Really sad news.

[boomer39]

he lived in heaviley, windermere road. 

[rubble-rouser]

Horrible news. Puts our disappointment today into perspective.

[Skidfingers McGonical]

Sort of story that should be pinned to the walls of Melwood for all to see.

 

Never take your talent or your health for granted.

 

Sad story.

How is getting a cruciate ligament injury and having to go through 23 operations taking your talent or health for granted?

 

If he became a bit of an alcoholic, I woukd suggest that it has something to with that career ending injury.

[Baltar]

I can remember Joe Fagan signing him...very sad news hopefully a minutes silence at the very least for the cup game with his former club Oldham.

Good idea, hope it happens against Oldham.

 

Very sad news.

[Harry Squatter]

I think I would have become an alcy if I was faced with a similar situation.

 

I remember my Dad raving about him as a few of his workmates had seen him play for Oldham and said he was going to be brilliant. There was no loan opportunities then so he just ended up playing for the reserves and probably became stagnant or went backwards. Each injury probably slowed him down and affected his confidence and overall mental state.

 

Falling through a greenhouse and nearly bleeding to death due to an ambulance strike highlights his bad fortune.

[Guest San Don]

Sad news, just seen this.

[MokTheAfflicted]

I remember him signing and  I had high hopes for him. 

 

RIP

 

 

YNWA

[Strontium]

I can remember Joe Fagan signing him...very sad news hopefully a minutes silence at the very least for the cup game with his former club Oldham.

That would be an empty gesture. A real mark of respect would be closing all the in-ground bars down for the match and telling our official club sponsor Carlsberg to remove all their branding.