Having enjoyed reading OFB’s interview with Doug Weatherall on the subject of Brian Clough, especially as many of us saw him play for the Boro, and those who didn’t remember his successes along with Peter Taylor as one of the best, if not the best, football managerial partnerships since the Second World War. Brian apparently came to the attention of George Camsell, a player who knew a thing about goalscoring and I’ve already touched on the Camsell years on an earlier blog last November (It can be found in the archives section of Diasboro under the heading of Boro 1 Sunderland 0 on 7th November 2.46pm). One interesting fact is that in that 1926/27 season Boro scored 122 league goals, 59 by Camsell whilst the other 63 represented 1.5 per game in the 42 matches, which is the same number Boro scored in 46 matches during their promotion season two seasons ago. How goalscoring has changed!
Brian Clough is reputed to have put down his finishing to the coaching he received from another ex-goalscoring Boro centre forward, Mickey Fenton and it is he who I want to write about later. But firstly let me finish off the Camsell years. Boro were relegated the season after Camsell’s record breaking season even though they accumulated 37 points which was only seven fewer than Derby County who finished 4th. Camsell scored 33 in that relegation season and another 30 the following promotion season which was the prelude to Boro’s longest period as a First Division club – 18 seasons over 25 years covering the Second World War.
George Camsell’s scoring record was on the decline during the early 1930s, ONLY reaching 30 goals once in the following seasons with Boro’s total goals well below 70 a season (what would Boro give today for a striker who could score 20 goals, never mind ONLY 30?). Anyway Mickey Fenton made his first team debut as an inside forward on the last day of the 1932/33 season, a 4-0 home win before a mere crowd of 7,340 against Blackburn Rovers. What’s more he scored, so did Camsell, but he made only three more appearances in the following season and failed to score. Boro just avoided relegation in 1934/35 with Camsell only scoring 14 goals and Fenton 8 in 21 appearances. The following season wasn’t much better with Boro finishing 14th although Camsell once more found his shooting boots with 28 goals but Fenton made only 6 appearances and didn’t score at all.
By now Camsell was in his mid thirties and Fenton 23 but hadn’t as yet played as a centre forward. But the next three seasons saw the Boro finish in the top seven and crowds increase. The 1936/37 season started with a 2-0 home win over Manchester City but Camsell got injured. Fenton then made his debut as a centre forward as Boro won three of the next four matches and were top of the league with 12 points from 5 matches although Fenton only scored once. Despite that Wilf Gillow, the manager, dropped Fenton for the next six matches to be replaced by the now fit Camsell. Boro didn’t win any of those matches and dropped to 15th although Camsell did score a hat-trick in a 5-5 home draw with Sunderland. What do they say – never change a winning team!
Mickey Fenton was then restored to the team initially at inside right but later as the centre forward, and didn’t miss another match as he finished with 22 goals in 35 matches whilst Camsell recorded 18 in 23 matches. Boro only lost once at home all season, ironically the last home match of the season 1-3 to Derby County, and finished 7th with 46 points. Fenton scored a hat-trick in a 3-2 home win over Manchester United, and also the equaliser at home to Arsenal when a crowd of 44,523 broke the ground record.
The following season Boro again accumulated 46 points but finished two places higher in 5th place having been as low as 16th following a 3-5 defeat at Leeds on Christmas Day. Boro won the return match against Leeds 2-0 two days later and then Sunderland at home 2-1 on New Years Day where the ground record was again broken. Boro then won 12 and drew two of their next 16 matches which included a 6-1 win away to Manchester City, and was then followed by a 2-1 home win against Champions-to-be Arsenal before another ground breaking attendance of 46,747. Fenton scored both Boro goals, as he had in the previous match where Tommy Cochrane playing on the left wing scored the other 4 which I believe is the highest scored in a match by a winger playing for the Boro. Unfortunately one of those defeats in that 16 match sequence was by 0-1 away to Third Division York City in a 5th Round FA Cup match. Typical Boro??? A 1-0 win away to Leicester City at the beginning of April had taken Boro up to 3rd in the league, but four defeats in the last seven matches accounted for Boro’s final position of 5th with Fenton having scored 24 league goals in his 36 appearances, Camsell 9 in 24 matches.
The last completed season before the Second World War saw Boro start with a 3-1 home win against Manchester United and saw Boro finish the season in 4th place on 49 points. It also saw 64 goals, the highest number of Boro goals ever scored at home in the First Division. However a 1-2 home defeat to Leeds in October saw Boro as low as 15th in the league, but they only suffered one more league defeat at home recording some large wins. In December Boro beat Blackpool 9-2 with Fenton scoring another hat-trick and Wilf Mannion going one better with four. A 5-1 home win over Stoke City on New Years Eve followed by another home win two days later 3-0 against Liverpool had Boro up to 3rd. The ground record was again broken in January when Boro unfortunately lost at home to Sunderland 0-2 in the FA Cup when the attendance was 51,080. Boro had already won 2-1 at Roker Park in October and were to complete only their second double over the Mackems when winning 3-0 in February, but the FA Cup defeat was recorded at the time as being a bitter pill to swallow.
When Boro lost 1-6 at Wolves in March Boro’s chance of a first League title effectively had gone despite five successive wins later and including a 8-2 home win against Portsmouth before a paltry 6,116 spectators due to heavy rain. Blackpool extracted some revenge for their 9-2 defeat in December by winning 3-0, and if only Boro had won their last match at Villa Park instead of a 1-1 draw, they would have equalled their highest First Division League position of 3rd achieved in 1914.
Boro scored 93 goals that season and for the first time ever, five players had reached double figures. George Camsell scored 10 in his 11 appearances, left winger Cliff Chadwick 11 in 19 matches, inside forward Benny Yorston 12 in 33 matches, Wilf Mannion 14 in 38 matches, and Mickey Fenton 34 in 33 matches. At last Fenton had arrived, and so had Boro as many pundits were speculating that Boro might win their first title in the next season. However Adolf Hitler intervened. Only three matches were played before the season was suspended and declared null and void. Boro lost at Villa 0-2, lost at Liverpool 1-4, and then drew 2-2 at home to Stoke City so perhaps the tipsters were way off beam as Boro, with only one point, were second from bottom to Leeds United at the time.
When the war finished it was too late to restart Football League matches, but the FA decided to restore the FA Cup in 1945/46 with matches over two legs. Boro entered the competition as usual in January’s Third Round. They drew the away leg 4-4 at Leeds, won the second leg 7-2 with a Fenton hat-trick, took three matches to defeat Blackpool losing 2-3 at home, winning 3-2 at Blackpool and 1-0 with a George Hardwick penalty at Elland Road before losing 0-1 at home to Bolton then drawing 1-1 away in the Fifth Round. Football League matches resumed on 31st August 1946 and replicated the fixtures from the aborted 1939/40 season. Boro won 1-0 at Villa and by the same score at Liverpool before beating Stoke 5-4 and Mickey Fenton certainly decided to make up for his lost seven years by scoring four times.
Fenton had guested for Port Vale, Notts County, Rochdale, Wolves and Blackpool during the war and Everton were keen to sign him, but having been born in Stockton and having played for South Bank East End in his former years, he was loyal to the Boro. With 147 league goals in 240 appearances he is Boro’s 5th highest goalscorer and had the war not robbed him of seven years of league football, he would possibly have made 500 appearances for Boro and maybe reached 300 goals or even possibly beaten George Camsell’s record of 325. His last match for Boro was on 21st January 1950, a 0-4 defeat at Villa Park and his only match of the season as he was recalled because of an injury to Peter McKennan. I was lucky as a ten year old to see his last goals for Boro on 11th December 1948, another hat-trick against Villa in a 6-0 win.
Boro had been spoilt for goalscoring centre forwards with Jimmy McClelland making way for George Camsell and then Mickey Fenton taking over the mantle. But Fenton’s retirement as a player caused problems for the Boro with a succession of rather disappointing replacement centre forwards over the next 8 years. Andy Donaldson, Peter McKennan, winger Johnny Spuhler converted with some success with Alex McCrae as his scoring inside forward partner, Neil Mochan, Ken McPherson, an aging Charlie Wayman, and then the young Dougie Cooper who made only 8 scoreless appearances and was originally preferred to Brian Clough until he got injured.
We all know what happened next. Brian Clough was the best centre forward I have ever seen wearing a Boro shirt, but Mickey Fenton was easily the second best in my time. What a triumvirate – Camsell, Fenton and Clough, all northeastern lads who played for the Boro. Obviously I never saw Camsell play; he is a legend in the history of Middlesbrough FC, but I reckon Mickey Fenton should be revered just as much, not only for his goalscoring record, but as one of the two people who had such an influence on the life of Brian Clough.