The term ‘Sgt-Major’ tended to be applied, with good reason, to Dick Graham, the crew-cut disciplinarian brought to Brisbane Road in the summer of 1966. ‘The only man I’ve ever been afraid of in my life,’ said Tommy Taylor.
Tommy nevertheless had reason to be grateful to the former Crystal Palace goalkeeper and manager, who gave him a debut at the start of the 1967-68 season when he was still 15, only a few days older than the club’s youngest-ever player, Paul Went, had been for his first game two years earlier.
At the start, Graham had turned to the experience missing from Dave Sexton’s side, straightaway bringing in players like Cliff Holton, Brian Whitehouse and John Snedden, all from Charlton, where he had been working. Initially the former pair had to do much of the coaching as Graham was confined to hospital with a back injury.
Financial problems had got worse, with crowds down to 4,000 and the O’s in the bottom two of the Third Division, and on a Sunday morning in November, Graham and director Arthur Page addressed supporters in the main stand, literally passing round the trainer’s blue plastic bucket for any spare change. £1,000 was collected for the Save Our Club campaign and at the end of season Paul Went was sold to Charlton for just under £30,000; by which time Holton’s 17 goals had helped Graham’s team to the safety of 14th place.
His second season, with colours changed from blue to red and with ‘Leyton’ dropped from the club’s title, was just as much of a struggle, however. The number of full-time professionals had been cut to just 15 and injuries right from the start meant finding five new players in a week while the team slumped to the bottom of the table.
Two of the newcomers, Vic Halom (converted from wing-half) and Roy Massey, became the principal goalscorers, and a run to the fourth round of the FA Cup boosted the coffers. But when Graham asked to spend some of the Cup receipts amid another injury crisis in February he was turned down and resigned.
In an illuminating newspaper interview two years later, he wished he had ‘stuck it out’ and was rightly proud of players he had converted like Rofe and Halom, who later brought in big money; as well as excellent signings like Ray Gooddard, Terry Mancini and Dave Harper.
The foundations of the promotion winning side of 1970 had been laid. While successor Jimmy Bloomfield would reap the rewards, Graham went on to four years at Colchester, including a famous FA Cup win over Don Revie’s Leeds United.
