William Alphonsus "Wee Willie" Crilley (29 August 1901 – 16 September 1955) was a Scottish-American

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

forward Forward is a relative direction, the opposite of backward. Forward may also refer to: People * Forward (surname) Sports * Forward (association football) * Forward (basketball), including: ** Point forward ** Power forward (basketball) ** Sm ...

who holds the record for the greatest number of goals scored by an Alloa Athletic player in a single season of the

Scottish Football League The Scottish Football League (SFL) was a league featuring professional and semi-professional football clubs mostly from Scotland.One club, Berwick Rangers, is based in the town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, which is located approximately 4 km south ...

. He had an itinerant career, spending most of it in the United States with a few seasons, or parts of seasons in Scotland.

Career

During his youth, Crilley played for Pale Ale, a local Glasgow amateur team. In 1920, he began the season with Cambuslang Rangers. During the season, he moved to

Alloa Athletic Alloa Athletic Football Club is a Scottish association football semi-professional club based in the town of Alloa, Clackmannanshire. Formed as Alloa in 1880, the football club shortly changed its name to Alloa Association, and then to Alloa Ath ...

of the

Second Division. In his first season with Alloa, he scored the game winners in Alloa's first and second round victories in the

Scottish Cup The Scottish Football Association Challenge Cup,Rangers F.C. Rangers Football Club is a Scottish professional football club based in the Govan district of Glasgow which plays in the Scottish Premiership. Although not its official name, it is often referred to as Glasgow Rangers outside Scotland. The fou ...

, a 4–1 loss for Alloa. Despite the loss in the Scottish Cup, Alloa won the 1921 Penman Trophy and Stirlingshire Cup. The next year, Crilley carried Alloa to the Second Division championship as he scored a record forty-nine goals, an amazing feat for a five-foot three center forward. Alloa transferred Crilley to

Celtic Celtic, Celtics or Keltic may refer to: Language and ethnicity *pertaining to Celts, a collection of Indo-European peoples in Europe and Anatolia **Celts (modern) *Celtic languages **Proto-Celtic language * Celtic music *Celtic nations Sports Fo ...

at the end of the season, but he played only three first team games, scoring a single goal. Celtic sent him back to Alloa at the end of the season, but injuries hindered his playing time.Alloa Athletic History
/ref> He then left Scotland to sign with

New York Field Club New York F.C. (also known as the New York Field Club) was a name used by two early twentieth-century American soccer clubs. History Founded in 1916 as the New York Football Club, the team was originally a member of the semi-professional National ...

in the American Soccer League which had not yet finished its season. He played five games, scoring five goals. Crilley began the 1923–1924 season in New York, played two league games, one

National Challenge Cup The Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup, commonly known as the U.S. Open Cup (USOC), is a knockout cup competition in men's soccer in the United States of America. It is the oldest ongoing national soccer competition in that country. The 2023 U.S. O ...

game before being transferred to the

New York Giants The New York Giants are a professional American football team based in the New York metropolitan area. The Giants compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's National Football Conference (NFC) East division. ...

. He played two games, scoring one goal, then returned to Scotland to rejoin Alloa. According to the Alloa history, he was "transferred down south for £1,250" but it does not identify Crilley's new team. However, at some point he returned to the United States where he played eleven games of the 1924–1925 season with

Indiana Flooring Indiana Flooring were a New York City soccer team that played in the American Soccer League between 1924 and 1927. They replaced New York Field Club. Before joining the ASL, the team had played in various state leagues. Ernest Viberg, a former ...

. Crilley returned to the Giants for the 1925–1926 season, seeing his greatest number of games during any stint with a US team, twenty-eight. By this time, he was no longer a center forward and had become better known as a top winger and an excellent play maker. Crilley resumed his nomadic career during the 1926–1927 season, bouncing between three teams during the course of the season. He began with the Giants, played nine games for

J&P Coats J. & P. Coats was an American soccer club founded in 1900 as the team of the Pawtucket, Rhode Island branch of the J. & P. Coats threadmaking company of Paisley, Scotland (following a 1952 merger this firm became part of the Coats Group). The club ...

and finished with two games at Philadelphia Field Club. He then played for the New York Nationals in 1927–1928. In the 1928–1929 season, he was with

Brooklyn Hispano The Brooklyn Hispano was an American soccer club based in Brooklyn, New York that was an inaugural member of the reformed American Soccer League. The club was named the Brooklyn Giants for the 1942/43 season only. The Hispano club competed in th ...

New York Hungaria New York Hungaria was an American soccer team which won the National Challenge Cup in 1962. Honors *National Challenge Cup (1): 1962 *Participations in CONCACAF Champions' Cup: 1963 *Cosmopolitan Soccer League Champions (6): 1956–1957, 1958� ...

and the

IRT Rangers Interborough Rapid Transit Rangers, better known as the IRT Rangers, were an early twentieth century U.S. soccer team sponsored by the New York City Interborough Rapid Transit Company. History In the mid-1920s the Rangers were an amateur team in t ...

of the

Eastern Professional Soccer League Eastern may refer to: Transportation *China Eastern Airlines, a current Chinese airline based in Shanghai *Eastern Air, former name of Zambia Skyways *Eastern Air Lines, a defunct American airline that operated from 1926 to 1991 *Eastern Air Li ...

.April 22, 1929 The Globe
/ref> He apparently returned to Scotland intending to play for Alloa Athletic, but was deported from Scotland because he had become a US citizen. Therefore, he was back into the ASL in the fall of 1930 with the

Newark Americans Newark Americans were a team in the first American Soccer League (1921-1933), American Soccer League. They were founded in 1930, but folded following the spring 1932 season. Year-by-year

Defunct soccer clubs in New Jersey American Soccer Le ...

and the

New York Soccer Club New York Soccer Club ( Youth Soccer Team ) was the name of a New York soccer team that, in 1930, played briefly in the American Soccer League. In 1923, New York fur merchant Maurice Vandeweghe - the father and grandfather of later basketball stars ...

. While he played only one league game with New York SC, he saw another five cup games in which he scored seven goals. He continued his itinerant ways in 1931, playing for both the

Fall River F.C. Fall River Football Club, also referred to as Fall River Field Club, was the name used by two United States soccer clubs, based in Fall River, Massachusetts. Both played in the American Soccer League during the early 1930s. The name is often used ...

and the

Brooklyn Wanderers The Brooklyn Wanderers was a U.S. soccer team which was a founding member of the National Association Football League in the late nineteenth century. Later versions joined the original American Soccer League and the reorganized American Soccer Le ...

before joining the

New York American :''Includes coverage of New York Journal-American and its predecessors New York Journal, The Journal, New York American and New York Evening Journal'' The ''New York Journal-American'' was a daily newspaper published in New York City from 1937 t ...

in the fall of 1931. Crilley replicated his early career goal scoring heroics for these last two teams, scoring 14 goals in 7 games for Brooklyn and 9 goals in 10 games for the Americans. In 1932, he attempted to rejoin

, but was rebuffed. In 1935, he played for

in the second American Soccer League. He returned to the United States and joined the

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cla ...

on 18 November 1942, serving in the Air Corps with

Fifteenth Air Force The Fifteenth Air Force (15 AF) is a numbered air force of the United States Air Force's Air Combat Command (ACC). It is headquartered at Shaw Air Force Base. It was reactivated on 20 August 2020, merging the previous units of the Ninth Air Force ...

during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Crilley 1903 births 1955 deaths Footballers from Glasgow Scottish men's footballers Scottish emigrants to the United States American men's soccer players American Soccer League (1921–1933) players American Soccer League (1933–1983) players Alloa Athletic F.C. players Brooklyn Hispano players Brooklyn Wanderers (1922–1931) players Celtic F.C. players Eastern Professional Soccer League (1928–29) players Fall River F.C. (1922–1931) players Indiana Flooring players IRT Rangers players Pawtucket Rangers players New York Americans (soccer) (1930–1933) players New York Hungaria players New York Field Club players New York Giants (soccer) players New York Nationals (ASL) players New York Soccer Club players Newark Americans players Philadelphia Field Club players United States Army Air Forces personnel of World War II Men's association football forwards British emigrants to the United States Cambuslang Rangers F.C. players Scottish Junior Football Association players