Edward Graham McCreadie (born 15 April 1940) is a Scottish former

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugb ...

who played at left-back, mainly for

Chelsea Chelsea or Chelsey may refer to: Places Australia * Chelsea, Victoria Canada * Chelsea, Nova Scotia * Chelsea, Quebec United Kingdom * Chelsea, London, an area of London, bounded to the south by the River Thames ** Chelsea (UK Parliament consti ...

. He later became a football

manager Management (or managing) is the administration of an organization, whether it is a business, a nonprofit organization, or a government body. It is the art and science of managing resources of the business. Management includes the activitie ...

Career

McCreadie started his footballing career with

amateur An amateur () is generally considered a person who pursues an avocation independent from their source of income. Amateurs and their pursuits are also described as popular, informal, self-taught, user-generated, DIY, and hobbyist. History ...

Scottish side Drumchapel before moving to Clydebank Juniors and then

East Stirlingshire East Stirlingshire Football Club is a Scotland, Scottish association football club based in the town of Falkirk. The club was founded in 1881 and competes in the , in the fifth tier of the Scottish football league system. The club's origins ca ...

. He was signed by Chelsea in 1962 by manager

Tommy Docherty Thomas Henderson Docherty (24 April 1928 – 31 December 2020), commonly known as The Doc, was a Scottish football player and manager. Docherty played for several clubs, most notably Preston North End, and represented Scotland 25 times betw ...

for £5,000 to help the club's push for promotion from the

Second Division In sport, the Second Division, also called Division 2 or Division II is usually the second highest division of a league, and will often have promotion and relegation with divisions above and below. Following the rise of Premier League style compet ...

. Docherty recounted that he discovered McCreadie by accident. He had attended an East Stirling match to watch another player named Gourlay, but "this left-back – I thought, "why the hell are you playing here?" He was great in the air, he was quick, his control was magic. I didn't know if he was a left-back or an outside left." As part of the deal Chelsea also agreed to play two friendly matches against East Stirlingshire. A match was played at

Firs Park Firs Park was a football stadium in Falkirk, Scotland, which was the home of East Stirlingshire F.C. between 1921 and 2008. It was located on Firs Street, 0.3 miles north-east of the town centre. At the time of closing the ground had a capacit ...

in 1963, but a return fixture was not scheduled. Over 50 years later, East Stirlingshire requested that Chelsea complete the agreement.Chelsea owe East Stirlingshire friendly from 1962 deal
BBC News Chelsea were promoted to the First Division later in 1962 and McCreadie became a fixture in the Chelsea defence for the next decade. A talented and pacy attacking full-back with impressive timing, McCreadie was a regular starter in the Chelsea sides of the 1960s and 1970s alongside the likes of

Bobby Tambling Robert Victor Tambling (born 18 September 1941) is an English former professional footballer, who played as a forward, most notably for Chelsea, Crystal Palace and England. He was Chelsea's all-time top scorer for 47 years, with 202 goals in ...

Peter Osgood Peter Leslie Osgood (20 February 1947 – 1 March 2006) was an English footballer who was active during the 1960s and 1970s. He is best remembered for representing Chelsea and Southampton at club level, and was also capped four times by Englan ...

and Charlie Cooke. While he only scored five goals for the club throughout his career, McCreadie scored a memorable winner in the

League Cup In several sports, most prominently association football, a league cup or secondary cup generally signifies a cup competition for which entry is restricted only to teams in a particular league. The first national association football tournament t ...

final of

1965 Events January–February * January 14 – The Prime Minister of Northern Ireland and the Taoiseach of the Republic of Ireland meet for the first time in 43 years. * January 20 ** Lyndon B. Johnson is sworn in for a full term ...

in which he dribbled 80

yards The yard (symbol: yd) is an English unit of length in both the British imperial and US customary systems of measurement equalling 3 feet or 36 inches. Since 1959 it has been by international agreement standardized as exactly ...

up the pitch before slotting the ball past

Leicester City Leicester ( ) is a city, unitary authority and the county town of Leicestershire in the East Midlands of England. It is the largest settlement in the East Midlands. The city lies on the River Soar and close to the eastern end of the National ...

goalkeeper In many team sports which involve scoring goals, the goalkeeper (sometimes termed goaltender, netminder, GK, goalie or keeper) is a designated player charged with directly preventing the opposing team from scoring by blocking or intercepting ...

Gordon Banks Gordon Banks (30 December 1937 – 12 February 2019) was an English professional footballer who played as a goalkeeper. Widely regarded as one of the greatest goalkeepers of all time, he made 679 appearances during a 20-year professional caree ...

to give his side a 3–2 first leg lead, which ultimately won the trophy for his club as the second leg at

Filbert Street Filbert Street was a football stadium in Leicester, England, which served as the home of Leicester City F.C. from 1891 until 2002. Although officially titled the City Business Stadium in the early 1990s, it remained known almost exclusively by ...

ended in a 0–0 draw. After a string of high-league placings and near misses in the cups (including defeat in the 1967

FA Cup The Football Association Challenge Cup, more commonly known as the FA Cup, is an annual knockout football competition in men's domestic English football. First played during the 1871–72 season, it is the oldest national football compet ...

final) but no more silverware, McCreadie won the FA Cup with Chelsea in 1970, where a move involving him won the throw-in which created David Webb's winner in the replayed final against

Leeds United Leeds United Football Club is a professional football club based in Leeds, West Yorkshire in England. The club competes in the Premier League, the highest level of England's football league system, and plays its home matches at Elland Road ...

Old Trafford Old Trafford () is a football stadium in Old Trafford, Greater Manchester, England, and the home of Manchester United. With a capacity of 74,310 it is the largest club football stadium (and second-largest football stadium overall after Wembl ...

. The side won the

Cup Winners' Cup The UEFA Cup Winners' Cup was a European football club competition contested annually by the winners of domestic cup competitions. The cup was, chronologically, the second seasonal inter-European club competition organised by UEFA. The tournam ...

the following season, but McCreadie missed the final in

Athens Athens ( ; el, Αθήνα, Athína ; grc, Ἀθῆναι, Athênai (pl.) ) is both the capital and largest city of Greece. With a population close to four million, it is also the seventh largest city in the European Union. Athens dominates a ...

through injury. He was also a

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to ...

international, winning 23 caps between 1965 and 1969 after making his debut against

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe ...

. He played in Scotland's famous 3–2 win over

world champions A world championship is generally an international competition open to elite competitors from around the world, representing their nations, and winning such an event will be considered the highest or near highest achievement in the sport, game, ...

England at

Wembley Wembley () is a large suburbIn British English, "suburb" often refers to the secondary urban centres of a city. Wembley is not a suburb in the American sense, i.e. a single-family residential area outside of the city itself. in north-west Londo ...

in 1967, after which the Scots declared themselves the new world champions. Upon his retirement from playing in 1973, McCreadie joined the coaching staff at Chelsea having made 410 appearances for the club. In April 1975 he was appointed manager but by this stage the team was in decline with the club heavily in

debt Debt is an obligation that requires one party, the debtor, to pay money or other agreed-upon value to another party, the creditor. Debt is a deferred payment, or series of payments, which differentiates it from an immediate purchase. The ...

and he couldn't prevent

relegation In sports leagues, promotion and relegation is a process where teams are transferred between multiple divisions based on their performance for the completed season. Leagues that use promotion and relegation systems are often called open league ...

to the Second Division. Nevertheless, McCreadie re-built the side – taking the captaincy from

John Hollins John William Hollins (born 16 July 1946) is an English retired footballer and manager. He was initially a midfielder who, later in his career, became an effective full-back. Hollins, throughout his footballing career, featured for clubs such a ...

and giving it to 18-year-old Ray Wilkins in the process – and with no money to spend, put together a team of youth players and veterans from the club's heyday. Chelsea were promoted back to the First Division in 1977. It was then that he lost his job in somewhat bizarre circumstances. Having won promotion, his request for a company car was rejected by chairman Brian Mears, so he resigned. Mears then relented and offered him the car but with his sense of pride he did not come back to the club as he had already made his mind up. McCreadie left for the

North American Soccer League The North American Soccer League may refer to: *North American Soccer League (1968–1984), a former Division I league *North American Soccer League (2011–2017) The North American Soccer League (NASL) was a professional men's soccer league ba ...

in the late 1970s and was appointed manager of the

Memphis Rogues The Memphis Rogues were a professional soccer team in the former North American Soccer League. They operated in the 1978, 1979, and 1980 seasons and played their home games in Memphis' Liberty Bowl Memorial Stadium. They also played indoor ...

, with whom he played one game in 1979,NASL Stats
/ref> and later the indoor Cleveland Force before finally retiring from football in 1985. He continues to live in Tennessee in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

References

External links

*
Article from The Scotsman

{{DEFAULTSORT:McCreadie, Eddie 1940 births Chelsea F.C. managers Chelsea F.C. players East Stirlingshire F.C. players Expatriate soccer players in the United States Living people Major Indoor Soccer League (1978–1992) coaches Memphis Rogues players North American Soccer League (1968–1984) coaches North American Soccer League (1968–1984) players Footballers from Glasgow Scotland international footballers Scottish expatriate footballers Scottish Football League players Scottish football managers Scottish expatriate football managers Scottish footballers English Football League players Clydebank Juniors F.C. players Scotland under-23 international footballers Association football fullbacks Drumchapel Amateur F.C. players Scottish Junior Football Association players Player-coaches Scottish expatriate sportspeople in the United States FA Cup Final players