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THE EINDHOVEN CONNECTION
Steve Goldby
"Total Football and its attacking pressure are very spectacular. It places great demands on
individual and team tactical excellence... An absolute prerequisite, to master such a team
tactical aspect, is that all the players possess a positive mentality, including the substitutes."
Rinus Michels
The last time I was in Eindhoven was just eight months ago when this current season was in its infancy and Boro had just been beaten by Tottenham.
Enraged by the feeling that we had thrown away the game, I had taken a drive there to escape from football and it turned out that it was completely the wrong place to go to do that.
Many of the bars and food outlets that I visited that night were showing replays of the same game that I was trying to forget about and almost everyone that I talked to wanted to talk football, especially when they found out where I was from.
If you go to Eindhoven and say you are from Middlesbrough, you will stir something in the locals and discover for yourself just how big the connection is between the two places.
This connection was forged almost exactly fifty years ago and the story of how it came about begins in November 1950 when one of Middlesbrough's greatest ever, George Hardwick played his final game for the club and left to become player-manager at Oldham Athletic.
Not many can make a smoooth transition from player to manager and even fewer can handle both roles at once but there was little doubt that George would be successful in his new role, despite the Boundary Park club having floundered in the lower divisions for years and not showed any signs that they would ever rise above this level.
George had taken over a club who were stagnating in the old Third Division North and declared upon arrival in Lancashire that promotion in two years was his ambition. And in those days, when George Hardwick spoke, people listened. 21,000 people turned out to see his debut for Oldham, a phenomenal crowd for the club in those times.
The role of player/manager was pretty much unheard of in 1950 but George took to it with great enthusiam and commitment and enjoyed his most prolific goalscoring season ever, netting seven times in twenty-one appearances and helping to stave off the prospect of relegation in the process.
George's first full season in charge of Oldham saw the club challenge for promotion and in 1952/53, they achieved it, winning the championship in the process. This was a massive achievement and George himself is on record quoting that particular season as one which brought huge personal satisfaction.
But amongst the celebrations and euphoria, something else was taking place which would have a bearing on the global game in years to come. Don't ever let a Dutchman tell you that 'total football' was invented in their country because it is simply not true. It was born in Oldham in the mid 1950's and was the idea of Middlesbrough's famous son.
'Total football' is a system whereby all players can alternate position at any given time and it was first demonstrated by the Oldham side of 1954 and further developed in George's next appointment as manager of the Dutch national side.
Fifty years ago, Holland were footballing minnows with no status in the international arena at all. George Hardwick started to change that with the introduction of a system that would become so successful that the Dutch would become world leaders twenty years later.
It is unfortunate that George only stayed in the job for a short time and there is no doubt that the length of his tenure is partly responsible for him not getting the credit he deserves for implementing his 'total football' system that transformed the Dutch from minnows to giants.
But there was further opportunity to continue the quest when George was appointed manager of PSV Eindhoven in June 1957. George immediately saw the huge potential of the club and took them from mediocrity to cup finalists, as well as a fifth place finish in the Dutch league.
PSV Eindhoven are now established as a fully fledged European giant but like Middlesbrough, they languished in the shadows for years before becoming what they are today. George Hardwick played no small part in this transformation and as mentioned at the beginning of this piece, is still fondly remembered by the locals of Eindhoven today.
George's PSV Eindhoven team also took part in a historic Teesside occasion when they were invited to play Middlesbrough at Ayresome Park in March 1958 in one of the first ever floodlit matches at the old stadium. The match ended in a 3-3 draw with Brian Clough grabbing a hat-trick for Boro.
So Middlesbrough will arrive in Eindhoven for the Uefa Cup final with a strong connection to Eindhoven and a lot of good wishes from the locality. Because without George Hardwick, things would have been a lot different today for Dutch football and for PSV Eindhoven.
George never played in a European club competition and never won a trophy with Middlesbrough. Victory in this year's Uefa Cup final would have made him extremely proud, especially given the venue and the connection between Boro and PSV, all brought about by George Hardwick, Middlesbrough's finest and the inventor of 'total football'.
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