Howard Kendall was part of a famous Everton midfield known as the “Holy Trinity”, but the biggest miracle he performed was as the club’s manager in the 1980s.
When Kendall returned to his home in 1983 to find “Kendall Out” daubed in paint on his garage door, the writing seemed to be, quite literally, on the wall. The club were languishing near the bottom of the First Division. The anguish of its fans — in a city where football is almost a religion — was rendered even more painful by the relentless dominance of Liverpool, their neighbours across Stanley Park.
The dreaded “vote of confidence” from the club chairman — usually the prelude to the sack — came and went. One of the most remarkable football stories, in a decade otherwise marked by the predictability of Liverpool’s success, began. After leading Everton to league championships in 1985 and 1987, Kendall became a revered figure in the blue half of Merseyside, grudgingly respected in the red.
Before that, he had played in the last Everton team to win the championship as part of a celebrated triumvirate of midfield players — along with Alan Ball and Colin Harvey. His style of management was the polar opposite of Harry Catterick, who managed that 1970 side. While Catterick was a remote figure, who rarely ventured on to the training field, Kendall was “one of the lads”, entering into the larks and “banter” of professional footballers.
However, his players did not take advantage of the grammar school-educated miner’s son, an astute and fatherly figure who was brilliant at motivating them. Several months after the garage daubing had shocked his neighbours in the well-heeled town of Formby, Everton’s fortunes had barely improved. Kendall was on the brink of being sacked in January 1984 with the club losing to lowly Oxford United in a cup match on a cold January night. Everton scored a lucky equaliser late in the game. The club went on to win the FA Cup that season.
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By that point, Kendall had moulded the side that would win the championship. It had the brilliant Neville Southall in goal — who was playing non-league football in Llandudno when Kendall met his father in a pub and was told that he was the best goalkeeper in Britain. He saw for himself and later signed the Welshman. By common consent in the football world, Peter Reid’s knees were “knackered”. Kendall signed him for £60,000 and the tigerish midfielder was a revelation. Kevin Sheedy, a Liverpool reject, became a regular on the left side of Kendall’s midfield and scored beautiful goals. Andy Gray, considered by many to be past his peak, returned to his flamboyant best, diving amid flying boots to head many goals. From Boxing Day until May 1985 Everton went 28 games unbeaten. After Everton beat Newcastle 4-0 their manager Jack Charlton was asked if he was devastated by the result: “Devastated? I’m delighted because that should have been 8-0,” he said.
Howard Kendall was born into a football-mad family in the village of Ryton, Co Durham, in 1946. At Washington Grammar School, he played in the same team as Bryan Ferry, who went on to form Roxy Music. Kendall remembered him as a “wimpy right winger”.
His father, Jack, was so keen for his son to make it in the game that when Howard signed for Preston North End as a 15 year old, the family moved to Lancashire. Kendall attracted notice as a hard-working defensive midfielder, or wing-half, who was elegant on the ball and scored his fair share of goals. In 1964, aged 17, he became the youngest player to appear in an FA Cup final. He was coveted by Bill Shankly, the Liverpool manager, who had told his board —with typical bravado — that if they coughed up the money to buy him, Liverpool would go a whole season without conceding a goal. When Everton swooped in to sign Kendall for a then big fee of £85,000 in 1967, Shankly tendered his resignation. It was rejected.
Kendall was sold to Birmingham in 1974 and later played for Stoke City before becoming player-manager of Blackburn Rovers in 1979. He returned to Everton as a player-manager in May, 1981, pulling on the blue jersey a final four times. Slower, thicker-set and with a balding pate, he was nonetheless still a cultured, unrushed figure in the middle of the field.
His first two and a half years in charge seemed as grim as the recession that bought misery to Merseyside, but Kendall was quietly rebuilding. He was compared to Brian Clough in his ability to find raw talents from the lower leagues, such as Trevor Steven, and polish them into international players. Kendall was also a big believer in giving his players the largesse to enjoy themselves off the field — even if it led to the occasional lurid tabloid headline — in the cause of fostering team spirit.
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Journalists, hardly noted for pusillanimity when it came to drinking, feared spending time with him because of Kendall’s prodigious alcohol intake. He always insisted on doing his Friday press conference after Liverpool’s. He would then ask the assembled scribes, “What’s that b*****d [Liverpool manager Kenny Dalglish] told you? I’ll give you a better story”.
On one pre-season trip, things got out of hand in a bar and police were called. One of the players, Ian Snodin, recalled: “We were out of order. They asked us who was in charge. The gaffer was drunk and in a dishevelled state with stains on his shirt caused by Kevin Sheedy throwing red wine over him. One of the policemen said in disbelief: ‘That guy is in charge of you!’ We started laughing, but the officer didn’t.”
After a late surge, Everton won the championship again in 1987. Kendall left the same year and never reached the same heights as a manager. He was on a shortlist to replace Bobby Robson as England manager in 1990, before the job was given to Graham Taylor, and managed Athletic Bilbao, Manchester City, Everton twice more, and Sheffield United with moderate success.
He was reportedly sacked by Notts County in April 1995 because of his drinking. When the chairman accused him of sneaking back into the club with plastic bags laden with red wine, Kendall responded with dignity, “I would never have hidden them in plastic bags”.
His first marriage to Cynthia ended in divorce. He is survived by their two daughters, Hailey and Lisa, and a son, Simon, a teacher. He is also survived by his second wife Lil.
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After his third spell in charge at Everton, which ended in 1998, Kendall settled into retirement in Formby, writing a weekly column for the Liverpool Echo. As a well-liked figure in the town’s pubs, he would often be visited by his former players. To a man, they still referred to him as “gaffer”.
Howard Kendall, footballer and manager, was born on May 22, 1946. He died of a heart attack on October 17, 2015, aged 69