Heroes. They come in all shapes and sizes, some human, some animal, some fictional. You were my favourite footballer, my footballing hero, ever since I can remember.
I can’t pinpoint why or, in fact, when, but I’m guessing at around 1972. There was no one specific moment, no net-bursting strike, no delicately floated cross, no ‘see you over the other side of the stand pal’ type of tackle that did it. Maybe you were part-human part-fictional, for that rocket boot always seemed to be an impossible childhood dream, as if created by a boys’ comic cartoonist, depicted by a bulging net and a keeper haplessly trailing in its wake, a feeling captured wonderfully by Paul Trevillion in the graphic.
Together you all inspired me, made me love football, love teamwork, love it when my own teammates did well just as much when I ever did. I wanted to play for Leeds. I wanted to score from the halfway line and I even persuaded my school teacher that we should always kick off to me, so I could blast it at the opposing goal, imagining I were you! (Sorry to let you down but my ratio was approximately 1:100!)
Eddie talks in reverence of you, of how growing up, even though you did so miles apart, the name Peter Lorimer was the buzz in Scottish youth football of the era. It must have been a reputation well-founded for the wee lad from Broughty Ferry to make his United debut so young. The Revie chap knew a quality player when he saw one.
Wow… that career, those hundreds and hundreds and HUNDREDS of games for the club, a peerless goalscoring record, a key figure for a very good Scotland side and, on your return from North America, a renaissance. All that skill, all that experience, all that authority brought to bear on a younger generation, when your club – now some way past that monumental peak of which you were such a part – needed you the most.
We can talk about the goals if you like? So spectacular when you pulled the trigger! My favourite, or at least the one I tried time and again to recreate in the playground or the cul-de-sac where I grew up… that absolute peach against Manchester City. The anticipation of Billy’s through ball, the audacious flick to wrong foot those two City defenders, the magnificent volley from 25 yards out into the top right-hand corner and that trademark self-congratulatory, yet somehow understated, clap above the head in celebration. At the same time both deft and devastating.
Watching those highlights clips again (and again) will never dilute that wonderful, clean, crisp strike of the ball. The minimal backlift, the type you’d see from a high-class Test batsman before timing his stroke to the boundary, the explosive contact of a heavyweight boxer’s hook flush on the jaw, the acceleration of a rocket destined beyond the heavens, and the payoff, the back of the net, stretched almost to breaking point. We love sport for many reasons, one being because it gives us the opportunity to witness the extraordinary. That strike was truly extraordinary.
My pride and joy, a yellow Admiral Leeds kit with the blue and white stripes on the sleeves. It was the only time I ever asked Mum and Dad if I could have a number on. Of course, it HAD to be number seven. And such was my desire to emulate, I even managed to extricate myself from centre back for a couple of very pleasant seasons wide on the right, trying to cross it like you did, trying to hit it with the same venomous, rasping power when I got a whiff of a chance.
The signature in my autograph book, finally acquired as you walked off the Fullerton Park training field on the day that Elvis died; the autobiography, also indelibly marked with ink, more teased than lashed, across the page by you; even the caricature adorned with your moniker on my office wall, all testimony to an appreciation that has endured.
Then, on a work night out about 20 years or so ago, you made my evening when you came over to sit with me for an hour to talk about the old days. And later, when I’d plucked up the courage to pick up the phone and ask you, we talked several times together in front of audiences who know a great footballer when they see one. What a joy for me to work with my hero. You never disappointed, regaling us with those tales you’d told a thousand times before as if it was your first time.
When I saw you at the Cardiff game at Elland Road in December 2019 I knew all was not well. Always as sharp as a tack whenever we met or chatted, the light was beginning to dim. You smiled, we shook hands and exchanged the usual pleasantries but inside I was upset… sad. You’re my footballing hero and heroes don’t suffer this way, do they? Except of course, they do.
As long as there’s a Leeds United they’ll remember you. The entertainer. The hotshot. 90 miles an hour. ‘Lash’. To a young Leeds lad you were superhuman. You were also a super human. You were a magnificent number seven but, to me, you’ll always be no.1.
