November 10, 2024

I had regrets about moving to Everton for a long time – they weren’t the club I wanted to join

I had regrets about moving to Everton for a long time - they weren't the club  I wanted to join - Liverpool Echo

Former Everton player Henry Newton celebrates his 80th birthday today but the future League Championship-winner struggled during his time at Goodison Park

Many happy returns to Henry Newton on his 80th birthday, a player whose ‘crime’ in the eyes of Evertonians it seems was that he wasn’t Colin Harvey, Howard Kendall or Alan Ball.

Born in Nottingham on February 18, 1944, ahead of a week that would see HMS Warwick torpedoed off the Cornish coast with the loss of 66 men, over half her crew, plus the last heavy air raids on London of the Second World War, Newton would make 281 appearances for home city club Forest, scoring 17 goals. Although the England Under-23 international, like Kendall, missed out on any senior caps in an era in which Alf Ramsey remained devoted to his tried and trusted options – Harvey was only capped once – he arrived with a stellar reputation.

Ivan Ponting, who says Newton’s time on Merseyside “must go down as an anti-climatic interlude in an accomplished career,” writes in his Everton Player by Player book: “When Harry Catterick parted with £150,000 and Irishman Tommy Jackson to sign Henry Newton from Nottingham Forest in October 1970, he was paying a top price – Martin Peters and Allan Clarke were the only two Britons to have cost more – for one of the leading midfielders in the land. Sadly, and through no fault of the talented 26-year-old, it was to prove an ill-fated moved.”
Ponting added: “Quick and brave, sharp in the tackle and a constructive passer, he was the type of all-purpose footballer who would have slotted productively into the engine room of any leading side.” So given such an enviable skill-set, why did it not work out for Newton at Goodison Park?

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