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The Bonnie Prince. Charlie Cooke - My Football Life
By
Charlie Cooke and Martin Knight Mainstream
ISBN 1-84596-961817
Anyone growing up watching Chelsea and present for the teams of the late
sixties and early seventies will remember fondly the sight of perhaps our
greatest ever winger, Charlie Cooke.
Compared, with good reason, to the likes of George Best one is left
recalling a true great of the game. Thus, a book written by the man himself
is a welcome addition to the Chelsea lore and is worth a place on your
bookshelf. Charlie was always a
naturally gifted player but the book describes in quite stark detail his
early life in post war industrial Scotland where the austerity of the time
grounded him and imparted a solid work ethic
The surroundings were stark it seems but surrounded by a very good family
Charlie describes what appears to be a fairly quick route to soccer
greatness. There were many who
recognized his talent and nurtured it but he worked extremely hard to make
sure they always saw his best.
By a very tender age he found himself not only playing for a princely wage
at club level but also representing his country and you will find a
fascinating link to present day Chelsea great, Carlo Cudicini.
I won't spoil it by describing it here.
Charlie was always a star and he landed at Chelsea when they were about to
cement their image as the kings of the Kings Road.
The drinking and partying were fairly well documented at the time but
Charlie's part in all that was never more than a whisper back then.
This book paints a very dark picture of just how close to
self-destruction he came and how lucky we are to still have a happy, healthy
Charlie still with us. They were heady days and they all lived the legend,
so to speak.
For this reviewers part it seems better to remember the ability of Charlie
to turn a game and hold it, all on his own.
Think of Arjen Robben and perhaps one has a modern reference frame;
mercurial genius, long quiet spells, devastating pace and ball skills. Just
like Robben, the elusive nature of his talent served to at the same time
frustrate and annoy many a fan who became impatient to see another moment of
Cooke's genius at work. Perhaps
it was these attributes that cement Charlie in the annals of wherever he
played and this book goes a long way to fleshing out a picture of a complex
man with equally complex talent. He was called a "schemer" in the parlance
of the time and it is a very apt description. He made the goals and scored
precious few, a fact he now regrets.
I saw him score a 25 yarder to win a game in 1969 and I recall this
man could hit a ball as hard as the best of them. But he wanted that
chinking run leaving the defenders sprawling on the ground in his wake; it
was for lesser mortals to actually stand there in front of goal and finish
off what the master schemer had created.
Perhaps his ancestry from the famous Scottish Circus family played its part
in all this but one is often left thinking we should have had more Charlie
at the time, time the booze and partying certainly impacted. His
international career spanned only 16 games which is a travesty.
There was much prejudice toward the Old Firm players based in
Scotland but there is a more than a hint that his excessive life-style was
the excuse for his exclusion if not the real reason. But the international
stage was left poorer either way.
Most who read this book will want to know all the details of a great period
in Blues history and they will leave this book satisfied. The mere mention
of the times with the Osgoods, Baldwin's, Harris's and the rest will take
one back to a tremendous time in Chelsea history.
It nicely avoids the banal tedium of many books of this type perhaps
because this man has quite a bit more to say than his contemporaries and his
place in the world went a long way past fast cars and booze. It is
gratifying that the outcome of the book is a happy one.
It reveals a man who has straightened out his bad habits, built a
successful coaching business and perhaps most importantly is looking at his
revered status with a mixture of bemusement and enjoyment.
A good book and worth your time.
Review by John Harlow
