Jim Smith – An obituary
Jim Smith passed away last week at the age of 79. He was a popular man wherever he played or managed and was held in the highest regard by many successful individuals within the game.
His playing career was spent in the Fourth Division and Northern Premier League and he amassed a total of 249 league appearances.
Smith appeared for Aldershot, Halifax Town, Lincoln City and Colchester United and played in the Northern Premier League for Boston United.
at Aldershot
His first foray into management came at Boston United where he took up the role as player/manager. In each of the three seasons when Smith was in charge, Boston would reach the Third Round of the FA Cup.
Smith would leave Boston United after they had gone 40 league games unbeaten. He joined Fourth Division Colchester United to become player/manager at Layer Road and Boston’s unbeaten run came to an end after 51 matches, a British record for a professional club.
Colchester finished third in the Fourth Division and were promoted in the 1973/74 season under Smith’s leadership.
Blackburn Rovers came in for Smith a year later having just got promoted to the Second Division and he stayed at Ewood Park for three years.
In March 1978, Sir Alf Ramsey resigned from the manager’s job at Birmingham City and despite being in the middle of a promotion push with Blackburn, Smith upped sticks and moved to St Andrews.
Birmingham were relegated in the 78/79 season (Smith’s first full season as Blues manager) but he was rebuilding the team. He sold Trevor Francis to Nottingham Forest for a British record £1 million, the first player to move for a seven figure sum in Britain.
Birmingham went straight back up and sitting comfortably in mid-table when Ron Saunders walked out of his job at Aston Villa, City’s local rivals.
The City board set their sights on the former Villa man, sacked Smith and brought Saunders in to replace him.
Oxford United were next and it wasn’t long before he won them some silverware. United won back to back league titles (the Third and Second Division titles) and Smith had guided them to the top flight for the first time in their history.
Oxford’s eccentric millionaire owner Robert Maxwell refused to improve Smith’s contract and not surprisingly, he walked out of the job.
QPR came in for Smith and he took them to the League Cup Final, beating the mighty Liverpool over two legs. In a twist of fate, it was Smith’s most-recent former club Oxford who they would play in the Final at Wembley.
Revenge was on the agenda but United didn’t read the script as they won convincingly 3-0.
1986 League Cup Fnal
Smith would stay at QPR until December 1988 when he left to join Newcastle United but he couldn’t stop them getting relegated after finishing the season rock bottom of the First Division.
The following season, Newcastle reached the play-offs but they lost to arch-rivals Sunderland. Smith walked out after a boardroom dispute in March 1991.
Jim got back into management in the summer of 1991 when he moved to down to the south coast to manage Portsmouth. In his first season, Portsmouth would reach the semi final of the FA Cup before losing in a replay to Liverpool.
The next season, Smith guided Portsmouth to third place in the league and they missed out on automatic promotion by goal difference. They then lost in the semi finals of the play offs.
Smith was sacked in January 1995 and took over as Derby County manager in the summer of 1995. Derby would finish as runner-up in the First Division and gained promotion to the Premiership.
In Smith’s time at the club, he oversaw the club’s move from the Baseball Ground to Pride Park. He finally left the club in October 2001.
Jim had three spells as Assistant Manager at Coventry City, Portsmouth and Southampton between 2002 and 2005 before he rejoined Oxford United as boss for just over a season and a half before he retired to concentrate on his role as a Director.
Smith managed Oxford for a third spell, albeit in the caretaker capacity for four matches.
Smith was known in his managerial career as ‘The Bald Eagle’ and was a great manager. He got the best out of his players and will be sorely missed.
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