Growing up in the 1980s, I knew only two things about David Pleat: he was the only Jewish football manager in the English league and he managed Luton Town, the biggest rival of my team, Watford FC. One of my earliest memories of watching a game at Watford was a memorable 4-3 victory against David Pleat’s Luton Town in a third round FA cup replay in 1984.
In his recently published autobiography, Just One More Goal, Pleat discusses his Jewish heritage in detail. We learn that his father Joe Plotz grew up in the East End, was a very successful amateur boxer, and was present at the Battle of Cable Street in 1936, when the Jewish community confronted Oswald Mosley and his Blackshirts.
His father changed his name to Pleat due to antisemitism, the desire to integrate in British society and as a nod, Pleat believes, to the numerous family members involved in tailoring.
David’s family moved to Nottingham, where he grew up on the Clifton estate. By 1961, he was on the books of Nottingham Forest and was selected for the Maccabiah Games that year in Israel. He was part of the British team, which won a gold medal in football. He brought back home “an LP with the Israeli national anthem Hatikvah, a song about hope that has always resonated”.
The autobiography is named in honour of Joe Merimovich, twice manager of Israel’s football team, who wrote: “It’s always the same thought: ‘Just one more goal.’ I’d like it written on my gravestone.”
Pleat made 185 football appearances in total for Nottingham Forest, Luton Town, Shrewsbury Town, Peterborough, and Exeter City where he played against Manchester United’s George Best in an FA cup game. However, his career was cut short at the age of just 28 due to injury. He is best known for his role in football management, having managed Luton Town, Tottenham Hotspur, Leicester City, Sheffield Wednesday, as well as long stints as Director of Football and Consultant Scout at Spurs.
Pleat chronicles the antisemitism he suffered in management. One such incident involved one of his Luton players shouting at him: “Come on Jew boy, we can’t wait all day.” He also talks about being referred to as a “four by two” by former Bolton manger Ian Greaves.
However, it is Pleat’s observations about football, based on his 60-year career in the beautiful game, which makes this book such an interesting read. Pleat has seen it all, from the abolition of the maximum wage in 1961 to the decisions to stop sharing gate receipts and the creation of the Premier League, steps which he argues have primarily benefited the bigger clubs. It has also become more difficult, Pleat points out, for Premier League and Championship clubs to sign young talented players from the lower leagues, because managers in the lower leagues prefer to use more experienced players – “old sweats”, as he calls them – rather than bringing on young talent.
Tottenham, on the recommendation of Pleat, signed some great players such as Christian Eriksen, Jan Vertonghen and Dele Ali. Interestingly, for every successful signing, a number get away. In 2004, Pleat had gone to Rotterdam to watch a young Robin Van Persie playing for Feyenoord, but he looked very disinterested in the game, so Pleat could not recommend that Spurs sign him. Arsenal later took a chance on him, and he ended up scoring nearly 100 goals for them. Pleat also gives a riveting account of the end of the reigns of Mauricio Pochettino and Jose Mourinho at Tottenham Hotspur.
There are some great anecdotes in the autobiography. In 1983, Luton had to beat Manchester City at Maine Road in the last game of the season to stay in Division 1, which they did, and it saw City relegated. There were some police officers on the Luton team coach, until the coach left Manchester. The police officers also partook in the alcoholic victory celebrations. They were all Manchester United fans and were delighted that Manchester City had been relegated!
Another great story is when former Newcastle manager Arthur Cox burst into the Luton Town dressing room at Kenilworth Road and accused David Pleat and his players of “robbing Newcastle and being cheats”. This was no footballing metaphor, someone had indeed broken into the away dressing room and stolen money, watches and jewellery belonging to the Newcastle players.
One thing that I am surprised Pleat did not discuss in his autobiography, and which has had a lasting impact on the beautiful game, is his role in helping to break the glass ceiling for Black footballers. Whereas today, 43 percent of players in the Premier League are Black, in the early 1980s, there were very few Black players in the old Division One. Managers such as David Pleat at Luton and Graham Taylor at Watford fielded numerous Black players, at a time when teams were pretty much devoid of Black footballers.
An ex-Luton footballer, Paul Elliot, has commented: “David protected you and he did not care what you looked like, where you came from. If you could play, he did not care about your background, if you were good enough for his team, you would play in his team. David being Jewish as well, he would have had his own challenges, so he understood what it is like to be discriminated against.”
Pleat is no longer working for Tottenham as a consultant scout, but even at 79, one can imagine Pleat coming out of retirement, scouting for emerging talent or shouting from the touchlines: “Just one more goal”.
As Alex Ferguson wrote: “David Pleat’s life will always be committed to the love of our game.”
If you want to read a well-written book about how modern football became what is it today, with a very strong Jewish flavour to it, this is the book to read.
Just One More Goal: The Autobiography of David Pleat is published by Biteback Publishing £20
Ze’ev Portner is a founding member of the Watford FC Jewish Supporters Group and a Law Lecturer at Buckinghamshire New University
