Willie Whigham

Oh brilliant. I was once lucky enough to be chaperone to Willie and his brother in law from the London bound train to an MSS party. Both really top blokes. Willie pulling up his brother in law about having a full head of hair, the brother in law's was only slightly receeding.
Willie was fantastic company and once he had necked a few pints the stories came rolling out about coach loads of fans coming down from Scotland to support him in his debut and then dressing room tales of punching the manager etc. The only problem was his accent also became more and more exaggerated. After I had spoken with him my mate Paul Thompson also tried to interview Willie. After half an hour Paul finally switched off his tape and thanked Willie.
I approached Paul, wondering what gems he might have got.
That looked good, what did he say?
Paul, looked as if he in shock and replied I haven't got a clue, I did not understand a word of it.
 
Robert Nichols said:
Oh brilliant. I was once lucky enough to be chaperone to Willie and his brother in law from the London bound train to an MSS party. Both really top blokes. Willie pulling up his brother in law about having a full head of hair, the brother in law's was only slightly receeding.
Willie was fantastic company and once he had necked a few pints the stories came rolling out about coach loads of fans coming down from Scotland to support him in his debut and then dressing room tales of punching the manager etc. The only problem was his accent also became more and more exaggerated. After I had spoken with him my mate Paul Thompson also tried to interview Willie. After half an hour Paul finally switched off his tape and thanked Willie.
I approached Paul, wondering what gems he might have got.
That looked good, what did he say?
Paul, looked as if he in shock and replied I haven't got a clue, I did not understand a word of it.
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I was at that MSS party. A terrific evening at the Oval cricket ground I think. When Wilfie was still alive. Had a quick chat to Willie too. Nice fella.
 
Magic memories. Might not have been best keeper in the world but certainly the ugliest.! Only joking Willie!
 
Great goalie on his day played an integral part in our promotion in 67. Before he came Des McPartland was between the sticks and we had lost 6 out of 11 games. Des was just a young kid and his kicking was woeful. His goal kicks only went about 30 yards and he couldn't reach the half way line with the ball out of hand.
Willie came in our form turned around. The rest is history.
We did have a wobble towards the end of the season where we lost 3 games in a row Walsall was the last of these. I remember this game for two reasons.
1 Walsall came out in white shirts and red shorts. They had to go back to the changers and borrow some of our shorts because of the colour clash
2 A Walsall player tried a speculative shot from well outside the box. I was right behind it in the Holgate, no problem I thought, but Willie just raised his arm as to Let the ball past the post. His hands went to his head as the ball nestled in the net

Despite that the team went unbeaten to the end of the season culminating in that match against Oxford. Willie rightly a Boro legend
 
Only bettered by Jim Platt and Mark Schwarzer. One of my all time Boro greats, he was a very good penalty saver. The reason for that, it is rumoured, is that he was so ugly he used to frighten the ball.
 
Not too sure if I seen WW play, his last game was away to Sunderland 1971 in a 4-1 defeat
I will have to go through the games see if I can recall anything

Photo I took at wembley 1990
 

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Trug said:
Only bettered by Jim Platt and Mark Schwarzer. One of my all time Boro greats, he was a very good penalty saver. The reason for that, it is rumoured, is that he was so ugly he used to frighten the ball.
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Pears? (The first one)
 
Ref E74 photo - Great to see ex players supporting the club such as Willie at Wembley in 1990 - 19 years after his last game and he was not from the area.
 
He was 'unconventionally good-looking'. I like reading about Scottish football. Every club has two or three nicknames so you have to figure out who they're refering to.
 
I noticed he never scored for Falkirk. :ROFLMAO:

I remember seeing him outside Highbury handing pies out with MSS. I couldn't help having a quip about not dropping them - he didn't find it funny.

I always thought it was great that our Chubby scored a penalty against him in the Ellis Cup.
 
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