Of all the players to appear in ‘Football’s Black Pioneers’ none had a longer career than Tony Ford who became Grimsby Town’s first black player on 4th October 1975 when he was sent on as substitute for No.8, Phil Hubbard. In fact only one player in the whole history of the Football League had a longer career and that was goalkeeper Peter Shilton. With 1,081 appearances in all competitions, Tony holds the record for an outfield player, surely a figure that is unlikely ever to be beaten.
We can’t re-live that moment from 1975 when Tony made history but we do have the programme from the game at Walsall’s then ground, Fellows Park. No one in the crowd that day could have had any inkling they were witnessing the start of such a career, indeed, if you had told sixteen year-old Tony what lay in store he probably would have laughed incredulously, even more so if you had told him he would go on to be awarded an MBE.
Walsall legend, Alan Buckley, wore the No.10 shirt against Grimsby (and scored a penalty that helped secure a 2-0 win) but, legend though he is, he ‘only’ played 530 games in his career, less than half the total Tony clocked up.
There are players in our book who won more medals, Viv Anderson has two European Cup winners medals to his name, but Viv made a mere 768 appearances. Tony’s final appearance was as a 42 year-old on 3rd November 2001 for Rochdale against Torquay United, we should try and get that programme too!
Unbelievably, when Bill Hern spoke to Tony, he expressed regret that he had retired to soon!
