Trevor Smith

England national football team at Empire Stadium, London 28 October 1959. From left, standing: Bobby Charlton, Don Howe, Eddie Hopkinson, Trevor Smith, Tony Allen, Ron Flowers; front row: John Connelly, Jimmy Greaves, Ronnie Clayton, Brian Clough and Edwin Holliday.

Trevor Smith (13 April 1936 – 9 August 2003) was an English footballer who played as a centre-half for Birmingham City, Walsall and the England national team.

Life and career Smith was born in Brierley Hill, Staffordshire, and attended Quarry Bank secondary modern school. In 1951 he captained the local schools' representative side, Brierley Hill, Sedgley and District, to their first final of the English Schools' F.A. Trophy, in which they lost to Liverpool Schools 5–3 on aggregate. A feature of the first leg, according to the Brierley Hill local newspaper, was the "solid play of the two centre-halves, Parkes for Liverpool and Smith for the home team", while the match programme from the second leg described him thus:

When he left school he signed for Birmingham City as an amateur, and played for the team that won the European Youth Cup (later renamed Blue Stars/FIFA Youth Cup) the following year. He turned professional on reaching his 17th birthday in April 1953, and made his first-team debut for Birmingham, then in the Second Division, six months later, scoring an own goal in a 4–2 win at Derby County. Apart from interruptions due to injury or National Service obligations, he was a regular choice for the first team from then on.

Smith's career at Birmingham coincided with probably the best period in the club's history. Under the management of Arthur Turner, they won promotion to the First Division in 1954–55, reached the FA Cup Final and achieved their highest ever finishing position (sixth place) the following season, and then the FA Cup semifinal in 1957, only to lose to Manchester United's "Busby Babes". They went on to play on the losing side in two successive Inter-Cities Fairs Cup finals, under Smith's captaincy. The club's success during this period was built on a solid defence, comprising a first-choice selection of international players Gil Merrick, Jeff Hall, Ken Green and Smith himself, together with wing-halves Len Boyd and hard-man Roy Warhurst.

Smith represented his country at schoolboy and youth levels, and won no fewer than 15 caps at under-23 level. He was selected to represent England B against their West German counterparts when still only 18. He had all the attributes necessary for a top-class centre-half. Tall and powerfully built, he was good in the air and in the tackle and read the game well, combining an uncompromising physical game with good technique. but he kept his place for the next match, against Sweden later that month. England performed poorly overall against the Swedes, Smith and his defence failed to cope with Swedish forward Agne Simonsson,

Career statistics

Honours Birmingham City Youth European Youth Cup: 1952

Birmingham City Football League Second Division: 1954–55 Football League Cup: 1962–63 FA Cup runner-up: 1955–56 Inter-Cities Fairs Cup runner-up: 1958–60, 1960–61