April 28, 1923 – March 11, 2016

EX-PROFESSIONAL footballer and Thurlestone resident Dave ‘Davy’ Walsh died on Friday, March 11, at the age of 92.

Born in Waterford, Ireland, on the April 28, 1923, Dave was one of five children to David, a baker, and Katherine Walsh.

A gifted sportsman, Dave played Gaelic football and Hurling at school, as, in his words, ‘soccer was a foreign game, frowned upon because it was English’. But on the streets he and the other kids would kick a ball around and he played for a local football team, much to the displeasure of his father.

When the Gaelic Association discovered he was playing football, his Gaelic Football team National Championship semi final win was overruled and he was suspended for six months.

He consequently spent that time playing football! Waterford had three teams: under 18’s, Junior and Senior. At 15 years of age, Walsh ended up playing for all three teams.

After scoring eight goals in one day for the Junior team, he was approached by a Limerick player Johnny Hattrey, who invited him for a trial at professional club Limerick.

He scored two goals in his trial match and with this victory he turned professional. Limerick signed him for £4 a week. It was October 1942 and Walsh was 19-years-old. Limerick went on that season to reach the final of the Irish Football Association.

From Limerick Walsh moved in 1943 to play for Linfield, the Belfast Protestant team, making him the first Catholic to play for them – Roy Keane in later years made this claim incorrectly!

He stayed for three years, scoring 105 goals, including 60 in 1945-6 when they won the Irish League and Cup.

In 1946 he was signed to West Bromwich Albion for £3,500 and became the first transfer from Ireland post war. He earned his stripes as the permanent centre forward by scoring in his first six games for the club, eight goals in total, a record that has never been broken.

Dave’s daughter Amanda said the move to England was such a shock he ‘almost went home’. As a great food lover, Ireland – being neutral in the Second World War – didn’t have rationing, so for ‘food obsessed’ Dave, this was almost too much to handle.

He became one of the most prolific goal scorers in the history of West Bromwich, scoring 100 goals in 174 appearances. So it was no surprise when competitive clubs were attracted to him.

He transferred to Aston Villa in 1950 for £25,000, the second highest transfer fee in the league at the time, and made 114 appearances, scoring 40 goals. He left for Walsall in 1955 but retired early from the game in 1957 due to injury.

Throughout his career, from 1945 until 1955, Walsh was selected to play internationally initially for both Northern and Southern Ireland as centre forward, until the rules changed in 1949 due to the introduction of the World Cup.

He earned 11 caps for Northern Ireland and 22 for Southern Ireland.

The most legendary of games was the win against England at Goodison Park in 1949. England at the time was invincible but Ireland beat them 2-0 and became the first foreign team to beat England at home after the war.

Both Stanley Matthews and Tom Finney, both friends of Walsh’s, lauded his ability and performance that day. It’s a victory they still celebrate today in Ireland. Walsh had been the last surviving member of that team.

Football Association of Ireland President Tony Fitzgerald paid tribute to Dave on the FAI website: ‘I would like to extend my sympathies to the Walsh family upon hearing this sad news. Davy was one of our great players and he deserves to be remembered as such.’

When still at Aston Villa, Dave opened a sports shop and then a second one, in Droitwich Spa, a town that had become his second home after meeting and marrying local girl Eileen Everton.

He and Eileen had two children, son David, a property developer who died aged 59 to cancer in 2014, and a daughter, Amanda, an advertising CEO.

On turning 60, Dave and Eileen moved to live in Thurlestone, where they spent 30 very happy years. Dave was able to spend even more time playing golf and his record of nine holes-in-one is a tough one to beat.

When asked what the secret of such a long life is, Dave’s eyes would twinkle and he would reply ‘Guinness and Eileen’s homemade puddings!’ At his 80th birthday, Amanda added a couple more to the list including ‘playing three rounds of golf a week, and never having a proper job’.

Amanda remembers her dad as a ‘very happy person’. She said: ‘He was always really easy going and sociable. He was a devout Catholic but was never judgemental. He was taught by his father, possibly due to being brought up in Ireland, never to discuss politics or religion and thought people should always just get along.’

She remembers the house when she was younger ‘always full of people’, and both her parents were ‘social animals’, who were always throwing drinks and dinner parties.

She said ‘its was all about sport’ when she was growing up, and both herself and her brother David were talented sportspeople.

She said her father was a natural at sport. In a father-son cricket match he and David played in when David was about nine or ten, Dave had never played cricket before and ended the match 100 not out. ‘He had a real eye for the ball’ she said.

After losing Eileen to cancer in 2012, Dave was diagnosed with Vascular Dementia in 2014, briefly moving to Thurlestone Court, and he passed away peacefully on Friday, March 11, 2016.

His daughter, Amanda, and his grandchildren, Jack, Virginia, Tom, Sophie and Jamie, survive him. His funeral will be held at Church of the Sacred Heart, Fore Street, Kingsbridge, on Tuesday, March 29, all are welcome.