Reputation
By the time of his retirement, Smith was perhaps the most admired figure in the English game, familiarly known to several generations of schoolboys simply by his initials at a time when only one other sportsman - the cricketer W.G. Grace - was so recognised. Despite the emergence of later, equally capable centre forwards in a more recognisably modern mould - most notably Vivian Woodward, Smith's successor in the England team - his abilities were recalled and praised well into the 1940s. The International Federation of Football History & Statistics, a scholarly group based in Wiesbaden, describes him as "the most brilliant, indeed perfect, footballer in the world around the turn of the century".
"G.O." was, according to contemporaries, unusually popular among professional footballers who were generally wary of the leading amateurs, not least because - wrote Sir Frederick Wall, the long-serving Secretary of the Football Association - he was "a man without petty pride". Steve Bloomer, Wall recalled, "had an intense admiration" for his England striking partner, and Bloomer himself remarked that, unlike the majority of amateurs of the day, Smith was invariably courteous to his professional team-mates (and social inferiors): "He was the finest type of amateur, one who would always shake hands with us professionals in a manner which said plainly he was pleased to meet them."
Read more about this topic: G. O. Smith
Famous quotes containing the word reputation:
“Men will not give up their privilege of helplessness without a struggle. The average man has a carefully cultivated ignorance about household matters—from what to do with the crumbs to the grocer’s telephone number—a sort of cheerful inefficiency which protects him better than the reputation for having a violent temper.”
—Crystal Eastman (1881–1928)
“From the moment a child begins to speak, he is taught to respect the word; he is taught how to use the word and how not to use it. The word is all-powerful, because it can build a man up, but it can also tear him down. That’s how powerful it is. So a child is taught to use words tenderly and never against anyone; a child is told never to take anyone’s name or reputation in vain.”
—Henry Old Coyote (20th century)
“So-called professional mathematicians have, in their reliance on the relative incapacity of the rest of mankind, acquired for themselves a reputation for profundity very similar to the reputation for sanctity possessed by theologians.”
—G.C. (Georg Christoph)