Career
Foakes did not become a Football League linesman until the age of thirty seven in 1984. However, it then took him just three more years to graduate to the full Referees List.
His first few years of officiating culminated in taking charge of an FA Cup quarter final at White Hart Lane between Tottenham (the eventual Cup winners) and Notts County. He officiated regularly in the former League Division One and was therefore an unsurprising choice for the new Premier League in 1992-93.
Over the next two years he handled a number of matches at Premier level. However, he was approaching retirement age and was not included on the reduced Premier League list of referees for season 1994-95. He reverted exclusively to the Football League where he had a strong profile of games. The Football League also granted him a Coca Cola Cup quarter final tie between Swindon Town and Millwall in early 1995. In April he handled the Associate Members Cup Final between Birmingham City and Carlisle United. In front of seventy six thousand fans at Wembley, the Midlands side won with a "sudden death" goal in extra time by Paul Tait - the only instance of an English professional Cup Final ending in this now discontinued manner.
He was back at Wembley at the end of May to finish his career with an even more significant game, as Bolton took on Reading in the Division One play-off Final for a place in the Premier League. In this match, Bolton won 4-3 after extra-time. Reading had been leading 2-0 and then missed a penalty before Bolton's comeback.
After retiring from the List he continued teaching and became one of the Football League's regional coordinators of refereeing. He died suddenly in September 2006.
Read more about this topic: Peter Foakes
Famous quotes containing the word career:
“Like the old soldier of the ballad, I now close my military career and just fade away, an old soldier who tried to do his duty as God gave him the light to see that duty. Goodbye.”
—Douglas MacArthur (1880–1964)
“Clearly, society has a tremendous stake in insisting on a woman’s natural fitness for the career of mother: the alternatives are all too expensive.”
—Ann Oakley (b. 1944)
“A black boxer’s career is the perfect metaphor for the career of a black male. Every day is like being in the gym, sparring with impersonal opponents as one faces the rudeness and hostility that a black male must confront in the United States, where he is the object of both fear and fascination.”
—Ishmael Reed (b. 1938)