Vivian Woodward

One of England's most successful captains, Vivian Woodward was born on 3rd June 1879. The prolific centre forward starred for Chelsea, Tottenham, English national team and captained Great Britain to two glorious Olympic medals.

The England captain with the highest win percentage, Woodward's tally of 29 goals in 23 matches remained a record till 1958. With injuries from serving in the war for Great Britain, Woodward ended his career post the first world war.

Early days

Born to a successful architect and a Freeman of the city of London, Woodward had no lack of opportunities to begin with. He went to a private school called Ascham College and was a brilliant sportsman from an early age.

Playing in school cricket team at the age of eleven, the prodigy was even better at football and soon became the start of team. By the age of 16, Woodward was playing for local team, Clacton Town in the North Essex League.

Debut

Following in the footsteps of his father, Woodward became an architect and only agreed to play football as an amateur. A series of impressive performances with Clacton Town led to him being spotted by the Spurs, who were considered one of the best team in the country at that time. Woodward made his debut for Tottenham in 1901 and remained with the club for a period of 8 years.

His vast potential was exposed playing for Tottenham and the national selectors came calling 1903. Woodward made his international debut for England in a 4-0 win over Ireland, where he scored twice to mark his arrival. He played another match against Wales next month where he managed to score again, thus cementing his spot in the team.

Rise to glory

Although he did not play regularly for Tottenham due to his commitments to Tennis and his profession, Woodward managed to establish himself as one of the most respected players of the game. In the 132 appearances made for Spurs, Woodward managed to net the ball on 63 occasions.

In 1906, the England team started touring for amateur games and in their first game, beat France 15-0. Woodward scored 8 of those goals.

1908 saw the Olympic games coming to London. Woodward starred for the Great Britain team and carried them to a gold. The year also saw Tottenham getting promoted to the second division. With Woodward's brilliance, Tottenham finished second in the league and got promoted again, this time to the first division.

In 1909, Woodward decided to retire from football in order to concentrate on his architectural career. However this decision did not last long as he was coaxed out of retirement by Chelsea and made his debut for the team in November 1909. Playing with the club for six seasons, Woodward appeared on 106 occasions and scored 30 goals. He was the club's top scorer in the 1912-13 season with 10 goals coming from his boot.

The year 1912 saw Woodward repeating history when he carried Great Britain to another gold in the Olympics. Woodward ended his international career with 29 goals in 23 full internationals and 57 goals in 44 amateur international matches.

Captaincy

Vivian Woodward was handed the onus of captaincy of the England national team in 1908 and he captained both the Olympic gold winning teams as well.

Retirement

After serving in the war and laden with injuries, Woodward played only a handful of matches as he could not replicate his earlier success. Post retirement, he served as a director at Chelsea.