Legend is an overused phrase in football but for Ipswich Town fans, and those that were lucky enough to see him play, Kevin Beattie lived up to the tag.

If his name is new to you or you just want to learn more about him, read on…

First a few facts and figures:

Thomas Kevin Beattie was born in Carlisle on 18 December 1953.

Aged 15, Beattie was playing for Blackfriars on Sunday and for a club called St Augustine on Saturdays, when he was spotted by a football scout and offered a trial with Liverpool. Beattie travelled to Liverpool and impressed manager Bill Shankly sufficiently for him to be invited back to sign for the club. Beattie returned to Liverpool on his own, after nobody from the club arrived to meet him at Lime Street station. After waiting an hour and assuming they had lost interest, and with nothing but his boots and train ticket, he returned home to Carlisle. Shankly would later describe missing out on signing the youngster as one of his biggest mistakes.

Soon after this, Beattie joined Ipswich Town as an apprentice. Ipswich manager Bobby Robson made sure that he was met at Euston station in London, played in a youth match at Fulham, and was accompanied all the way to Ipswich’s Portman Road ground by chief scout, Ron Gray. Robson told Gray, “If you miss him, you’ve lost your job”. The poverty Beattie came from was evident when he arrived in Ipswich wearing his father’s shoes, so when Ipswich signed him, they immediately bought him some clothes. As a youth, he played as a striker, but Robson converted him into a defender, usually a centre-half; the player said in later life that the move suited him well, as it meant he could see all the play in front of him.

Beattie was given his first-team debut aged 18 against Manchester United in the opening match of the 1972–73 season in England’s top division. Ipswich won the game 2–1, and afterwards he asked United’s Bobby Charlton for his autograph; Charlton told Beattie that his play reminded him of Duncan Edwards and that, in years to come, he would be the one signing autographs.

In the 1977–78 season a damaged knee cartilage saw him withdraw from the England squad requiring an operation. Having had three weeks’ recuperation, he was restored to the Ipswich squad in time to play in the third round UEFA Cup home leg against FC Barcelona!

Ipswich won the fixture 3–0, and even though he suffered a reaction in his knee, he insisted he was able to play in the away leg. Robson disagreed however and he was left out of the side… Ipswich were knocked out on penalties.

Cortisone injections became commonplace for Beattie from this point on, but he was given the all-clear to play the FA Cup semi-final against West Bromwich Albion.  A 3–1 victory saw Ipswich into the final, but the next day his knee was once again swollen and his participation in the final was in jeopardy.

According to Beattie, “the boss secretly told me that if I felt fit enough to play then I was in”. Robson did not announce the Cup final team until the last minute: it included a formation change to include five midfielders and Paul Mariner as a lone striker – and Beattie in defence.

Roger Osborne’s late goal for Ipswich was the only score of the game, Ipswich famously winning the trophy. Beattie had three cortisone injections to get through the final. Following the cup final success, he and teammates Robin Turner and David Geddis were awarded the freedom of Carlisle.

He played his last match for Ipswich in April 1981, in an FA Cup semi-final loss to Manchester City in which he broke his arm.

Ipswich won the UEFA Cup at the end of the season, but Beattie was not presented with a winner’s medal as he did not play in the final or even appear on the bench, through injury. 26 years later, a petition was organised by Rob Finch, the writer of Beattie’s 2007 biography The Greatest Footballer England Never Had, calling on UEFA to right the wrong. Beattie was finally awarded a medal by UEFA president Michel Platini at the 2008 UEFA Cup Final between Rangers and Zenit Saint Petersburg.

Beattie retired due to injury in December 1981, following five knee operations in four years. His testimonial game took place in March 1982, against a Dynamo Moscow XI.

Beattie’s senior England debut came under Don Revie, a starting role in a 5–0 victory over Cyprus at Wembley in April 1975, especially notable for Malcolm Macdonald scoring all five goals. Beattie managed to put the ball in the net, but the goal was disallowed for a foul on the goalkeeper; ultimately, the only goal he scored for his country was in May 1975, during a 5–1 victory over Scotland in the 1974–75 British Home Championship.

His final game for England was in October 1977 against Luxembourg in a qualification match for the 1978 FIFA World Cup. In total, he earned nine caps between 1975 and 1977, scoring once.

Beattie was renowned for his strength, the nickname “Beast” reflecting that, but also his quality on the ball (with the resultant other nickname of “Diamond”). Robson described him as “the quickest defender I ever saw… with a left foot like a howitzer”.

Beattie’s strengths as a player: What a player the boy was… He could climb higher than the crossbar and still head the ball down. He had the sweetest left foot I’ve ever seen and could hit 60-yard passes, without looking, that eliminated six opposition players from the game. He had the strength of a tank, was lightning quick and he could tackle.

Beattie met his wife Margaret Boldy, known as Maggie, in the late-1960s/early-1970s in a youth club near to his apprentice accommodation, Beattie describing it as “love at first sight”. They were married in 1974, and soon after she appeared in the Radio Times in a “Footballers’ Wives” feature; at that point the couple were still living in a “modest” club-owned house. During the mid-1980s, Maggie was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis and later confined to a wheelchair, with Beattie as her carer in their council-owned bungalow. They had three daughters, Emma, Sarah and Louise.

On 16 September 2018, Beattie died of a suspected heart attack at the age of 64. He was survived by his wife and daughters. His funeral was held at the crematorium at Nacton on 26 October 2018. Beattie was once described by Bobby Robson as the best England player he had seen, and that he could have rivalled Duncan Edwards. Beattie was inducted into the Ipswich Town Hall of Fame in 2008, was voted numerous times as Ipswich Town’s “greatest ever player”

Along with some of his Ipswich teammates, Beattie featured in the 1981 film Escape to Victory. His skills were shown on the pitch as the body double for Michael Caine’s prisoner-of-war character, and the two became friends. Beattie had a cooler relationship with Sylvester Stallone though.

Kevin once said he wanted his name to help others, so when he sadly passed away, the idea of the Kevin Beattie Foundation was born

THE BEAT GOES ON!