Keith Hanvey will be entertaining hospitality diners on Saturday 11th April when Dale meet Wealdstone, he’ll be recounting his two spells at Dale back in the seventies.
He was born in 1952 first venturing into football signing for Manchester City “I made sure I got my “A” Levels at school and was playing for City’s “A” and “B” team at the same time. One day Joe Mercer and Malcolm Allison, management team, walked up to me and asked me to sign professional forms. I progressed quite quickly in the first three months playing in the Club’s reserve side, also I played in the Texaco Cup making my debut for the first team against Airdie” Keith suffered an horrendous injury which became the defining moment of his career “I played in a reserve game up at Newcastle United and I broke my thigh, which looking back was the big moment in my career. I was out for the remainder of my two year contract at City. A guy put his knee onto my thigh in a tackle which ruined a lot of the nerves in that area and broke the bone, I was out for eighteen months” He recovered and went on to play for Swansea City on loan to gain first team experience, however whilst he was in South Wales, Johnny Hart was installed as first team manager at City and according to Keith, he didn’t rate him like Joe Mercer and missing home plus his father having a serious illness, he soon wanted to move back closer to Manchester, which saw him signing for the Dale, under manager, Walter Joyce manager, a keen admirer.
According to Rochdale’s Who’s Who, Keith was the first signing by Walter Joyce, playing originally at left back before reverting to centre half and one of the most successful signings during that period. Despite relegation and injury problems, he was a regular with the distinction of being the leading scorer with four goals in 1976/7, not bad for a defender.
Keith had two spells at the Dale, the first he describes “I started to learn about the game, a really good experience before returning for a second spell in my latter years that resulted in retiring after my groin injury, despite my time at Spotland not being too successful regarding results, I learned a lot and it gave me a good grounding and a shop window for my subsequent professional career in football, which took me to several higher ranked Clubs, including Swansea, Grimsby and Huddersfield, where I eventually retired after a serious injury”
According to Keith, he was played in midfield, full back, got some games under his belt and started hearing Clubs were showing interest, Sheffield United offered £25K but the bid was refused but on deadline transfer day, Dick Connor at Grimsby Town offered £15K, which was readily accepted as Dale needed the money.
He spent eighteen months at Grimsby, nearly famous as was going to be the first transfer tribunal case in summer of 1978 but eventually going to Huddersfield Town for £25K, where he spent six years and two promotions later returning to sign for Dale on a contract where he trained for two days a week whilst learning Financial Management but after a serious injury against Doncaster Rovers, he was advised to retire mid 1984/85 after months of trying to get fit. According to Keith, he didn’t pursue the rest of contract with Dale under Brian Green as manager.
Reflecting on retirement he quotes “a local businessman gave me a salesman job on the road, which I enjoyed but some months later Huddersfield Town offered me the Commercial Managers job, which kept me there for over six years and left after Leeds United wanted me as Commercial Manager in 1990, where I worked for nearly thirty two years, latterly as compere and helping Commercial. I now have a Hospitality business alongside my role at Leeds for over twenty years”
Keith made 136 appearances scoring 10 goals for Dale, total career 407 games, 26 goals
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