George Best, Pele, and me: Malcolm Linton looks back at his US soccer days
Malcolm Linton tries to tackle Pele
This summer’s World Cup in North America has brought back big memories for a Northumberland resident who played his part in reviving interest in soccer in the United States in the 1970s – along with George Best, Pele, and Bobby Moore.
Malcolm Linton, who now lives in Longframlington, was a centre-back at Leyton Orient when he was recruited to join Florida-based Tampa Bay Rowdies in the North American Soccer League in 1975. Malcolm, who was earning a basic £20 a week at Orient after joining them from his home town club Southend, needed no second bidding to sign for Tampa for quite a few dollars more.
The Rowdies won the league that year. Then Malcolm found himself transferred from the US east coast to the west, in the same LA Aztecs team as the legendary George Best, and up against another football superstar, Pele, then playing for New York Cosmos. It was a showbiz lifestyle with the Aztecs, who were co-owned by Elton John. Malcolm recalls Rod Stewart joining them at a training session, and being introduced to a sunbather lying on the beach beside George Best who turned out to be Cher.
Malcolm with Rod Stewart
He became good friends with Best, “a really nice fellow”. They used to stay up at night talking, and the media-hounded superstar told him: “Wherever I went, there was always someone from the press nearby. Even when I went to the toilet.” Malcolm was not quite so pally with Bobby Moore. After he beat Moore in the air, and accidentally elbowed him at the same time, England’s World Cup-winning captain told him in no uncertain terms never to consider doing anything like that again.
Aztecs Team photo
Teammates in the Aztecs included other English stars such as Chelsea’s Charlie Cooke, and striker Ron Davies, from Southampton, while Clyde Best and John Sissons, from West Ham, lined up at his first US club, the Rowdies. The latter folded in 1993, but was succeeded by a ‘phoenix’ Tampa Bay Rowdies in 2008 who last year invited Malcolm and his wife Paula over to Florida, to induct him into the club’s hall of fame.
Malcolm showed me his scrapbooks of memories, including match reports of his time with Orient, as well as sometimes oddly-worded articles about the Rowdies and the Aztecs, as American sports reporters got to grips with this strange game called soccer. The extra drinks breaks in the World Cup don’t surprise him. In his early games at Tampa matches were interrupted three or four times by the referee, as well at half-time, at seemingly random moments that were probably linked to adverts.
After he returned from the States to England, he played for non-league Tilbury, including an FA cup match against Stoke City, and for Gravesend and Northfleet, before leaving the game to work in building, double-glazing, and as a tanker driver.
Malcolm today
Nowadays Malcolm, aged 74, generally prefers playing golf at Rothbury to watching football: “The game has changed so much.” He and Paula moved to Northumberland two years ago, and “love it here. Everyone’s so friendly.” But he adds: “They could do with a good football team!” Steady on, Malcolm!
Greg Freeman