It was an evening staged to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Harry Catterick’s birth – and to present John Hurst with the Dixie Dean Memorial award.
But it was stolen by a protégé and a team-mate of both.
It was the People’s Lounge at Goodison Park, in November 2019.
And Terry Darracott was undeniably a man of the people.
A cheery, engaging, infectiously enthusiastic individual, Terry made 179 appearances for Everton Football Club – every single minute of every single one crammed with desire, courage and unstinting effort.
A humble man, by his own admission his talent was ordinary, but his force of nature and his personality were extraordinary.
And he had the fans who crammed the People’s Lounge that night eating out of his hand with stories of his life and career.
Like the day he learned he was making his Everton debut against Arsenal at the age of 17 – from Bill Shankly!
“Harry Catterick never used to talk to anyone,” laughed Terry.
“It had been in the local paper that I might be making my debut but I hadn’t been told anything, and I came out of Bellefield and turned right to head to the bus stop – when Shanks’ purple Ford Capri pulled up alongside me.
“He wound the window down and asked if it was right that I was making my debut the next day?
“I said ‘I don’t know. The manager hasn’t told me yet.’ And Shanks said ‘ Aye, well I think you’re going to be playing so I’ll wish you all the best.’
“I got home and when my mum asked me how my day had gone I said ‘You’re not going to believe this, but I think I’m going to be playing tomorrow – because Bill Shankly has just told me!”
Darracott duly did make the first of his 179 appearances the next day – a 2-0 victory. Predictably he never once looked like troubling the scoresheet.
Like Tony Hibbert who followed him into the Everton right-back’s jersey, it was a knack he maintained throughout his Everton career.
“I got close a couple of times but I’d rather remember the ones I kicked off the line!” he once declared.
He came close to celebrating a goal at the Street End against Norwich in 1977, a 3-0 triumph near the start of a stirring 22-match unbeaten run.
The Echo reported: “Darracott unleashed a venomous volley which Hansbury could only parry leaving Dobson with a simple tap in job from six yards.”
It might have been ‘only’ an assist, but Terry celebrated as if he’d scored himself, such was his joy at being part of a points clinching goal.
That was his penultimate season as an Everton player.
And following spells with Tulsa Roughnecks – an appropriate destination for a defender of bone jarring intensity – and Wrexham, he returned to Goodison as an enormously popular member of the backroom staff.
The coach journey back from Norwich in 1987, after Pat Van Den Hauwe’s goal had secured Everton’s second league title in three seasons, is part of the club’s enduring folklore.
Manager Howard Kendall had instructed the coach driver to travel no faster than 40mph – for the entire 250-mile journey. And Terry Darracott took the microphone for the whole six hours, presenting his own version of Champions Radio and inviting players up to sing songs.
His personality and man-management skills were also valued by bosses at clubs like Manchester City and Blackburn, where he subsequently moved on.
As a coach at Blackburn he would often call ahead of visits to Anfield, to ask if I had any team news insight into the Liverpool line up.
A passionate Blue, he would never make the same call when Blackburn were facing Everton.
Love ran deeper than his tribal attachments.
And he loved the Blues deeply.
His face was always a welcome one at Bellefield when I made occasional trips there in the late 80s and early 90s as a wannabe Everton writer.
There’s an image at the top of my Twitter feed of an excited young journalist prodding a ball past a young Everton goalkeeper on Bellefield’s old ‘C’ team pitch.
It was taken by Terry.
Such was my excitement at being asked to play in a press v backroom staff clash against names like Colin Harvey, Paul Power, David Jones and Mike Lyons I took a camera along and asked Terry if he’d press the shutter every time I went near the ball.
Rather than pay cursory attention to my request, he did just that – and captured my goal-hanging for posterity.
It goes without saying that we lost.
But Terry was happy to indulge a young man’s whim. Quite simply he was one of life’s good guys.
The peerless Ivan Ponting summed up Terry’s footballing qualities perfectly in his wonderful Player By Player volume.
“Terry Darracott embodied the spirit of Everton,” he wrote. “His dedication to the Royal Blue cause was absolute, and despite enjoying only one season as an undisputed regular during 11 years in the senior squad, his enthusiasm remained undimmed to the end.
“Some canny observers maintained that Terry was more effective as a one-on-one marker and cite an occasion at Goodison when he shackled George Best so effectively the brilliant Irishman was, for once, reduced to passenger status.
“The fans warmed to the down-to-earth approach of an engaging character who was, after all, one of their own.”
He still is. RIP Terry.
