Peter Withe

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Peter Withe (born 30 August 1951, Liverpool) is a much-travelled English footballer who played centre forward, between 1971 and 1990. He now works as a manager, predominantly in South-east Asia.

The highlights of his career came at Aston Villa, where he was a key player in the Football League title triumph of 1981 and scored his side's only goal in their European Cup final triumph in 1982.

His brother, Chris, played for Bradford City.

[edit] Playing career

He won the Championship with Nottingham Forest but then left on the verge of their European Cup glory to join then-2nd division side Newcastle United.

Ron Saunders took him to Aston Villa on the eve of the 1980/81 season for a fee of £500,000, the club's record signing at the time but a snip considered the service he gave them over the next five years.

He formed a deadly and almost telepathic partnership up front with young starlet Gary Shaw, and scored 20 goals in Aston Villa's last championship winning season 1980/81. Withe was also the scorer of Aston Villa's winner against Bayern Munich in the European Cup final of 1982.

Capped by England 11 times, Withe scored once, and was the first English Aston Villa player to feature in a World Cup Finals squad (España 82).

During the summer of 1975, he spent one season in the United States as a member of the expansion Portland Timbers of the North American Soccer League (NASL).

The focal point of a strong offense, Withe scored 17 goals and added 7 assists in 22 games to lead the Timbers to first place in their division and a tie for the best record in the league at 16-6.

The Timbers played two home playoff games in front of more than 30,000 fans each, numbers unheard of for US soccer at the time. They advanced to Soccer Bowl '75, the league championship, where they lost to the Tampa Bay Rowdies 2-0.

[edit] Managerial career

Withe went into management and, after propelling the Thailand national team towards some success, managed Indonesia until 18 January 2007. He was sacked due to his side's inability to go past the first round of the ASEAN Football Championship, the tournament which he previously won with Thailand in 2000 and 2002, then finished as the runner-up with Indonesia in 2004. He was also sustained a brief touchline ban as manager of Thailand for wearing shorts during an international match against the United Arab Emirates. The head of the Thai Football Association said he should be wearing a suit.

He also had a brief spell as manager of Wimbledon, being promoted from position of first team coach in October 1991 following Ray Harford's resignation. Withe's time in charge was not at all successful, winning only one game out of thirteen in the league, and he was replaced after just 105 days at the helm by the club's youth team coach Joe Kinnear, partly as a result of player complaints to the directors about Withe's style of man-management.

[edit] External links

• Peter Withe career stats at Soccerbase
• The Observer Interview
• Withe looks to improve Indonesia’s fortunes

v • d • e England squad - 1982 FIFA World Cup 1 Clemence • 2 Anderson • 3 Brooking • 4 Butcher • 5 Coppell • 6 Foster • 7 Keegan • 8 Francis • 9 Hoddle • 10 McDermott • 11 Mariner • 12 Mills • 13 Corrigan • 14 Neal • 15 Rix • 16 Robson • 17 Sansom • 18 Thompson • 19 Wilkins • 20 Withe • 21 Woodcock • 22 Shilton • Coach: Greenwood