Heroes & Humans of Football Geoff Hurst: The Last Boy of '66 - Living with Glory's Shadow
What happens when your greatest moment becomes both a blessing and a burden? This is not just the story of Geoff Hurst's World Cup hat-trick but a deeper exploration of a vanishing era of English football and the often-challenging lives of the heroes of '66 after their moment of glory.
In this episode, Simon and Mehreen uncover the complex legacy of England's World Cup-winning team through the eyes of its last surviving member. From modest wages and part-time jobs to the devastating impact of dementia on his teammates, Hurst's story reveals how differently football treated its heroes in the 1960s. They explore how these working-class heroes navigated life after football in an era before mega-contracts and media careers and how many struggled to find their place in the modern world.
Time stamps:
0:00: Introduction and the last survivor
04:15: Football in the 1960s—a different world
08:32: Working-class heroes and modest lifestyles
12:45: The road to the World Cup team
17:23: That day at Wembley
23:41: Life immediately after the victory
28:56: The struggle to adjust to normal life
34:18: Financial hardships of the '66 team
39:27: The dementia crisis—losing teammates one by one
45:33: Bobby Moore's difficult later years
51:19: The forgotten stories of the other players
56:44: Part-time jobs and post-football careers
1:02:38: The burden of being forever '66
1:08:15: Modern football vs. the amateur era
1:13:27: Preserving the memory of a vanishing generation
1:18:52: What modern football can learn from '66
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