Stan Cullis

Statue of Stan Cullis outside Wolves'Molineux Stadium
Personal information
Full name	Stanley Cullis
Date of birth	(1916-10-25)25 October 1916
Place of birth	Ellesmere Port, England
Date of death	28 February 2001(2001-02-28) (aged 84)
Place of death	Malvern, England
Position	Centre half
Youth career
1930–1933	Ellesmere Port Wednesday
Senior career*
Years	Team	Apps	(Gls)
1934–1947	Wolverhampton Wanderers	152	(2)
1943	→Gillingham (wartime guest)
International career
1937–1939	England	12	(0)
Managerial career
1948–1964	Wolverhampton Wanderers
1965–1970	Birmingham City
* Club domestic league appearances and goals

Stanley Cullis (25 October 1916 – 28 February 2001) was an English professionalfootballer andmanager, primarily forWolverhampton Wanderers.

During his term as manager between 1948 and 1964, Wolves became one of the strongest teams in the English game, winning the league title on three occasions, and playing a series of high-profile friendly matches against top European sides which acted as a precursor to theEuropean Cup.

Cullis joinedWolverhampton Wanderers as a teenager after a trial atBolton Wanderers, signing professionally within a week of his arrival. He quickly moved up through the youth and reserve ranks and made his senior debut on 16 February 1935 in a 2–3 defeat atHuddersfield Town. He had to wait until the1936–37 season though before he became first choice, when he replacedBill Morris, and swiftly becameclub captain.

Cullis led the team to become one of the top teams in England, finishing runners-up in the league in1937–38 and1938–39. In 1939 Wolves had the chance to winThe Double, but with only 5 wins in the last 11 matches the team lost the championship by 5 points toEverton. They reached theFA Cup Final but lost 4–1 toPortsmouth, thus becoming the third English club to finish as runners-up in both League and FA Cup.^{[citation needed]}

He won a call-up to theEngland team and made his international debut on 23 October 1937 in a 5–1 success againstIreland. Because of the outbreak of the war, he won only 12 full caps (once as captain), although he also played in 20 wartime internationals (10 as captain).

England playedGermany inBerlin on 14 May 1938. The England players were directed pre-match that on the pitch during the German national anthem, they should give aNazi salute. With similarities toJack Kirby in 1934, Cullis refused. After Cullis responded, "Count me out",^[1] the only player to refuse, he was dropped from the team. His place went toAlf Young of Huddersfield. England won the match 6–3.^[2][3]

During the conflict, he served as aPT instructor in both Britain and Italy, and also managed 34 wartime appearances for Wolves in regional competitions, as well as guesting forAldershot,Fulham andLiverpool. Shortly after, he also managed brieflyFredrikstad in 1946.^[4]

When competitive football resumed in England in1946–47, Cullis played just one more season for Wolves, in which the club once again narrowly missed out on a first league title. He then announced his retirement as a result of injury and was appointed assistant to managerTed Vizard, after having made 171 appearances in total for the club.

In June 1948, aged just 31, Cullis became manager of Wolverhampton Wanderers and presided over the most successful era in the club's history. In his first season in charge, he became the youngest manager to win theFA Cup atWembley as Wolves beatLeicester City to win their first major trophy since 1908. Five years later Wolves overhauled local rivalsWest Bromwich Albion to win theirfirst league title.

Cullis's team restored some pride to English football after the national team's thrashings at the hands ofHungary when they beat the star-studdedHonvéd side in a1954 friendly, and Cullis's comments that his team were "champions of the world" played a large part in the formation of European club competitions. They also played Moscow Spartak, Dynamo and Real Madrid (1957) in other floodlit friendlies.

Cullis led Wolves to two more league titles, in1957–58 and1958–59, and they narrowly missed the hat-trick in1959–60, losing by one point toBurnley, while also winning the FA Cup again in1960 to seal their position as one of the dominant teams of the era. The 1960s saw Wolves begin to struggle, and Cullis was surprisingly sacked in September 1964, declaring that he would not work in football again, despite offers fromToronto City^[5] andJuventus.

After a short spell working as a sales representative, he did return to the game as manager ofBirmingham City in December 1965, but could not reproduce the success he had enjoyed at Wolves. Cullis retired from football in March 1970, and took up a post with a travel agency inMalvern, his adopted home town.^{[citation needed]}

Cullis died on 28 February 2001 at the age of 84.^[6][7][8]

Tributes to Cullis include the naming of a stand (the Stan Cullis Stand) at Wolves'Molineux Stadium and a statue of him outside it; in 2003 he was inducted into theEnglish Football Hall of Fame in recognition of his impact as a manager.

In his 1976 autobiography,Bill Shankly paid high tribute to Cullis, saying: "While Stan [Cullis] was volatile and outrageous in what he said, he never swore. And he could be as soft as mash. He would give you his last penny. Stan was 100 per cent Wolverhampton. His blood must have been of old gold. He would have died for Wolverhampton. Above all, Stan is a very clever man who could have been successful at anything. When he left Wolverhampton, I think his heart was broken and he thought the whole world had come down on top of him. All round, as a player, as a manager, and for general intelligence, it would be difficult to name anyone since the game began who could qualify to be in the same class as Stan Cullis."^{[citation needed]}

Wolverhampton Wanderers (as player and manager)^[9]

• First Division
  • Champions:1953–54,1957–58,1958–59
  • Runners-up:1937–38,1938–391949–50,1954–55,1959–60
  • Third-place:1946–47,1952–53,1955–56,1960–61
• FA Cup
  • Winners:1949,1960
  • Runners-up:1939
  • Semi-finalists: 1951
• FA Charity Shield
  • Winners:1959
  • Shared:1949 (with Portsmouth),1954 (with West Bromwich Albion),1960 (with Burnley)
  • Runners-up:1958
• FA Youth Cup
  • Winners: 1958
  • Runners-up: 1953, 1954, 1962

^{[citation needed]}

^{[citation needed]}

• List of English football championship-winning managers

Wikimedia Commons has media related toStan Cullis.

• Official Wolves profile
• English Hall of Fame Profile
• BBC tributes report

• 1916 births
• 2001 deaths
• Aldershot F.C. wartime guest players
• Birmingham City F.C. managers
• British Army personnel of World War II
• English men's footballers
• England men's international footballers
• England men's wartime international footballers
• Liverpool F.C. wartime guest players
• Gillingham F.C. players
• English Football Hall of Fame inductees
• English Football League players
• English Football League representative players
• English football managers
• Footballers from Cheshire
• Fredrikstad FK managers
• Men's association football defenders
• Military personnel from Cheshire
• Footballers from Ellesmere Port
• Royal Army Physical Training Corps soldiers
• Wolverhampton Wanderers F.C. managers
• Wolverhampton Wanderers F.C. players

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• Short description is different from Wikidata
• Use dmy dates from February 2021
• All articles with unsourced statements
• Articles with unsourced statements from August 2020
• Articles with unsourced statements from September 2022
• Articles with unsourced statements from July 2016
• Commons category link from Wikidata