Wyn Davies

An international footballer and Toon Army hero.

Born:

20 MAR 1942

Place of Birth:

Caernarfon

Biography:

Ronald Wyn Davies started his footballing career with Deiniiolen before moving to play for Llanberis in the Caernarfon area league, whilst working at the slate mine in the town.

Before long, he was signed by Caernarfon Town from the Welsh League (North), and began to attract attention from bigger clubs such as Aston Villa and Manchester United.

But he decided to stay in Wales, moving to the Race Course, Wrexham and helping them to win the Welsh Youth Cup in 1960. He made his league debut in 1961, scoring a goal in the game where Wrexham beat Worcester 3-1.

His ability to win the ball in the air heightened the interest from larger clubs, and he was signed to Bolton Wanderers for £20,000 in 1962. His parting gift to Wrexham was to score three goals in the team's historic 10-1 win over Hartlepool.

Wyn won his first cap for Wales in a game against England at Wembley in 1964. He went on to play for his country 34 times, scoring six goals over a period of ten years.

He scored 66 goals in 155 games for Bolton before moving on to Newcastle United for £80,000 in 1966 - a record sum for the club at that time. He played his first game for the Magpies against their arch rivals, Sunderland, in October 1966 and soon became a hero at St James's Park. His skills in the air earned him the nicknames 'Wyn the leap' and 'The Mighty Wyn' from the Geordie faithful.

He was part of the 1969 Newcastle team which beat the Hungarian team Ujpesti Dozsa to win the Inter-City Fairs Cup - the forerunner to the UEFA cup.

Wyn scored 40golsin 180 games at St James's Park before moving to Manchester City in 1971. He almost won the league with his new club in his first season with them, but the Manchester club missed out by just one point.

After losing his place in the City team to Rodney Marsh, Wyn made the move across Manchester to play for United in September 1972. But his time there was short and he moved on to Blackpool, then Stockport County and Crewe Alexandra.

A knee injury forced him out of the professional game, though he did manage to play a handful of games for Bangor City before moving to Bolton to begin a new career as a baker. He's still in Bolton, and has lots of pleasure in going for a walk with his dogs each day.