Sports psychology is undoubtedly a big part of football these days, but as far back as April 1949 it was taking place in deepest Leicestershire via a hypnotist. Towards the end of the 1948-49 season, with Hinckley Athletic struggling at the wrong end of the Birmingham Combination, a publicity stunt was set up to attempt to aid the ailing side. An advertisement in the Hinckley Times reading “Richard Payne will conduct an amazing experiment with members of the Hinckley Athletic Team. Don’t miss it.”
Taking place on the 12th of April at the Hinckley Working Men’s Club Hall, Payne, billed at the time as ‘Britain’s Greatest Hypnotist’ was having an evening off from his regular slot in Leicester to do a special performance at the WMC. The idea being to raise funds for improvements to Athletic’s Middlefield Road ground, with Payne himself expected to chuck some money into the pot, as well as hopefully improve matters on the pitch as well.
A big game was up next too, with a match against Birmingham Combination leaders and local rivals Bedworth Town due to be played in a week’s time. So, with that in mind 300 fans turned up to see Payne put six Athletic players to sleep, while he told them ‘you will win’, ‘you will win’. The left-half apparently getting so carried away during the hypnosis that he kicked a hat 50 yards across the length of the hall.
The plan was supposed to have a second part to it though, and that never came to fruition. The plan being for Payne to visit the Hinckley dressing room on Easter Tuesday, the day of the big match against Bedworth. The board of directors didn’t fancy the idea as much however and so Payne never appeared in the dressing room, and Bedworth won 2-1 and went on to win the Birmingham Combination title with ease.
As far as Athletic were concerned, they ended up losing all three of their games over the Easter holidays, but they did manage to stay up by finishing three places above the relegation zone. The poor form cost player-coach Bobby Davidson his job though, with the club itself lasting up until 1997 when a merger with local rivals Hinckley Town meant the formation of Hinckley United, who are currently in desperate financial straits and sit bottom of the Blue Square Bet North with just two points at the time of writing.
A more well-known psychologist, faith healer, spiritualist, whatever you want to call her, is of course, Eileen Drewery, who was brought into the England set-up as an advisor before the 1998 World Cup by then boss Glenn Hoddle, with him describing her as ‘more of an agony aunt’. Although the fact that in the late ‘90s she had QPR’s Danny Maddix rubbing vodka and oil over a career threatening foot injury while reciting the Lord’s Prayer suggests she thought of herself as more of a faith healer.
Darren Anderton, Mark Bright, Paul Gascoigne, Paul Merson and Ian Wright all also had sessions with Mrs Drewery to help the mental side of their game, but Robbie Fowler was less impressed, saying he spent most of the time at her house watching television with her husband, with Fowler also commenting on the session: “I was in there for about two minutes. She said I had three demons and there wasn't much she could do for me. I wasn't worried, though, because I'd heard that Gazza had five!”
Darren Anderton, the man labelled ‘sicknote’ whose injury record wasn’t actually as bad as it seemed has a different view of Eileen Drewery though as he spoke of a visit to her in 1997: “She told me that I had a contracting muscle in my lower back and that both of my hamstrings needed to be manually stretched or they would tighten up every time I tried to exercise, and she told me the solution had just come to her. It was bizarre, but the first time I left her I felt like a different person, one who was convinced this woman had resolved what had been ailing me for so long.”
So, there you go, if your muscles are tight then stretch them, that’s the magic of faith healing for you.