The Pools 200 Club: Eric Wildon

Goooooal!
By Albatross
October 12 2005

Welcome to the first article in the Pools 200 Club - a series of articles about the players that have made most appearances for Hartlepool United in the Post-War era. First up is a forward from the late 1940s and early 1950s - Eric Wildon.

Welcome to the first article of The Pools 200 Club, a series that will profile each of the players to make 200 or more League Appearances for the club in the post-war era. Some of the names are familiar, others less so - but all have pulled on a Pools shirt 200 times.

We'll be going in reverse order of number of appearances, and that means first up is a player who made the 200 mark but got no further. He was a striker in the late 1940s and early 1950s, and his name was LE (Eric) Wildon.

Wildon was born in Middlebrough in 1924, and signed for the club from a local side, Price's, in 1947. At that time former Chelsea forward Fred Richardson lead the line, and Wildon made just one appearance - his debut coming against Wrexham in March 1948. The following season started with Richardson again the regular choice, but after he was transferred to Barnsley after a superb start of the season, Wildon started to get a few opportunities. He scored his first goal in the 1-0 home win over Bradford City in October 1948, but was in and out of the team - although he did get a double in the last home game of 1948/9 against Tranmere to tally three goals from 14 appearances. Pools finished 16th, a slight improvement from the previous season, but Fred Westgarth was still struggling to pull things together.

Wildon started to become a more regular member of the side in 1949/50, although he was still often playing in other positions along the front line - and Pools were still struggling. 31 games and eight goals had seen him become more established - but Pools finished 18th (of 22). There was little to say that Wildon was about to write himself into the Pools record book.

1950/1 got off to a slow start for Eric, with three goals in nine games, but a corner was about to be turned. After missing the game with Shrewsbury, Wildon came back into the side to score a double against Lincoln; the next week he had possibly his finest performance netting all four goals in a 4-1 win over Wrexham - the date was October 7, 1950. For a while it seemed that there was no stopping the 26 year old, with November seeing him score hat-tricks against Barrow and then, two weeks later, Bradford PA. His goal on Christmas Day against Gateshead was his 19th of the season - but after that he struggled to maintain his scoring form. Nevertheless, by the end of the season he'd notched 26 goals in 44 games, with another in the FA Cup - the best tally by a Pools player since Billy Robinson's 28 in 1927/8, and one that wouldn't be beaten again until Joe Allon did so as Pools won promotion 40 years later. Pools however struggled, finishing 16th in Div3 North. One curious statistic is that Pools were less than impressive away from home, winning just two games, and Wildon scored all but two of his league goals at the Victoria Ground.

Pools improved the following season, and Wildon again played an important part - although he never quite recaptured his form of 1950/51. Nineteen goals were more than enough to make him top scorer, and Pools finished in the top half for the first time since the War. It wasn't to last for either Pools or Eric though - 1952/3 saw us finish once more near the wrong end of the table, in 17th place, and Wildon managed eleven goals - but also saw the return of the player he'd effectively replaced as Fred Richardson returned to the club. Fred Westgarth had paid £1000 for his services to Chester, and Wildon found himself more and more sidelined towards the end of the season. Nevertheless, he was our top goalscorer in the League for a third successive year.

Although he started 1953/4 on the sidelines once more, he extended that record to four successive seasons. After missing out on most of the first ten games, he returned to the side and once again started scoring goals for fun - eleven in fifteen games - and eventually finished with 15 league goals plus another in the FA Cup. Richardson, who had come in to replace Wildon, scored just six as Pools again finished in the bottom half. It was enough to see Wildon start as the first choice in 1954/5, but despite scoring four goals in the first five games, the goals dried up and Richardson was soon back in favour. He made only sporadic appearances for the rest of the season, scoring his final goal for the club against Accrington Stanley on 9 April 1955 and making his last appearance in the club's colours against Mansfield a week later. He left the club soon after, joining Stockton in the North-Eastern League.

Wildon may not be as well-known as many of the other players that have graced the Vic over the years, but his record for Pools remains impressive. Leading scorer for four years in a row, and his strike rate - 87 goals in 200 League appearances - was formidable. Only three players are ahead of him in terms of goals scored, one of those (Johnny Wigham) is from before the War, and all of them played significantly more games. Like many of his generation, his career started late because of the war - he was almost 23 before making his league debut. It makes his achievements all the more remarkable.

Eric Wildon
Born: Middlesbrough, 5 April 1924
Pools Career: 215 Matches (200 League), 89 goals (87 League).
League Debut: v Wrexham (H), 27/3/48 (Lost 0-2)
Last League Appearance: v Mansfield Town (H), 16/4/55 (Lost 1-2)

(Thanks to Headlander for providing some of the information used in this piece. Other sources used were the Pools Stats Site (http://www.poolstats.co.uk) and Gordon Small's "The Definitive Hartlepool United FC".)