Jimmy Hill

James William Thomas "Jimmy" Hill OBE (22 July 1928 – 19 December 2015) was an English football personality.^[1]

Jimmy Hill

Hill (left) with former Fulham team-mate Maurice Cook
Personal information
Full name	James William Thomas Hill
Date of birth	(1928-07-22)22 July 1928
Place of birth	Balham, London, England
Date of death	19 December 2015(2015-12-19) (aged 87)
Place of death	Hurstpierpoint, West Sussex, England
Position(s)	Forward
Senior career*
Years	Team	Apps	(Gls)
1949–1952	Brentford	83	(10)
1952–1961	Fulham	276	(41)
Managerial career
1961–1967	Coventry City
*Club domestic league appearances and goals

His career has taken in every role in football, including player, union leader, coach, manager, director, chairman, television executive, presenter, analyst and match official.

Early life

Hill was born in Balham, London.^[2] His father was a World War I veteran. He studied at Henry Thornton Grammar School.

Career

Hill started playing in 1949 with Brentford, making 87 appearances before moving to Fulham in March 1952. He played nearly 300 games, scoring 52 goals. In 1957, he became chairman of the Professional Footballers' Association (PFA)

In November 1961, after retiring as a player aged 33, Hill became manager of Coventry City. His time at Coventry was marked by great changes to the club, nicknamed "The Sky Blue Revolution".

After winning the Division Three championship in 1963–64, and the Division Two title in 1966–67, Hill quit the club shortly before the start of the 1967–68 season.

After leaving Coventry in 1967, Hill moved into broadcasting, acting as technical adviser for the BBC. In 1999, Hill moved from the BBC to Sky Sports, where he featured on Jimmy Hill's Sunday Supplement. It was a weekly discussion show between Hill and three football journalists talking over a Sunday breakfast.

In 2007, he was replaced from the show because of his ill health.

Personal life

Hill married three times, having three children by his first wife, Gloria, and two by his second, Heather. In September 2013 it was revealed that he was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease in 2008.^[3]

Hill died from the disease on 19 December 2015 in Hurstpierpoint, West Sussex at the age of 87.^[4]