ABSTRACT
Alex Smithies was one of the guardians of the club’s conscience. He had been a fixture at Liverpool since being employed by Bob Paisley in 1979, and understood the weight of wisdom, acquired over 50 years in the game. He was Dalglish’s most trusted scout, operating on the front line where statisticians were regarded as armchair generals: “I was at a meeting with Kenny the other day, when one of the whiz kids tried to get clever. Kenny told him: ‘At this club we rely on our eyes and our ears.’”
