Irish inside left Peter Doherty was a considerable star of the 1930s, 40s and 50s who scored over 200 goals in his career. Starting at Coleraine and Glentoran, he signed for Blackpool in November 1933 making his debut in December at Bradford Park Avenue. He won the first of his 16 caps for Ireland in 1935. Manchester City paid a club record £10,000 for him in February 1936 after 29 goals in 87 games, and he played in all but one of their games, scoring 30 goals, as City won the 1937 League Championship. However despite a further 23 goals the following season they were relegated. He remained a City player during WW2 but guested for a number of clubs including Derby County, Liverpool, Manchester United and West Bromwich Albion and at the end of the War he transferred to Derby County. He played 134 times for City scoring 88 goals (and scored another 60 in Wartime games). He won the FA Cup with Derby in 1946, scoring the winning goal in the Cup Final win over Charlton Athletic. In December 1946 he signed for Huddersfield Town after 17 goals in 25 games, 10 of which were in the 1946 Cup run. At Leeds Road he managed 37 goals in 87 games before becoming player manager of Doncaster Rovers in the summer of 1949. In his first season he scored 27 goals as Rovers won the Third Division (North) Championship and he continued to play a further 3 seasons in Division Two, before hanging up his boots aged nearly 40 after 57 goals in 106 games for Rovers. He continued as manager until 1958, and also managed Northern Ireland from 1951 to 1962. He also managed Bristol City from 1958 to 1960.
- In his autobiography, Len Shackleton wrote of Doherty: “Peter Doherty was surely the genius among geniuses. Possessor of the most baffling body swerve in football, able to perform all the tricks with the ball, owning a shot like the kick of a mule, and, with all this, having such tremendous enthusiasm for the game that he would work like a horse for ninety minutes. That was pipe-smoking Peter Doherty, the Irish redhead who, I am convinced, had enough football skill to stroll through a game smoking that pipe-and still make the other twenty-one players appear second-raters. But of course Peter never strolled through anything. His energy had to be seen to be appreciated.”
