Barry Len Image 2 Notts County 1925

Description

Sneinton, Nottingham born winger Len Barry played football with the RAF at Cranwell in 1919 before joining Second Division Notts County on amateur forms in 1920, making his Football League debut against Wolverhampton Wanderers in March 1921, playing twice in a week against Wolves. They would be his only first team outings for another 21 months, when at Christmas 1922 he played both home and away against Fulham, making 9 appearances in 1922-23 as Notts County won the Second Division Championship, and turning professional in 1923.

While still an amateur he played for The Amateurs in the 1923 FA Charity Shield, which they lost 2-0 to The Professionals at Stamford Bridge. He also scored in his only England Amateur international in a 3-0 win over Ireland at Crystal Palace that November.

He broke into the Magpies’ team as a regular in 1924 and was ever present in 1924-25, missing only one game in 1925-26, and by the time he joined Leicester City for £3,300 in September 1927 he had scored 11 goals in 153 appearances. He was then part of Leicester’s team that finished 3rd and 2nd in the League Championship in successive seasons (1927-28 and 1928-29), which until 2016 constituted the club’s highest ever finishes in the Football League, presenting the likes of Arthur Chandler and Ernie Hine with the bullets that took Leicester so close to glory.

As a result he won 5 England caps, being first selected in May 1928 in a 5-1 win over France in Paris, his final cap coming a year later in a 4-3 defeat to Spain in Madrid. Oddly all of his caps came on England summer tour games as opposed to Home Championship games. He also went on the FA Tour of Canada in 1931. In August 1933 he joined Nottingham Forest after 26 goals in 214 appearances for The Foxes, but retired in April 1934 after he was released by Forest after a single goal in 17 games.