Eddie May
Edwin Charles May (19 May 1943 – 14 April 2012) was an English football player and manager. May was born in Epping, and played for Dagenham, Southend United, Wrexham and Swansea City. The burly, affable May loomed large in the modern history of Welsh football. During his playing prime in the first half of the 1970s he cut an imposing figure at the heart of the Wrexham rearguard, totalling some 400 senior appearances for The Racecourse club scoring 35 goals, all with his head . Later the most successful stint in his long, varied and eventually globetrotting coaching and managerial career came at the helm of Cardiff City, whom he guided to the double of Third Division title and Welsh Cup glory in 1992–93. He also served Swansea City as a player and, fleetingly, Newport County as a coach, thus becoming one of the few men to be associated with all four of Wales' most famous clubs. Playing career May's first League employers were Southend United, whom he joined from Dagenham in January 1965, making his debut for the Third Division Shrimpers that spring as a left-back. Soon, though, the muscular six-footer found his natural position as a dominant centre-half, majestic in the air, powerful and unfailingly courageous, but his fine personal form could not prevent the Roots Hall side from sinking to the bottom division in the spring of 1966. He went on to make 100 league appearances, scoring 3 times for the Shrimpers, before moving to Wrexham in June 1968 for a fee of £5,000. In June 1968 May was sold to Fourth Division rivals Wrexham for £5,000 and he settled rapidly at the Racecourse Ground, playing an influential role as the Robins were promoted in 1970 as runners-up to Chesterfield. Thereafter he became captain, leading John Neal's enterprising side to Welsh Cup success in 1972 and in two other rousing knockout campaigns. In 1973-74 Wrexham reached the last eight of the FA Cup, beating the soon-to-be-crowned Second Division champions Middlesbrough and top-flight Southampton before bowing 1–0 to Burnley, then among the top six clubs in the country. Then in 1975-76 May was an inspirational part of the side which made it to the quarter-finals of the European Cup- Winners' Cup, where they went down 2–1 on aggregate to the illustrious Belgians, Anderlecht. The following August, aged 33 and having missed only 34 League games in his eight seasons in North Wales, he was freed to join Fourth Division Swansea City having spent the 1975 summer with NASL side Chicago Sting. During his Swans career he scored 8 times in 90 games and was a member of the 1978 promotion winning squad. May retired from the game shortly after. In recent years, May was inducted into The Wrexham FC Hall of Fame. Coaching and managerial career Early coaching career May loved the game far too much to leave it and later in 1978 became a coach at Leicester City, contributing to the Foxes' Second Division title campaign of