George Mulhall

George Mulhall

Personal information
Date of birth	(1936-05-08)8 May 1936
Place of birth	Falkirk, Scotland
Date of death	27 April 2018(2018-04-27) (aged 81)
Place of death	Brighouse, England
Position(s)	Outside left
Youth career
	Denny YMCA
	Kilsyth Rangers
Senior career*
Years	Team	Apps	(Gls)
1953–1962	Aberdeen	110	(30)
1962–1969	Sunderland	253	(56)
1967	→ Vancouver Royal Canadians (loan)	10	(3)
1969–1971	Cape Town City	41	(22)
1971–1972	Morton	1	(0)
Total		415	(111)
International career
1959–1963	Scotland	3	(1)
1959–1961	Scottish League XI	3	(0)
Managerial career
1972–1974	Halifax Town
1978–1981	Bradford City
1981–1982	Bolton Wanderers
1996	Halifax Town
1997–1998	Halifax Town
*Club domestic league appearances and goals

George Mulhall (8 May 1936 – 27 April 2018) was a Scottish football player and manager. Born in Falkirk, Mulhall played as an outside left for Aberdeen and Sunderland. He was capped three times for Scotland. He became the manager of Bradford City, Bolton Wanderers and Halifax Town.

Playing career

Two of Mulhall's elder brothers had forged professional careers; Martin with Falkirk, Albion Rovers and Cowdenbeath, and Edward with East Stirlingshire. George, who signed for Aberdeen on his 17th birthday, had played at Denny YMCA and Kilsyth Rangers before moving to Pittodrie.

Mulhall initially had difficulty breaking into the Aberdeen first team, as his left wing position was occupied by Jackie Hather. He made his first team debut on the opening day of the 1955–56 season, while Hather was recovering from injury, but he did not become a regular in the side until 1959.

Mulhall earned his first international cap in October 1959, when he scored in a 4–0 win over Northern Ireland. He played in 150 games for Aberdeen, scoring 42 goals.

In September 1962 he signed for Sunderland for £23,000. Mulhall made 289 appearances and scored 67 goals for Sunderland, and he helped the team to win promotion to the First Division in 1963–64. Mulhall was ever-present that season, as part of a run of 114 consecutive appearances. He won another two international caps, also against Northern Ireland, before moving to South Africa to play for Cape Town City in 1969. He stayed for three seasons before playing one final game for Morton.

Managerial career

Mulhall moved into coaching upon his playing retirement first becoming trainer-coach at Halifax Town. He was promoted to first team manager in 1972, and held this position until September 1974. A month later he moved to Bolton Wanderers where he spent four years as coach and assistant manager.

In November 1978 he moved to Bradford City to replace John Napier as manager. In his first full season he guided the club to 5th in Division Four before he was tempted back to Bolton in March 1981. He managed Bolton for one year until he was sacked. He served as a scout at Ipswich Town and assistant manager at Tranmere Rovers. He later returned to Halifax Town as joint manager with Kieran O'Regan and got them promoted back into the Football League in 1998, at which point Mulhall retired.

Mulhall died on 27 April 2018, aged 81.

Career statistics

Club

Appearances and goals by club, season and competition

Club	Season	League			National Cup		League Cup		Total
		Division	Apps	Goals	Apps	Goals	Apps	Goals	Apps	Goals
Aberdeen	1955–56	Scottish Division One	7	3	0	0	5	1	12	4
	1956–57		2	1	0	0	0	0	2	1
	1957–58		4	1	0	0	1	0	5	1
	1958–59		4	1	0	0	1	2	5	3
	1959–60		27	5	3	0	6	2	36	7
	1960–61		32	10	2	0	6	2	40	12
	1961–62		32	9	4	2	6	0	42	11
	1962–63		2	0	0	0	6	3	8	3
	Total		110	30	9	2	31	10	150	42
Sunderland	1962–63	Second Division	35	7	4	2	6	2	45	11
	1963–64		42	9	6	1	1	0	49	10
	1964–65	First Division	41	9	2	1	3	1	46	11
	1965–66		36	8	1	0	1	1	38	9
	1966–67		33	12	5	1	2	1	40	14
	1967–68		35	4	1	0	3	1	39	5
	1968–69		31	7	0	0	1	0	32	7
	Total		253	56	19	5	17	6	289	67
Vancouver Royal Canadians (loan)	1967	United Soccer Association	10	3	0	0	0	0	10	3
Cape Town City	1969	NFL (South Africa)	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
	1970		-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
	1971		-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
	Total		41	22	-	-	-	-	41+	22+
Greenock Morton	1971–72	Scottish Division One	1	0	0	0	1	0	2	0
Career total			415	111	28+	7+	49+	16+	492+	134+

International

Appearances and goals by national team and year

National team	Year	Apps	Goals
Scotland	1959	1	1
	1960	—
	1961	—
	1962	1	0
	1963	1	0
Total		3	1

Scores and results list Scotland's goal tally first, score column indicates score after each Mulhall goal

List of international goals scored by George Mulhall

No.	Date	Venue	Opponent	Score	Result	Competition
1	3 October 1959	Windsor Park, Belfast, Northern Ireland	Northern Ireland	0-4	0-4	1959-60 British Home Championship

Managerial record

Team	From	To	Record
			P	W	L	D	Win %
Halifax Town	1972	1974	-	-	-	-	-
Bradford City	1978	1981	115	48	34	33	41.74%
Bolton Wanderers	1981	1982	42	13	22	7	30.95%
Halifax Town	1996	1998	-	-	-	-	-
Total			157+	61+	56+	40+	36.35%

External links

• George Mulhall management career statistics at Soccerbase