George O'Brien Tribute on Saints Website

[derry]

David Bull has done a really good tribute to George on the Official site. It didn't say when he died. He was a great player, one of my favourites.

RIP George.

[Badger]

Sad to hear he's passed away, have heard good stories of George O'Brien. He was before my time, but older relatives rated him highly, and on hearing their admiration he was a player I wished I'd had chance to see.

 

Interesting how after he finished playing he became a publican, sub-postmaster and then a taxi driver, What a different era.

Edited 19 March, 2020 by Badger

[Shropshire Saint]

Started watching Saints in 1964 and George was playing up front with Martin Chivers. Great striker - always enjoyed watching him play. He got injured part way through our 1965/66 promotion season and never played for Saints again, being transferred to Leyton Orient when Norman Dean had taken his place in the team. RIP George and thanks for the memories.

[Turkish]

Always sad to hear of former greats passing. Well before my time but my dad and grandad loved him and would often talk about how good he was.

[rooney]

A very good player who was a treat to watch. RIP.

[gordonToo]

An all time favourite for me and a marvellous player who complemented Terry Paine so very well. I can still see it now: Paine finds George on the edge of the area and .... back of the net!!

[zurichboy]

I remember stand behind the goal at the Milton Road end when George took a penalty. He hit it so hard that the ball got stuck behind one of those metal net supports and it took quite a while to remove it.

RIP George......

[derry]

George was unique in football. Most altercations end up in handbags but in 1959/60 we were playing Newport County at the Dell Harry Harris a big fellow who went to Portsmouth and played most of his football at centre half clattered George, in the blink of an eye George who wasn't that big but gutsy hit Harris with an uppercut sweet as you like and knocked him out. Harris was carried off, George was sent off.

 

Again in the third round of the FA Cup 1959/60 we went to First Division Manchester City, won 5-1 away against the City's best team, Paine was unplayable, Reeves 4, O'Brien. A special train was laid on to take the supporters to Manchester. The team travelled on the train, when we stopped at Southampton as he was getting off George shouted, "Where's the ****** brass band".

 

Paine and O'Brien had perfected a crossover move ond often did it, they ran fast at each other and as they crossed over whoever had the ball transferred it to the other. It worked time after time and was impossible to counter.

 

George was a supreme goalscorer and I remember him with pleasure. I used to bump into him first at Stoneham then later at my present club. George was a very good single figure golfer.

[Charlie Wayman]

He was truly fantastic striker in that wonderful forward line of the early sixties. Probably saw him play 100 times and he rarely let us down. Loved him.

[stknowle]

Superb scoring record for us, goal every 1.6 games. Nowhere near that anywhere else he played. Nice one George RIP.

[cambsaint]

I started watching the Saints in the 62 season.

I remember George O'Brien well.

To me he is still the consummate penalty taker.

No messing, everyone including the keeper knew where it was going.

A run up, and he hit the ball very hard and itUnsavae arrowed into the top stanchion,I think it was invariably the right hand one.

Unsaveable, and remember this was with heavy boots and a heavy wet leather ball and often a penalty are that resembled a ploughed field.

I think Osgood's penalties were similar, but with a better ball.

I chatted to a fellow fan walking down Hills Road who played golf with the retired George, and he told me that George was a really nice bloke, who said that

Terry Paine did all the hard work and all he had to do was arrive in the right place at the right time and stick it in.

something of an understatement but the two together got us to Div !, although Chivers had taken over at the end.

We used to enjoy a few real hammerings if the two were on song.

RIP my first football hero.

[Panda]

I felt George never really got the recognition he deserved, always seemingly in the shadow of others but he was a unique goal scorer. Like others, he did have Terry Paine to lay the chances on but when they came George rarely missed them. Another of the team I watched as a school boy gone. Sad news; RIP George and thanks for the memories.

[derry]

A really good history of George on the Dunfermline Athletic official website and on Newsnow