Francis Lee

[remember arthur mann]

He dresses like a used car salesman from Romford.

Winning penalties is like making love to a beautiful women..... ;)

You're thinking of a Swiss roll, not Swiss Toni !
Still got my 'Forward with Franny' badge.

 

[Prestwich_Blue]

He dresses like a used car salesman from Romford.

And you dress like one of his customers.

 

[gordondaviesmoustache]

He dresses like a used car salesman from Romford.

And you dress like one of his customers.

Hmm..maybe not what I'm wearing today....

 

[bgblue]

 

[Vic]

Lee scored 17 or 18 pens in one season. The myth started by that other lot is franny got them by diving. From what i remember and have read lee only won one of those penalties.

Frannie Lee was a really tough little character who seemed to bounce off defenders. He ran at them with amzing close ball control at speed. He was hard to knock off the ball and when that happened it was usually in the penalty area, hence the phrase "Lee Wun Pen"

"Lee Won Pen" was the Rag (and Rag media) gloss. It was originally Lee One Pen simply from the scoreline - Lee, 1 (Pen)

 

[lancs blue]

Lee scored 17 or 18 pens in one season. The myth started by that other lot is franny got them by diving. From what i remember and have read lee only won one of those penalties.

According to Wikipedia, Frannie scored 15 penalties in 71-72, though I thought it was 13! I seem to remember hearing somewhere that he won only four of those.

Frannie is my all-time favourite player and I well remember the incident with Hunter, as well as the goal he scored for Derby on his return to Maine Road. The King claimed on the 'Bell, Lee, Summerbee' video that all the City supporters rose and cheered the goal because they could still see the light blue shirt under the white Derby County one!

It was 13 pens in the league, which I think is still an English top division record (Lampard may have equalled it or come close for Chelsea?). From memory he did win a few of those himself, I remember the one against the rags in the classic 3-3 draw at Maine Rd and also against Wolves when he scored one in a hat-trick in a 5-2 win.

I used to love watching Frannie run at defenders, in a way he was similar to Aguero with his strength and low centre of gravity, very difficult to knock him off the ball without fouling him.

 

[OB1]

One of my childhood heroes and one of our all-time greats. One of my earliest match-going memories is him scoring a hat trick against the Rags.

Our Kid dated his daughter once upon a time.

 

[nobody can eat fifty eggs]

he wasn't fat, he was "barrell chested" :0)

Yes he was barrel chested, I remember an interview where he was asked about his weight and Franny said he never carried an ounce of fat whilst playing.

 

[the blue panther]

My memories of Franny are just that he was a cracking player in every sense. Could dribble, was fast and had a thunderous right foot. He wasn't dirty in any way at all to the best of my recollection, though he could obviously handle himself, as he showed Norman Hunter - who really was a dirty player. As Hunter found out, Franny had a thunderous right hand as well.
I would love to see it go off on a pitch like that again some day between 2 players, like Hunter and Franny did - all we ever get now is handbags! We should be setting the kids a far better example. Happy days...jumpers for goalposts....

 

[Didsbury Dave]

I'll tell you a story about Franny. My Dad played with him when Franny was a young kid at Bolton. They were playing West Ham and in the dressing room before the game, the Bolton lads were asking Franny what it felt like to be up against Bobby Moore, one of the best centre halves in the world. My Dad said Franny was going "He's shit, he's too slow, I'm going to give him the hardest game he's ever had". My Dad said he thought to himself "You arrogant bastard".

But apparently Franny did exactly that, at 19 years old or whatever: gave Bobby Moore the absolute runaround. My Dad couldn't believe it.

True story that and sums Franny up in lots of ways: horribly arrogant, but a brilliant player.

Awful, awful chairman, though. Something he has had a bit of a get-out-of-jail-free card with City fans for.