While many of his team-mates launched successful careers after Bermuda’s success at the 1968 International Youth Tournament, captain Alan Richardson moved away from the sport and in another direction by becoming a chartered accountant.

Richardson eventually recovered from the severe ankle injury and the disappointment of not leading the team to victory in the tournament’s final, as Clyde Best skippered the team to victory over Haiti at the National Stadium.

However, the memories of the tournament 45 years ago this month will always remain with Richardson, a defender who was just starting to break through with his club PHC.

“The injury was a huge disappointment, it took me almost a year to fully recover and I left for university the next summer,” Richardson said.

“After coming back and playing a few games for PHC at Christmas, my professional pursuits to become a chartered accountant took precedence and I never really got back to competitive football.

“For all intents and purposes, that tournament was probably the end of my competitive football career, though I did play for Dalhousie University. The year I first went there was the first time Dalhousie won the Maritime championship in over 30 years.”

Richardson suffered his injury in the 4-4 group match with Haiti as Best scored twice and Haiti’s striker Sannon hit a hat-trick. And though he tried to play on after treatment, Richardson was eventually substituted late in the first half.

He remembers very clearly the collision with his own team-mate, David Frost, that ended his participation in the tournament. “What happened was a ball had been played into the middle of the goal area, David Frost was back defending at the time as he would typically do and we both went up for the ball and I came down just before him and when he came down he landed on the exterior side of my ankle and caused a severe dislocation and sprain of my angle,” Richardson said.

“While I tried to continue, a few tackles later it was obvious to me that it was just no strength left in my ankle. That’s when I left the field and never returned for the tournament because it was just too severe. Haiti were an exceptional team and had a marksman named Sannon who I was given the task of marking after he had scored a very early goal.”

Richardson has some regrets about not being a part of PHC’s Triple Crown winning team of 1970-71, which saw the emergence of a new crop of talented youngsters at the club.

“Even though I was very involved with my higher education, I just absolutely loved sport,” Richardson said.

“The Crystal Palace youth team that I came up in had people like Dale and Dereck [Russell], David Frost, Clint Smith and Danny Seymour.

“The senior team was in a state of decline and had promoted a bunch of us into the senior team and I remember Devonshire Colts beating us about 6-0 at Devonshire Rec one night, but three years later the team was Triple Crown winners.

“I didn’t play for the Triple Crown team other than maybe Christmas, because during the season I was abroad at university. As I look back and had the privilege of captaining that youth team, while I didn’t have a burning ambition to play professionally, I do regret not being here for another season or two to be a part of that Triple Crown team.”

Captaining the likes of Clyde Best, Mel Lewis, Richard Simmons, Johnny Nusum and Harold Madeiros at youth level remains a highlight of Richardson’s brief football career. Best went the furthest as a player with West Ham, but others were very talented, too, Richardson points out.

“I look back at some of the extraordinarily talented players on that team, two players in particular were Dale Russell and ‘Dirt’ Simmons who never quite got to fully realise their potential,” he said.

“Dale was just one incredibly talented guy, he could do amazing things with the ball and is probably known for that overhead scissor kick he scored at BAA one night. He was Townsey, Dereck and every other Russell all in one, a dominant left-foot player — almost like [Lionel)]Messi.

“Clyde’s record speaks for itself. He was a cut above the rest, could head well and had a shot from 40 yards that would come out of a cannon ball. In terms of a professional career, those two could have been up there with Clyde. It would have been nice to have seen that team play as a full senior squad; that was probably one of the more talented group of players to come out of Bermuda.”