THE ASSYRIAN ATHLETIC CLUB

OF TORONTO

Proud Home of the Winged Bull Soccer Teams

Chosen by Talent Scout

In April 1953, Youra and a few other teammates played in a combined R.A.F.-Iraq and C.C. Select team against a crack R.A.F. team from the Suez Canal Zone. Among the spectators was a Flight Lieutenant, R. K. Weston.

He was a Command Transport pilot shuttling between Britain and the Middle East and a Bristol Rovers Club football talent scout who took an extensive interest in R.A.F. soccer. Impressed by Youra's play and potential, he offered him a chance to go to England to train and play for his club. Youra jumped at the chance, but it took some doing for the pilot and a group of R.A.F. officers, who were football enthusiasts, to persuade the club manager to accept him. When travel arrangements were made, the officers chipped in to help Youra with his travel expenses, and in August 1954 Youra left for England, through Marseilles, France, to make a name for himself in English professional football.

Chaotic Arrival

During his arrival in London on the boat train from France, Youra created a commotion! Equipped by the memory of a photograph, 'a travel agency man was to meet and greet Youra at London's Victoria Station to escort him to Paddington to catch a train to Temple Meads in Bristol. But he missed him in the crowd! Mr. John Gummow, Bristol Rovers' secretary, waited at the Bristol station for the "handsome, tanned desert boy" with a photo of Youra in his hand, but Youra was not on the train! He phoned the agency. "Sorry," he was told. "Your desert footballer has slipped through Victoria and vanished! He is somewhere in London." Inspired by the spirit of adventure, Youra had decided to make his own way to Bristol on his own time!

Ordered "Go Home"

Youra was admitted to England on a one-month visitor's permit. Through the intervention of his club manager, Mr. Bert Tann, and other officials, however, he was granted two one-month extensions. But when his time was up, he was ordered to leave the country. In the short period of three months Youra had made such a good impression on the press and the football public that the Home Office's "Go Home" order to Youra created an uproar in both the press and the football circles. Dozens of people offered Youra a job so that he would not be a drag on the labor market, and the Bristol Rovers Club and the Bristol Evening World enlisted the help of members of parliament. Mr. Tann saw Sir Walter Monkton, Minister of Labor and MP for Bristol West, and Mr. W. A. Wilkins, another MP and a football fan, both of whom had a talk with the Home Secretary. "And what will Youra, or the airmen at Habbaniya, or the local Iraqi population, or even the Rovers' players who have taken this swarthy, quiet lad into their hearts and homes think of British justice if the Home Office pushes him ceremoniously back home?" asked the Bristol Evening World.

Granted Residence and Work

The hue and cry and the impassioned appeals finally softened up the Home Secretary, who finally agreed to let Youra stay permanently and play football. He was also granted employment by the National Coal Board and he started working as a miner at Pensford Colliery, Somerset, on November 7,1954.