Weymouth Football Club are sad to learn that former Terra Ray Gough passed away in hospital in Exeter on March 11th, following a period of illness.
The funeral service will be held at the Exeter and Devon Crematorium Topsham Rd, Exeter, EX2 6EU at 1330 on the 28th March 2018 and afterwards at the Exeter Golf and Country Club, Topsham Road, Exeter, EX2 7AE
Ray Gough was born in Belfast on 8th February 1938. His football career started with the 11th Belfast Boys Brigade, but signed for Crusaders at 16. After 2 seasons there he joined Linfield, but not before he had set something of a record by gaining Youth, Amateur and Junior International caps in three successive weeks. In fact he had been offered the opportunity to join Aston Villa, Preston or Rangers, but his amateur status proved to be a problem. When he moved to Windsor Park he embraced professional status.
Whilst with Linfield he was selected in the Irish League side to play the English League at Blackpool and also as a non-playing member of the full International side.
As he struggled to recover from a compound fracture of his leg Linfield allowed him to join Exeter City, but this stay only lasted 5 months before he moved to Canada to play for Toronto Italia. He returned to England to join Millwall and then came to Weymouth for £250 in July 1965.
He moved on to Bath City in May 1969 having scored 37 times in his 189(1) appearances.
On retirement he returned to Exeter to assist in the executive areas on match days.
The following is posted on behalf of Ray’s family.
Ray always talked very fondly of his years at Weymouth FC. Our recollections are that Millwall, with whom Ray had a promotion winning season from the old Third to the Second Division, had offered Ray a new contract. There was also a whisper of interest from West Ham. However, his relationship with his future wife Val who lived in Exeter, was his priority which meant being up in London wasn’t ideal and as I’m sure your aware, the financial rewards for footballers weren’t significant enough then to take them both up to London, so Ray was delighted to be able to stay in Exeter, work part-time and play for Weymouth.
