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Charles John Hurley (Template:Lang-ga) born 4 October 1936) was a centre back. He began his career at Millwall, where his term at The Den was disrupted by injury which certainly delayed his debut on the international stage. Hurley is best remembered from his time at Sunderland, where he was named the Black Cats' "Player of the Century" by their fans on the occasion of the club's centenary in 1979. Nicknamed 'The King', Hurley was a classy defender for both Sunderland and the Republic of Ireland. He ended his playing career at Bolton Wanderers and was later manager of Reading.

Hurley was born in Cork, Ireland, but his family moved to Rainham, Essex, England when Charlie was seven months old.

Career at Sunderland

On 26 September 1957, Charlie Hurley arrived at Roker Park to begin a career that would span 12 seasons and 402 appearances. It is a little known fact that when originally asked by Millwall whether he would like a move, he initially turned Sunderland down. The £18,000 transfer was sealed due to the apparent persuasiveness of then Sunderland manager Alan Brown, who had been alerted to his potential by the former Millwall manager Charlie Hewitt.

Hurley's Sunderland career had a disastrous start; a 7-0 rout by Blackpool, coupled with him scoring an own goal on his debut, which was quickly followed by a 6-0 defeat by Burnley. Hurley had been unfortunate enough to have competed against centre forwards to would later go on to represent England. In Ray Charnley and Ray Pointer, Blackpool and Burnley had strikers of the highest quality. Matters improved and eventually promotion was achieved in the 1963/64 season after two campaigns which had seen Sunderland miss out on top flight football due to consecutive day last failures against Swansea Town and Chelsea.

Curiously, for a man who was indelibly linked with powerful headed goals, it took 124 league and cup appearances for Sunderland before he broke his scoring duck. A 1-1 Boxing Day draw in 1960 against Sheffield United was the first of 43.

Whilst the 1963/64 season was special for Sunderland AFC, resulting in promotion, it was also personally highly satisfactory for Hurley. Only Bobby Moore prevented Hurley from becoming Football Writers Player of the Year.

Alan Brown's departure from Roker Park, to take over at Sheffield Wednesday saw first George Hardwick and then Scotsman Ian McColl take over. During one match at Old Trafford in November 1966, first Hurley, and then Northern Ireland defender John Parke went in goal, as Montgomery had to leave the game because of an injury sustained in the first half.

Hurley's last goal for Sunderland came against Arsenal in April 1968, typically a header. His last appearance in a red and white shirt was at Turf Moor, Burnley in April 1969.

Hurley's greatest match was arguably the FA Cup 5th round victory at Carrow Road in February 1961, when he scored the only goal to dump Norwich city out of the competition. Sunderland would then go on to succumb to a Danny Blanchflower-inspired Spurs side, who became double winners for the first time in the 20th century.

On 2 June 1969, Charlie moved to Bolton Wanderers on a free transfer.

• Articles lacking sources from September 2007
• 1936 births
• Living people
• Republic of Ireland association footballers
• Republic of Ireland international footballers
• Republic of Ireland football managers
• Republic of Ireland national football team managers
• Reading F.C. managers
• Millwall F.C. players
• Sunderland A.F.C. players
• Bolton Wanderers F.C. players