William "Bill" Smith was an English professional footballer who played at centre-forward for various clubs in the years immediately prior to the First World War.

Football career

Smith was born in Denaby Main, in the West Riding of Yorkshire

West Riding of Yorkshire

The West Riding of Yorkshire is one of the three historic subdivisions of Yorkshire, England. From 1889 to 1974 the administrative county, County of York, West Riding , was based closely on the historic boundaries...

 and played his early football for the nearby Hickleton Main Colliery, before joining Brentford

Brentford F.C.

Brentford Football Club are a professional English football club based in Brentford in the London Borough of Hounslow. They are currently playing in Football League One....

 of the Southern League

Southern Football League

The Southern League is an English football competition featuring semi-professional and amateur clubs from the South West, South Central and Midlands of England and South Wales...

 in October 1912. At Griffin Park

Griffin Park

Griffin Park is a football ground situated in the London Borough of Hounslow, west London. It has been the home ground of League One side Brentford since it was built in 1904. It is known for being the only English league football ground to have a pub on each corner, and is situated in a...

, he soon gained a reputation as a prolific goal-scorer with ten goals from 27 appearances.

In the 1913 close-season, he moved to the south coast

Southern England

Southern England, the South and the South of England are imprecise terms used to refer to the southern counties of England bordering the English Midlands. It has a number of different interpretations of its geographic extents. The South is considered by many to be a cultural region with a distinct...

 to join Southampton

Southampton F.C.

Southampton Football Club is an English football team, nicknamed The Saints, based in the city of Southampton, Hampshire. The club gained promotion to the Championship from League One in the 2010–2011 season after being relegated in 2009. Their home ground is the St Mary's Stadium, where the club...

 and made his debut for the "Saints" in the opening match of the 1914–15 season. Despite "showing persistence and industry", he struggled to reproduce the form he had at Brentford and after scoring only four goals in his first fourteen appearances, he was replaced by Percy Prince

Percy Prince

Percy Prince was an English amateur footballer who played as a centre-forward for Southampton and Boscombe in the early 20th century.-Football career:...

. Smith was recalled for a further five matches in December/January without managing to score, and lost his place again, this time to new signing, Arthur Hollins

Arthur Hollins (footballer)

Arthur Hollins was an English professional footballer who played at centre-forward for Southampton between 1914 and 1915.-Football career:Hollins was born in Wolverhampton and started his professional career at Walsall, without breaking into the first-team....

.

In the summer of 1914, Smith returned to Yorkshire

Yorkshire

Yorkshire is a historic county of northern England and the largest in the United Kingdom. Because of its great size in comparison to other English counties, functions have been increasingly undertaken over time by its subdivisions, which have also been subject to periodic reform...

 to join Halifax Town

Halifax Town A.F.C.

Halifax Town Association Football Club were an English football team who most recently played in the Conference National, although prior to that they participated in the Football League for over eighty years...

 of the Midland League

Midland Football League

There have been at least two different football competitions in England which used the name Midland Football League.One existed until 1982 before merging with the Yorkshire League to form the Northern Counties League....

.