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Family, friends, players and fans gathered to pay their respects to the former Liverpool Women manager Matt Beard on Friday as he was laid to rest at a memorial service in “the city he saw as his home”.
Some had flown from overseas to join Beard’s wife, Debbie, children Harry and Ellie, stepson Scott, and mother, Margaret, at Liverpool’s Catholic Metropolitan Cathedral. Others had travelled after games and training for a service which celebrated a pioneering figure in women’s football, who died last month, aged 47.
As Beard’s coffin, draped in two Liverpool scarves, was carried into Sir Frederick Gibberd’s modernist “cathedral for a new world”, it was flanked by a 50-strong phalanx of current and former players who had played under him, many from Liverpool and West Ham. They were joined by Liverpool Women’s first-team squad, along with the head coach, Gareth Taylor, and his coaching staff, and the club’s sporting director, Richard Hughes.
In an emotional eulogy, Mark Beard called his brother a “beautiful soul and a one-in-a-million personality” who “always found a way to make you laugh and smile”.
Beard, he said, had gone into women’s football soon after moving into coaching in his 20s when an injury cut short a playing career and had “never looked back”, becoming one of the game’s “most inspirational managers”. Beard started his coaching at Millwall Lionesses in 2008, later taking charge of Chelsea, Liverpool over two spells, West Ham United and Burnley. He became Liverpool Women’s most successful manager, leading them to back-to-back Women’s Super League titles in 2013 and 2014.
“He won everything there was to win, but more important than the titles was what he brought to people,” he said.
An inquest confirmed last month that Beard had died by suicide, and his brother paid tribute to staff at the Countess of Chester hospital, where Beard was treated, and the city of Liverpool, which he said had supported the family in their grief. “Please, please, please let Matt’s passing be a lesson to us all,” he said. “We are all human, so be more thoughtful.”
Beard’s family requested that instead of flowers, gestures of remembrance be made through donations to a mental health charity, and the running order for the service had the contact details of support services including the Samaritans, the National Suicide Prevention Helpline and the peer-to-peer support group Andy’s Man Club.
Current and former players joined coaches, pundits and fans in the cathedral, including Emma Hayes, the former Chelsea and current US women’s national team coach, and footballers including England’s Lucy Bronze, Liverpool’s Gemma Bonner and Arsenal’s Olivia Smith. Liverpool men’s all-time top goalscorer, Ian Rush, also attended the service, alongside Manchester United Women’s head coach, Marc Skinner.
That people had travelled from far and wide was testament to Beard’s importance to the women’s game, said the commentator Jacqui Oatley. “Matt was just such a special person, and he was so significant in the evolution of the women’s game in this country,” she said.
The former Liverpool and England forward Natasha Dowie, who won two WSL titles under Beard and returned to Liverpool during his second period at the club, said after the service that he had treated everyone with the same warmth and kindness, whether they were a chief executive or a fan.
“How will Matt be remembered?” she said. “A cheeky smile, someone that made you laugh, a twinkle in his eyes, an ‘All right, darling’, a big hug, which made you feel like a million dollars. He was a father figure … and I was very lucky to have played under him.”
Beard was a “kind, caring, funny, cheeky” man, who had a real impact on everyone he met, said the Canada head coach and former Liverpool player Casey Stoney. His death, she said, had to be a moment for people across football to recognise the importance of reaching out for help. “But I think the biggest impact I hope people take from this is that we’re all human and we all need help sometimes and we all need to talk,” Stoney said. “I hope people start taking the time to get out of their busy lives and reach out. I wish I had done more of that.”
As Beard’s coffin was led out of the cathedral to a private ceremony where he would be laid to rest, fans raised scarves and joined Beard’s niece Lucy for an elegiac rendition of Liverpool’s club anthem, You’ll Never Walk Alone. He was, said the Liverpool Women fan Michael Smith, a manager who had made fans feel like part of his family, coming on to supporter coaches and giving out signed shirts from the players. “He was an icon in the women’s game and in this city,” he said. “But he was so good with everyone he met. He wasn’t just a manager, it was like he was a friend.”
