Football's biggest hardman wanted to 'strangle' Chelsea legend and left David Beckham terrified

One of football's toughest players said he wanted to strangle Dennis Wise and left David Beckham scared of coming up against him.

The 1980s and 1990s gave birth to some of football's most memorable hardmen, with the likes of Vinnie Jones, Roy Keane and Duncan Ferguson gaining cult hero status among English football fans.

Most of those names transcended football in their retirement years, largely due to the rise of the Premier League that replaced the old First Division in 1992.

But one of the toughest players in English football before the advent of the Premier League was former Millwall and Brentford midfielder Terry Hurlock.

Standing at 5ft 9in, Hurlock was an fearsome ball-winning midfielder who was involved in his fair share of controversy during his career.

At Celtic, he was shown a straight red card for aiming an off-the-ball elbow into the face of a Rangers player. Three Gers stars were sent off that day in 1991, and manager Graeme Souness had to publicly apologise afterwards.

He signed for Millwall in 1987 and spent three years at The Den, earning the nickname 'Terry Warlock' from supporters.

He is also a member of Brentford's Hall of Fame, having spent six seasons as a professional with the Third Division side between 1980 and 1986.

In an interview with the Daily Mail, Hurlock claimed that Wimbledon enforcer Jones was 'too smart to come near me on the pitch' and revealed what he wanted to do to future Chelsea legend Dennis Wise after seeing him every day in training.

Hurlock's Millwall and Wise's Wimbledon side shared training facilities at the time, with Hurlock explaining: "We'd be running past them on the pitch, eyeing them up. Wally [Downes]. Vinnie. Little Dennis. I wanted to strangle him.

"You'd be shouting across, 'Crazy Gang'? We're the real f***ing Crazy Gang. We're Millwall."

FourFourTwo named Hurlock as the toughest footballer of the 1990s in 2023.

And it is fair to say that Beckham was not the biggest fan of the tough-tackling midfielder.

During his one-month loan spell at Preston North End in 1995, Beckham came up against Hurlock and Fulham, scoring a free-kick in a 3-2 win.

The future Manchester United legend would later tell reporters: "I remember Terry Hurlock playing in the game. And I stayed away from him all game, for obvious reasons.

"But I scored a free-kick in that game, and that was a different time in my career, and a special time when I look back on it."

Fortunately for him, Beckham never came up against Hurlock again after that match, as the midfielder retired from football at the age of 36 in 1995.