Background
As a junior, he joined West Ham United (where his father Harry Hooper Snr was a trainer) and went on to play 119 league games for the club, scoring 39 goals.
As a junior, he joined West Ham United (where his father Harry Hooper Snr was a trainer) and went on to play 119 league games for the club, scoring 39 goals.
Born in Pittington, County Durham, Hooper started playing football at Hylton Colliery. He represented the Football League in games against the Irish League in 1954, and the Scottish League in 1955. He also played for the London XI in the Inter-Cities Fairs Cup group stage game against the Basel XI on 4 June 1955, scoring the last goal of a 5–0 rout.
Hooper moved to Wolverhampton Wanderers for £25,000, and scored 19 goals in 39 league matches.
He then joined Birmingham City for a fee of £20,000, spending nearly three years at the club and winning a runners-up medal in the 1960 Fairs Cup, before returning to the north-east with Sunderland for a fee of £18,000. He went on to play non-league football with Kettering Town, Dunstable Town and Heanor Town before retiring.