If a player is described as 'craggy', the chances are that he's a tall, red-headed Scottish centre half, and John McCormick was a perfect example of the species. Big Mac was ever present in the 1968-69 promotion side, along with Jackson and Kember, and kept his place until being dropped to accommodate Bobby Bell in 1973, at the age of 36. Although physically very tough, he was by no means a dirty player, and set an example to his colleagues with his supreme application to the job.
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| John McCormick |
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When heading a ball either in defence or attack he seemed to use every muscle in his body for maximum power, and was the last player ever to let his head drop if things were going badly. No one would claim that he was the most skilful of players in possession, but his timing in the tackle was always accurate and efficient, and his positional sense compensated for the occasional waywardness of his partner, Mel Blyth. As a traditional 'stopper' he was one of the best, and would have deserved a place in any Palace side since.
Mel Blyth was in fact deposed as centre back for a while by yet another Scotsman, Roger Hynd, but after playing in midfield for much of the 1969-70 season he won his place back when Hynd was temporarily switched to the forward line. Blyth liked to play his way out of defence, but the execution didn't always match the ambition, and he often found himself getting into trouble. Nevertheless, the contrasting styles of Blyth and McCormick made for a good mix, and the two of them stayed together until McCormick's retirement, near the end of Bert Head's time in charge. Blyth continued on and off throughout Malcolm Allison's first, disastrous year, before being sold cheaply to Southampton in the same week that Ian Evans arrived from QPR. His move to The Dell renewed his enthusiasm and there he played the best football of his career as a member of the side that beat Palace in the F.A.Cup semi-final, going on to collect a winners' medal. Two years later he came back to Selhurst Park on loan, ironically to fill the gap left after Ian Evans' awful injury, before giving way to the next No.6, Billy Gilbert. Blyth's reputation was completely the opposite of John McCormick's, both on the field and off it, and he was always likely to get into trouble with referees, once being sent off in a game against Everton for elbowing the niggling Alan Whittle, then playing for the Toffeemen. After a newspaper had run an article about his playboy image, quoting him as saying "..my Saturday night ends late on Sunday morning - it's devoted exclusively to birds and booze", he was given the programme space normally devoted to Bert Head's utterances to put the record straight, and he expressed his disgust that the article had "made me out to be some kind of raver", although it certainly had the ring of truth. Blyth's fellow central defenders after McCormick were a fairly motley bunch, with Allison's supposed star of the future Derek Jeffries being the best and Bobby Bell probably the worst, with the hard man Roy Barry somewhere in between, but when Ian Evans succeeded Blyth, Palace at last had a really good central defender in the team.
Evans came as part of the package with Terry Venables, and it was a bold move for a player with such an obviously bright future to drop down to the Third Division, but we were glad that he did. For the next three years Evans was the key player in a Palace team that, although unable to climb out of Division Three, played good, entertaining football to big crowds, and surprised everyone by reaching the last four of the F.A.Cup, which was no fluke.
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| Ian Evans |
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Initially partnered by Derek Jeffries, with Jim Cannon at left back, Evans was clearly a player of great ability, but once Cannon joined him in the centre he looked superb. Both players were ever-present, together with Kenny Sansom, in Terry Venables' first season as manager, when Palace finally made it back to the Second Division, and they looked set to go straight up to the First the following year, until Evans broke his leg against Fulham, in a tackle with George Best. Evans' recovery was painfully slow, and by the time he was fit again, Billy Gilbert had established himself in the side, and Evans finished his playing days at Barnsley, before coming back to Palace in 1984 as Steve Coppell's assistant.
Jim Cannon had made an impact in his first ever game for Palace, when he scored the second goal in the victory against Chelsea that signalled Allison's arrival, but it took him a couple of years, playing mainly at left back, to establish himself in the first team. He really matured when he played alongside Evans, and by the time Billy Gibert came into the side Cannon was one of the team's senior players, at the age of 24. In nearly 15 years of service, under a total of seven managers, Cannon was often the one player who could be relied on perform consistently well, and after a while it was difficult to imagine Crystal Palace without him, his 568 league appearances giving him a club record that is unlikely to be beaten. Although he was often touted as a potential Scottish International, he was probably just short of that level, but as a club player he was the type that is invaluable. When he was feeling confident he would set off on a gallop that took him into a shooting position, which was only occasionally successful, but most of his few goals came from headers, and he was always a danger at the far post from corners. His best remembered goal, though, was the fourth against Ipswich in 1979 that sent Palace to the top of Division One, the day that both he and his team were at their peak.
Cannon's regular partner for some seven years was Billy Gilbert, a straightforward player with few frills, although like everyone else in Venables' team of 1979 he had the confidence early in his career to play a quality of football that later gave way to a more basic defensive strategy, depending rather more on intimidation. Gilbert had long spells of very good form with interludes when nothing would go right, but his final season at Palace was his best for a long time and I for one was sorry to see him go to Portsmouth, although things were in such a state under Alan Mullery that one could hardly blame him for wanting to get away. When Coppell took charge, then, one of his many problems was finding a replacement for Billy Gilbert - although John Lacy was on the staff, he wisely looked elsewhere - and after Chris Whyte's too brief sojourn, and experiments with Gavin Nebbeling and Gary Stebbing, he persuaded Chelsea's Titan Micky Droy to form a formidable team with Jim Cannon. Although this was only a short term solution, the difference that Droy made to the defence was a major factor in Palace's revival the following year, and it was typically shrewd of Coppell to give him the job, at the age of 34.
After Droy had finally slowed to a halt, Gavin Nebbeling showed significant improvement in his game to win back his place, but was soon under threat from the former Spurs and Brighton player Gary O'Reilly, and these two vied for the No.5 shirt for the next three seasons, although O'Reilly missed a lot of that time through injury. Both players were very strong in the air, but less sure of themselves on the ground, although to my mind O'Reilly was certainly the better player, as well as coming over as a thoroughly nice character from his intelligent and articulate appearances on the radio. All this time Jim Cannon had been the one constant factor in a changing defence, but after coming close to promotion for three years running, Coppell decided that his skipper had served his purpose, and shocked some of his admirers by giving him a free transfer.
Jeff Hopkins was the player bought to replace Cannon, and he has yet to win the fans over despite playing a big part in Palace's promotion to Division One. When at his best he looks a perfectly good player, but his confidence too often seems to desert him and he is sometimes guilty of disastrous lapses of concentration, like his own goals against Swindon in the play-offs and Millwall in the First Division. After the 9-0 Nightmare at Anfield, a priority was obviously to spend some money on a centre half with some authority, and following protracted negotiation Palace landed Andy Thorn, one of Wimbledon's Cup-winning team who had used that opportunity to get away from Plough Lane, ending up at Newcastle. The prosaic reputation of that side worried those who hadn't seen Thorn play, but he quickly proved himself to be an excellent bargain, a player around whom an entire defence can be structured. Once he came into the side Palace always appeared likely to stay in Division One, and he acted as a talisman all the way to Wembley, raising the game of those around him, particularly Gary O'Reilly in the Cup semi-final and final.
Thorn may yet be one of the best central defenders Palace have had, but for my team the player who holds that title, quite comfortably, is Ian Evans, despite his career being cut short by such a bad injury. I think Jim Cannon would earn a place in most fans' imaginary sides, and it is difficult to argue against his selection, but sentiment steers me towards John McCormick - one of my first idols - whose image always comes to mind when I think of the old claret and blue colours.