Bluebirds- “you are like a Harry Kane!”
By Bob Banks
There are young fans at Tottenham who went to their first game aged eight and have now near crossed 20 years of age without knowing a Kane-less home football experience.
In the post-Bosman transfer world, where football mercenaries kiss the badge at different clubs every year, Harry was a striking exception.
It got me thinking about club stalwarts and those great servants whom have delivered, season in and season out, for Cardiff City over the years.
Billy Hardy, Phil “Joe” Dwyer, Don Murray, Tom Farquhason, Fred Keenor, Peter King, Ron Stitfall, Jack Evans, Alan Harrington and Peter Whittingham all make the top ten chart for all time appearances for the club. Harrington, a cultured right back whose playing career (1952-1966) embraced CCFC’s first post-war period in the top division, clocked up 405 games, the lowest of the ten but still representing some 14 years of club loyalty.
That’s great loyalty yes- but not within touching distance of top-of-the-tree Billy Hardy, with a whopping 590 games under his belt in all competitions, in a 20-year - yes, that’s right, 20-year- City career (1911-1931) that also embraced a terrible four-year World War.
Bill Hardy
Post-war, Billy was part of the first team that ever played for Cardiff City in the Football League after they joined in 1920, winning promotion to the First Division in their inaugural season. He was a mainstay of the side that finished runners up in 1923-24 and reached two FA Cup Finals in 1925 and of course, 1927, when they beat Arsenal to lift the cup.
Player Coach in 1930, he ended his Cardiff career in 1932 when the Bluebirds had been relegated to the Third Division South.
If you look around the City car park when you next attend and witness the sea of six-figure motors, the dubious recompense for serial low achievement, spare a minute to compare this modern monopoly money world to Billy’s promotion-achieving, cup winning and cup runners up record. Billy had a wise financial head at that time and set himself up with a post-Football career- as a Coal Merchant.
Many readers will know and love Joe Dwyer and Don Murray, two fantastic clubmen of the sixties and seventies. Both took no prisoners at a time when Tippy Tappy mostly involved treading on an opponent’s heels rather than cute passing movements. Every ounce of these boy’s breath was devoted to delivering a result and both were as reliable and dependable as a three o’clock kick off in those days.
I once saw Murray take a penalty at the Grange End. A foolish decision to let his considerable tackling and blocking skills anywhere near the creative end of the game and he duly obliged by putting the spot kick into the roof of the stand (no mean feat considering the elevation required). I read a city fan’s account of the kick recently. It seems Phil Dwyer, at a later social occasion they both attended that had got hold of vintage clips of Don’s stratospheric shot, cackled at him “Hey Don- they’re still looking for that ball in Grangetown!”
Don Murray
Phil clocked up 575 and Don 532 games in 13 and 12 year careers.
The glory years of the early 20th century were also home to both Tom Farquharson and Fred Keenor’s careers with the City. Dublin-born Keeper Tom was spotted playing for Abertillery Town and joined Cardiff in 1922. Five years later he had a cup winners medal. He gathered in 507 appearances.
Keenor- sorry that should be Mr Keenor- made 507 appearances for Cardiff City and also appeared at the Battle of the Somme, where he got a near career- threatening injury after blocking some shrapnel. His captaincy of the Cup winning team is the stuff of legend and of statues. We’ll be doing a bit more on Mr Keenor as we move on with this column.
Peter King was a mercurial winger who joined the club from Worcester City in 1960 and was the first ever player to score a European goal for the Bluebirds, netting against Esberj fB in the Cup Winner’s Cup. He top scored in the 1967-8 season with 18 goals, helping Cardiff to reach the Cup winners cup semi-final. An achilles injury ended his career after 477 games.
Peter King
Next came Peter Whittingham’s ten-year career. Super Whitts- self effacing, an impeccable left foot and a brilliant entertainer who graced 457 matches, remains in the hearts and minds of all modern fans. He is very much missed.
To round off the top ten of CCFC super servants, we have Ron Stitfall (452 games) and Jack Evans (424 games). Stitfall, a one-club man with 18 years service, played five years for Wales at right back. A keen City fan, in his early years he netted five times as a number nine before settling into the full back role.
Jack Evans (14 year’s service) signed for the City for six shillings. Club Secretary Bartley Wilson (no relation to our famous mascot) is reported to have said “it’s all we had- and that included his fare from Treorchy!”
Jack scored the first ever goal at Ninian Park in a friendly against Aston Villa on September 1 1910. It was a fitting score because he had helped to build the ground, earning 35 shillings a week for playing plus “bonuses” for “undertaking other jobs around the construction.”
Jack was from Bala, and had a famously powerful shot, nicknamed the “Bala Bang”. It is claimed that his shooting broke the wrist of a keeper attempting to stop the ball and a Manchester City keeper was apparently knocked out by another Evans thunderbolt.
So that’s the Cardiff City top ten club servants. All have notched up at least 88 more club shirts that Bayern’s Harry, who nevertheless remains a modern-day loyalty phenomenon.
To finish, a word of respect here for our current one-club hero Joe Ralls. Firstly, Joe is rightly on his way to being a club legend. Some 344 appearances (already 26 more than Harry Kane for Spurs and 61 short of making the City top ten). Many of these games were notched in a time of incredible managerial and club turbulence when the side was chopped and changed game to game, season to season. In the last few seasons, he has survived wholesale changes in club personnel and he turns up and does a shift, week in and week out.
Joe Ralls
He is now in his 12th year with the club. Just 30 this year, Joe has survived 13 solo managers -and one double act Gabbs and Young- and all our off-the-field traumas and is still putting in 100 per cent.
How many more like Joe and the top ten will we see as football further evolves into an unstoppable global entertainment business? Certainly, each day sees us move further and further away from the genuine, working class game it was when Billy, Tom and Fred, in particular, performed so honestly and successfully in a blue shirt.