Heroes & Villains – Crystal Palace
Hero – Jim Cannon
Every club had an archetypal tough centre-back during the 70’s and 80’s.
In the 1970’s, Leeds had Norman Hunter, Liverpool had Tommy Smith and Chelsea had Ron Harris. The 1980’s introduced the likes of Terry Butcher, Paul McGrath and Tony Adams to the fore.
Jim Cannon played through both eras for Crystal Palace. Between 1973 and 1988, Cannon featured 660 times for the club, a record that stands to this day. Most of his appearances came as a centre-back, but he could also play in midfield or as a left-back.
His no-nonsense approach at the back worked wonders in Palace’s ‘Team of the 80’s’ and he is widely-regrded by Crystal Palace fans. He finished runner-up in Crystal Palace’s ‘Player of the Century’ award, second only to Ian Wright.
Villain – Tomas Brolin
Brolin arrived at Selhurst Park after being released by Leeds United in November 1997.
He was barely recognisable from five years prior when he tore through the England defence to knock us out of Euro ’92.
Whilst researching Brolin’s time at Palace, I found the words ‘horrendous, slow, fat and lazy’. These characteristics are far from what you need from a centre forward at your club!
One particular game at Selhurst Park lives long in the memories of all who were there at the game or who watched it on Match of the Day.
Early on in the first half, Brolin jumped up to head the ball and instead clashed heads with former Leeds team-mate Bruno Ribeiro. He was taken off the pitch, the wound was stitched up and went back to the itch six minutes later with a bandage wrapped around his head.
Brolin made 13 appearances for the South London club and never scored in his time at Selhurst Park.
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