THE HIPPEST HERO OF THEM ALL, THE GREAT COLIN HARVEY
By
Mickey Blue Eyes.

In June 2003 Colin Harvey has finally conceded best to Time. His hips have given out. Nobody who saw him swivel them at his peak years will be in the least surprised. In the cause of Everton he turned them through angles which should have been impossible for a human frame. He paid a heavy price in pain and premature ending of his football career, albeit at the age of 58. He was one of the greatest players ever to pull on a Royal Blue Jersey. If you were to argue he was the finest midfield player of his generation you wouldn’t get many true fans who disagreed, me included. At a time when I still had footy heroes Colin was mine. He was magnificent. I wouldn’t swap my memories of him for all the revenue streams, cheap salesmanship, tee shirt vendors and wretched bookkeeping in the modern game.

He was more than a great player, he was One Of Us, an Evertonian, a Corinthian in similar vein to the great Brian Labone. He was a graduate of the School of Science. We have never had anybody who made his way right through our club at every level in the same way as Colin Harvey. He joined us from school and represented us from schoolboy to manager. He is Royal Blue to his very marrow. There has never been an Evertonian this fan wanted more to succeed.

You can’t put a premium on great players like Colin and the pleasure he gave to all those who watched him while he weaved his magic.

I was lucky enough to see his first team début in a European Cup second leg versus Internazionale at the San Siro in Milan when he was eighteen. Previously I had seen him in a few reserve games but like everybody else I didn’t expect to see him in the first team for a year or two. But that was the way the great Harry Catterick ran things. He did it his way, without frills or fanfare or any of this messiah nonsense.

Unforgettably he looked about fourteen years of age, small, short cropped hair when everybody else had Beatles locks, an intense furrowed brow and slightly bandy legs even then. On the same field were players of the stature of Luis Suarez, Costa da Jair, Horst Syzmaniak, Fachetti and all the Everton legends of the day. The atmosphere was absolutely electric after the first leg ended 0-0 at Goodison and we had a goal disallowed in the kind of suspicious circumstances which have always attached to Italian football. After a nervous start Colin settled in and let nobody down despite the game deteriorating into a ludicrous battle to see who could kick who the hardest. Mercifully, he stayed out of the vendettas though he took some nasty treatment himself. He had arrived.

Catterick brought him on in exactly the right way, gradually increasing his appearances until he became virtually irreplaceable. Initially he was selected in the old inside forward positions before finally settling into wide left midfield where he matured into a truly wonderful player.

So how do you describe sports genius? Answer: with great difficulty, especially when talents are so crystallised. The nuances exist at every level. Colin was a pure ball player, one hundred percent skill with the necessary timing to look after himself with confidence when faced with the bullies of the day. Players like Ron Harris, Peter Storey and Norman Hunter never got any change out of him even when they tried their worst. And believe me that could be the most sickening sight in sport. Colin was never fazed.

His early league form was uneven. When he didn’t reach his own standards it was usually because he was trying too hard. But once he learned how to pace a game he blossomed to a level of play of almost sublime perfection. Quite early on he had conquered virtually all of the basic skills to get him through his professional life. He could dribble, pass and tackle so well he eventually got nicknamed The White Pelé despite weaknesses in his heading and shooting abilities. He was so good Catterick didn’t hesitate to use him as all-round replacement for the vast experience of Tony Kay and Denis Stevens in midfield.

Small surprise it was his hips which gave out on him. His main trademarks were an ability to wriggle through any tackle and to get to the byline and cross the ball while still facing forward as his hips swivelled in the direction of the cross. Prior to his appearance the only player I had seen who had similar ability was Eddie Coleman of pre-Munich Manchester United, who rightly drew the nickname Snake Hips. That was Colin, and then some. Afterwards, the nearest I have seen is Trevor Brooking at his playing height.

His passing was superb, long or short. Probably the most memorable of his long passes was, ironically, a defective one in the 1966 Cup Final. With the score at 2-2, us having come back from 2-0 down, he got the ball about a third of the way in our half, right side. He glanced up, saw Derek Temple set for a run, and right footed sent it arrowing upfield maybe forty metres. Unusually, it dropped short right at defender Gerry Young’s feet for a relatively easy clearance. But poor Gerry misjudged it and it shot under his weak trapping action and left Derek in the clear for a famous winner. Maybe Young was surprised that Colin hadn’t delivered his usual immaculate long ball.

In the previous semi-final he had scored an equally famous winner against Manchester United at Burnden Park. Yet more irony – that too was mishit, this time on his left foot. Not that it mattered. He could have hit it in with his knee and nobody would have cared. If memory serves he also scored a goal in our 2-0 win over West Brom to win the title in 1970. He didn’t score many.

His play reached near perfection during the title winning season of 1969-70, as did the team’s. Catterick had spent the previous few years assembling a wonderful young footballing side and it climaxed that season in some of the finest football it has been my pleasure to watch. It was as sweet as a poem. Colin was at the heart of everything, ushering it along with the kind of class and style you just can’t coach. You could almost set your watch to their rhyme and meter. You could bet that come 4.20 pm the opposition would be swamped by wave after wave of attacking fury traced on the pitch in exquisite but deadly geometry. By then the midfield comprised the famous Trinity of Harvey – Ball – Kendall, great players all. Colin was my favourite of the three because he was the most consistent and the best all round player.

He only played for England on one occasion but this had little to do with his status in the game. Everybody knew how good he was. The problem lay in how the great Alf Ramsey, England’s manager, selected his teams. Alf was tremendously loyal to those he figured did the job he brought them in to do, even when they were journeymen players like Nobby Stiles, Alan Mullery or even lesser lights. Alf was big on system players and Colin liked to do things with the ball which went against the England system. There’s no question it was England’s loss but you never heard one word of complaint from Harvey. He was better than that.

He was never quite the same player after 1970. His form declined the following season after he received a serious eye injury. Despite sporadic surges of form he never recaptured the consistency of former years. In the end he left for Sheffield Wednesday after more than ten years of marvellous and loyal playing service.

Eventually of course he returned as first team coach to Howard Kendall’s tenure as manager. They were as formidable as a management team as they were in their playing days and their joint talents ushered in one of our clubs most glorious eras. When Howard moved on after the European ban Colin was the natural choice as replacement. But he never quite got it right and often the demands of management seemed to sit badly on his shoulders. It was made worse for him when he had to have a hip replacement while still manager and this made it difficult for him during coaching sessions. It was no real surprise when he lost his job as manager despite a gallant effort to maintain the success of earlier years. Me, I was desperately disappointed when it didn’t work out. I have never ever wanted one of ours to succeed as much as I did Colin. It was a bad moment.

Which made it all the more joyous for me when he eventually re-established himself as youth team coach and played a key role in guiding many of our most promising youngsters through their early years. It was a role he seemed much more suited to and one which gave him more pleasure. He was certainly a hard task master for the kids and left them in no doubt as to what was required to be good and to survive in The Beautiful Game.

But then nobody ever played it like Colin Harvey. He was a great player during a time when we had many great players at the club. He played football like it was second nature artistry to him. All those years ago in the San Siro he was One Of Us. And he never forgot. Which is why I count myself as lucky to have seen him at his best.

Thanks, Colin. (12/06/03)