John Craven in the Sky Blue
On this Wednesday (22nd May) in 1974 the Sky Blues completed their third and last fixture in an invitation tournament in the Far East and in spite of achieving only a 1-1 draw in the game with Derby County in Singapore came away with the Anchor Cup!! Given that City had already beaten Everton 2-1 that was all City needed to do in the round-robin tournament with the Toffees and the Rams (who had drawn 2-2 with each other earlier in the week) but they had to work hard to get it.
Overseas tours in the close season seemed part of the club’s plans in the early 1970s. The Sky Blues had already toured South Korea, Japan and Thailand in summer 1972 culminating in a 2-2 draw in Bangkok against FC Santos from Brazil (for whom Pele played and scored). In summer 1973 they played a lone game in both Sweden (a 3-2 win over Norkopping) and Majorca (5-0 victory over Capdepera). There was speculation (denied by him) that Gordon Milne, City’s manager since 1972, was being considered for the job of England boss as the tournament began.
Sky Blue Manager Gordon
Milne’s men (Gordon is a current CCFPA member) had finished sixteenth in Division One in 1973-74 four places and two points clear of the relegation zone. In Summer 1974 they entered the Anchor Cup and took a tour party consisting of (CCFPA members underlined):-
Bill Glazier, Neil Ramsbottom, Alan Dugdale, Graham Oakey, Chris Cattlin, the late John Craven, the late Peter Hindley, Bobby Parker, Mick McGuire, Alan Green, Dennis Mortimer, Willie Carr, the late Brian Alderson, David Cross, Mick Ferguson and Colin Stein.
Good to see Chris, Alan and Willie at our Legends Day 2023, Dennis at LD24 and Chris back at LD25 a few weeks ago.!
With almost 30,000 fans watching the game, it was the Rams that scored first in the 57th minute when Kevin Hector slid the ball past Sky Blue goalie Bill Glazier latching onto a cross from Roger Davies. John Craven netted the Sky Blues equaliser after 75 minutes following up his own penalty (awarded when Alan Dugdale was flattened in the box) to score after Rams ‘keeper Colin Boulton parried his spot kick.
The 1973-74 CCFC squad
City therefore finished the triangular tournament with three points to the Rams’ two and Everton‘s one. In the first game in Kuantan, Malaysia the opponents were also Derby County and the Sky Blues had succumbed 2-3 with a brace from Brian Alderson in front of 20,000. Then, moving to Singapore fully 35,000 watched as the Sky Blues took on and defeated Everton 2-1 with goals from Willie Carr and David Cross.
CCFC Director Tom Sergeant was presented with the Anchor Cup by Mr Othman Wok, the country’s Minister of Social Affairs. Does anyone know what happened to the Anchor Cup? We would be grateful for more information about any of these games.
Thanks to CCFPA’s Mike Young for sourcing the images.
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