Mick CHANNON

Fans' favourite Mick Channon returned to the Dell in September 1979 after a two year spell at Manchester City which had seen him struggle to reproduce the fine form he had shown during his first spell with the Saints. Mick's second spell with the Saints saw him score 28 goals in 119 league games before moving on to Newcastle United in September 1982. He is pictured above during the match against Birmingham City on 10th October 1981.

A centre forward of wit and modesty, Mick Channon's perennially superb form for the extremely unfashionable Southampton kept him in five years' worth of England squads through the barren 1970s, even though Saints spent a good deal of time away from English football's top flight and there were a number of bustling, skilled strikers who could easily have laid claim to Channon's crown. He debuted - along with a fair few others - in a 1972 Wembley friendly against Yugoslavia, helping set up England's goal for Joe Royle in a 1-1 draw, and began to look like a really promising part of England's 1974 World Cup hopes over the course of the next 12 months. He scored his first goal for his country in the life-enhancing Valentine's Day 5-0 destruction of Scotland at Hampden Park, and added a further goal in the summer when Wales were dispatched 3-0 in the summer Home Internationals. A triumvirate of real danger alongside Martin Chivers and Allan Clarke began to develop, and all contributed goals through the calendar year except when it really mattered; the 2-0 defeat in Poland which Channon crucially missed.

England's hopes of World Cup qualification centred thereonin on beating the same opposition at Wembley in October - England annihilated Austria 7-0 three weeks earlier (the photo above is during the game), with Channon scoring two - and so Alf Ramsey picked his favourite three strikers for the game which he hoped would take England to Germany the following summer. The rest became part of the awkward chapter in England history as Channon was, arguably, the individual most denied by the heroics and madnesses of Poland keeper Jan Tomaszewski, and the 1-1 draw took the visitors through and the hosts into despair. Channon played in Ramsey's final game in charge in the spring of 1974, and was called up by temporary replacement Joe Mercer for the Home Internationals, starting and completing all three games without scoring. This brief spell of profligacy was quickly curtailed as Channon scored in three of the four summer friendlies and then, when Don Revie took over and the focus switched to the 1976 European Championships, maintained his place in the team for the opening qualifiers at the end of 1974. (Matthew Rudd)

Czechoslovakia visited Wembley for the opening European Championships qualifier and England began in style with a 3-0 win. Channon opened the scoring and played a part in one of Colin Bell's later brace, but there was wastefulness from all branches of the England attack when Portugal came to Wembley a month later and got a goalless draw. Two fixtures against Cyrpus were then required to take England's hopes back on to the right track and Channon took a relaxed back seat as new striker partner Malcolm Macdonald scored all five in the Wembley whitewash, followed by a single Kevin Keegan goal in Limassol. Channon's facilility to be really useful on a team front shone through in these games, as they did during the 1975 Home Internationals when he didn't score but made his contribution in a 2-2 draw with Wales and then the superb 5-1 win over Scotland.

He returned to scoring form with the clincher in a 2-1 friendly win over Switzerland in September, prior to the crucial visits ahead to Czechoslovakia and Portugal to decide their fate for the following summer's European Championships. Channon emerged with all England's share of credit - he scored in both but England won neither (a 2-1 reverse in Bratislava; a 1-1 draw in Lisbon) and again the finals of a major tournament had eluded England. The summer of 1976 began with Mick picking up an FA Cup winners' medal with Southampton (they were not in the top flight yet pulled off a major shock by beating Manchester United) and continued with an eventful Home International tournament - Channon scored twice against Northern Ireland at Wembley, then smacked home a diving header to give England the lead at Hampden, only for Scotland to fight back and win 2-1 - and a mini-tournament in the USA to celebrate the bi-centenary. Channon scored twice in a fine New York comeback against Italy from 2-0 down to win 3-2 and had essentially become England's most feared and liked striker, despite his lack of a glamorous club and often spending his time in a lower division.

This was an indictment on the rest of England's footballing elite and the coaching thereof, and so the quest to get to the 1978 World Cup became all the more vital. Channon wouldn't see out the group, however - he scored in the opening win against Finland but was played too wide in a tactical purgatory against Italy in Rome and England lost 2-0. He put two away against Luxembourg in a 5-0 win which helped the group's goal difference and scored in two of the Home Internationals, but a move to Manchester City unsettled him both personally and form-wise, and he barely lasted beyond Revie's ill-fated tour of South America which saw the coach's controversial resignation. Ron Greenwood called Channon up for the friendly against Switzerland in September 1977 and then didn't ask him to return. Mick was not yet 30 and might have been useful, but his inability to transfer his glorious control of Southampton's goals table to Manchester City did for his international future. He went back to Southampton in 1979 but his England chances were long dead. A return of 21 goals in 46 games looks healthy; the reaility is that it's vastly underrated, with Channon playing in a badly misfiring England set-up and having to justify his selection more than most because of the supposedly lesser standards he often faced at club level. The fact that he emerged as England's best player within their worst period says it all about how good he was, and how abject much of the others were. (Matthew Rudd)