Mel Blyth

Mel Blyth

Personal information
Full name	Melvin Bernard Blyth
Date of birth	28 July 1944 (1944-07-28) (age 67)
Place of birth	Norwich, England
Height	6 ft 1 in (1.85 m)
Playing position	Centre back
Youth career
	Norwich City
Senior career*
Years	Team	Apps†	(Gls)†
1967–1968	Scunthorpe United	27	(3)
1968–1974	Crystal Palace	216	(9)
1974–1977	Southampton	105	(6)
1977–1978	→ Crystal Palace (loan)	6	(0)
1978	Cape Town City
1978	Margate
1978–1981	Millwall	75	(0)
1980	Houston Hurricane (summer)
1981	Bulova (Hong Kong)
1982	Andover
* Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only. † Appearances (Goals).

Melvin Bernard "Mel" Blyth (born Norwich, England on 28 July 1944) is a former footballer, who played for several clubs, including Southampton with whom he won the FA Cup in 1976.

Norwich City and Scunthorpe United

Mel Blyth started his football career with non-league Great Yarmouth. He then joined Norwich City, although he never made an appearance in the first team.

When, in October 1967, former Norwich manager, Ron Ashman, took up the reins at Scunthorpe United, then struggling at the foot of Division 3, he returned to his old club to sign several players, including Steve Deere, Geoff Barnard and Mel Blyth to shore up the holes in the defence.

Unfortunately, Scunthorpe were relegated at the end of the 1967-68 season and in July 1968, Mel moved on to Crystal Palace.

Crystal Palace

Mel joined Crystal Palace in the summer of 1968 as an old-style wing-half, but he developed into a centre-back. He immediately became a regular member of Palace’s 1968-69 Division 2 promotion side, and the in their first ever match in Division 1, he scored Palace’s first goal in the top flight with a looping header against Manchester United. He followed this with another goal against Everton on the following Saturday.

As Palace struggled in Division 1, regularly finishing just above the relegation zone, Mel became a permanent fixture in the Palace defence alongside John McCormick. He was deposed as centre back for a while by Roger Hynd but after playing in midfield for much of the 1969-70 season he won his place back when Hynd was temporarily switched to the forward line. The contrasting styles of Blyth and McCormick made for a good mix, and the two of them stayed together until McCormick's retirement, near the end of Bert Head's time in charge.

Palace eventually lost their fight to avoid relegation at the end of the 1972-73 season, under manager Malcolm Allison. In the following season, Mel had a long spell of injury and Palace went straight on down into Division 3. Shortly after the start of the 1974-75 season, in the same week that Ian Evans arrived from QPR, Mel was signed by Southampton for a fee of £60,000.

Southampton

Saints paid £60,000 for Mel Blyth in September 1974 – he was one of Lawrie McMenemy’s first over-30 signings. His move to The Dell renewed his enthusiasm and there he played the best football of his career. Blyth’s impact in his first season at The Dell was such that he was voted the supporters’ player of the year.

His effective partnership with Jim Steele was the mainstay of Saints’ victorious FA Cup run of 1976, including beating his former club, Crystal Palace, in the semi-final.

By the end of the 1976-77 season, six of the twelve players from Saints Cup-winning side had left the club; Mel was the seventh after he had argued with McMenemy about breaking up the cup-winning team too quickly. The arrival of Chris Nicholl, in 1977, signalled the end of 33-year-old Mel’s sojourn on the South coast and, after a brief return to Palace, he completed his League career with Millwall.

In total he made 136 appearances for the Saints, scoring 7 goals.

Back to Crystal Palace

Mel re-appeared in Palace’s colours in November 1977, when Terry Venables signed him on loan, after Ian Evans, who had replaced him in 1974, had broken his leg.

In both stints at Palace, Mel made 262 first team appearances scoring 12 goals.

Millwall

In the summer of 1978 he moved to non-league Margate, and then in November 1978, he moved on to Millwall, where he made a further 86 appearances.

Foreign Adventures

In the 1978 close-season he played for Cape Town City, then managed by former Palace coach, Frank Lord. At Cape Town, he played alongside Mick Channon & Kevin Keegan. He later played for Houston Hurricane, before a spell in 1981 in Hong Kong with Bulova alongside Charlie George and Barry Haines (formerly at Spurs). After falling out with the manager, Ron Wylie, Mel returned to England, ending his career at non-league Andover.

After football

Although he was an electrician by trade, Mel later became a driving instructor but, by November 1990 he was running his own building firm in south London. In 2003 he was a director of a building company and also a part-time coach in Crystal Palace’s schoolboy academy.

Honours

As a player

With Southampton F.C.

• FA Cup winner 1976

References

• Duncan Holley & Gary Chalk (2003). In That Number - A post-war chronicle of Southampton FC. Hagiology. ISBN 0-9534474-3-X. 

• Tim Manns (2006). Tie a Yellow Ribbon: How the Saints Won the Cup. Hagiology. ISBN 0-9534474-6-4. 

Persondata
Name	Blyth, Mel
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	28 July 1944
Place of birth	Norwich, England
Date of death
Place of death