Karl Darlow – could he become Cymru’s oldest debutant?

by Russell Todd, with Ian Garland

In episode 177 of the podcast, Leon and I discussed Craig Bellamy’s maiden squad announcement, and one of the headline selections in an otherwise pretty routine selection was the inclusion of Leeds United goalkeeper Karl Darlow.

Much has been said on social media about his decision, finally, to declare allegiance for the land of his grandfather – Ken Leek a member of Cymru’s 1958 World Cup squad who won 13 caps scoring 5 goals – after turning down approaches in 2013 and 2018.

An interesting and hitherto overlooked element to Darlow’s selection is where, at 33, he would rank in the pantheon of oldest debutants should he be capped against either Türkiye or Montenegro this month.

And herein lies an interesting quirk related to Bellamy’s brand new back room team.

When Martyn Margetson, Bellamy’s new goalkeeper coach, replaced Danny Coyne at half time versus Canada at The Racecourse in 2004, he became Cymru’s oldest postwar debutant, at the age of 32 years and 265 days.

Margetson was some 58 days older than Arthur ‘Buller’ Lever the previous oldest postwar debutant, who made his debut in Wally Barnes’ absence versus Scotland in October 1952 aged 32y. and 207d.. Lever reportedly struggled against the great Scottish winger, Billy Liddell, and he did not win another cap. But this should not cloud Lever’s reputation as an excellent defender, who was unlucky to play at right back in an era when Barnes and Alf Sherwood were his international competition.

Less than a year earlier, Glyn Williams had claimed the postwar record when he too was selected in Barnes’ absence (he was on an Arsenal tour of Brazil) to face Switzerland in November 1951. Williams was 32y. 191d. on debut and he too did not win another cap.

More recent 30+ debutants include the popular Roger Freestone who Mark Hughes capped in the 2000 friendly versus Brazil ( 31y. 9m. 4d) and Dave Williams (30y. 11m. 14d.) who won five caps in 1986 after making his debut in a 2-1 win against Saudi Arabia in Al Khobar.

Curiously, is Williams the first player to make his international debut after managing on a full-time basis, in the Football League? Williams was promoted to player-manager at Bristol Rovers at the tender age of 27 in 1983, before Norwich City bought him at the start of the 1985-86 season, the season he made his international bow. Williams later caretaker managed Norwich and Wales.

So, who pre-war were older on debut than Margetson? It’s not uncommon to have made debuts post 30 in the pre-war era with the likes of Fred Dewey (1930, 32y. 14d.), Jack Jenkins (1924, 31y. 10m. 30d.), John Neal (1930, 31y. 10m. 26d.), and Tom Davies (1904, 31y. 23 d.) all relatively advanced in age when the Cymru call finally came.

In his book Y Crysau Cochion Gwynfor Jones refers to two, frustratingly unnamed, players older than Margetson on debut and we have to go all the way back to the days when international football was still in its infancy to have an idea who these were…and who Darlow is competing with for the title of Cymru’s oldest debutant. So with Ian Garland’s help, I’ve been doing some digging.

According to Ian’s sublime Sons of Cambria Vol. 1, co-written with Gareth M. Davies, the player listed as Cymru’s 18^th ever cap, James Davies, “must have been 33 when he played against Scotland on 23 March 1878”, Cymru’s third ever game. Even though Ian has not to date located a date of birth for James Davies, he does know the date he was baptised: 16 June 1844. So Davies was definitely at least 33. Incidentally, Davies is the only FAW president who could say he played for Cymru.

John Evans (cap #152) appears to be the other candidate, but it’s hard to be precise as we do not know his date of birth either. According to Ian, “Evans’s year of birth was probably extrapolated from his obituary. There were about six likely candidates for his precise birth [but] we couldn’t get beyond the year.

In the Victorian era, the Ireland away trip was never a popular gig. The voyage was off-putting which is probably why Welsh teams in Ireland tended to be weaker than usual. This could have been a factor in explaining Evans’s call up, but given Cymru were in the middle of a dreadful run of form – without a win in ten matches and four straight defeats – selectors were presumably keen to find the right playing blend to halt the run. However, in April 1893 at Ulsterville in Belfast the run continued with a 4-3 defeat, but the Oswestry United player retained his place for the next two matches, his three caps proving the sum total of his international career.

Calculators out! Let’s do the maths for Davies and Evans and see how Darlow compares.

Davies and Evans could have been born anytime between 1 January and 31 December in their respective birth years (1844; 1859). But since we know Davies’s baptism date in his case we can narrow things down to the first 6 months of 1844; so let us assume Davies was baptised within a month of his birth. On their respective debuts:

d.o.b.	Davies	Evans
b.1 Jan	34y. 2 m. 23 d.	34y. 3 m. 8 d.
b. 16 May	33y. 10m. 8d.
b. 31 Dec		33y. 3 m. 9 d.

On the day of the Türkiye game, Karl Darlow will be 33y. 10m. 30d., and already older than Davies reasonably might have been, and older than Evans at the youngest he could have been.

Darlow turns 34 just ahead of the October international window and if he still hasn’t made his debut by the time the November window comes round against Türkiye and Iceland, he will only be 6 weeks younger than Davies was at the oldest he could have been; and 8 weeks younger than Evans could have been at his oldest.

If either Davies or Evans were born in April or later in 1844 and 1859, Darlow could become Cymru’s oldest ever debutant in November. But there would remain that caveat that we can’t be 100% certain without knowing for sure when either was born. Darlow would, however, overtake Margetson as the oldest post-war debutant, as well as become the oldest debutant of the Twentieth and Twenty-First centuries, and oldest for 130 years.

To avoid any doubt whatsoever Darlow will have to wait until 2025 to win a cap for him to unquestionably become Cymru’s oldest ever debutant.

But having been so lukewarm in his commitment to the Cymru cause for so long, whether he’d entertain warming the bench for the next six months is another question entirely…..