Maurice Norman (8 May 1934 – 27 November 2022) was an English

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby lea ...

who played nearly 400 times in

the Football League The English Football League (EFL) is a league of professional football clubs from England and Wales. Founded in 1888 as the Football League, it is the oldest football league in the world, and was the top-level football league in England from ...

as a

centre half In the sport of association football, a defender is an Glossary of association football terms#O, outfield player whose primary role is to stop attacks during the game and prevent the opposition from scoring. Defenders fall into four main categ ...

for

Norwich City Norwich City Football Club is a professional football club based in Norwich, Norfolk, England. The club competes in the Championship, the second tier of English football. The club was founded in 1902. Since 1935, Norwich have played their h ...

and

Tottenham Hotspur Tottenham Hotspur Football Club, commonly referred to as simply Tottenham (, , , ) or Spurs, is a professional Association football, football club based in Tottenham, North London, England. The club itself has stated that it should always ...

. At international level, Norman won 23

caps Caps are flat headgear. Caps or CAPS may also refer to: Science and technology Computing * CESG Assisted Products Service, provided by the U.K. Government Communications Headquarters * Composite Application Platform Suite, by Java Caps, a Java ...

for the England national team.

Club career

Norman was born in Mulbarton,

Norfolk Norfolk ( ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in England, located in East Anglia and officially part of the East of England region. It borders Lincolnshire and The Wash to the north-west, the North Sea to the north and eas ...

. He began his career at

, and played 35 league matches for the Canaries between 1952 and 1955. Despite such a short career with the club, he was elected into the Norwich City Hall of Fame in 2002. He signed for

in November 1955 for a £28,000 transfer fee, that also included the return transfer of Ireland international striker Johnny Gavin to Norwich. Norman played his first game for his new club against Cardiff City, and stayed at White Hart Lane until 1965, making 411 first-team appearances and scoring 19 goals for Spurs. He was an integral part of Bill Nicholson's

Double Double, The Double or Dubble may refer to: Mathematics and computing * Multiplication by 2 * Double precision, a floating-point representation of numbers that is typically 64 bits in length * A double number of the form x+yj, where j^2=+1 * A ...

-winning Tottenham team of 1960–61 that went on to retain the FA Cup in

1962 The year saw the Cuban Missile Crisis, which is often considered the closest the world came to a Nuclear warfare, nuclear confrontation during the Cold War. Events January * January 1 – Samoa, Western Samoa becomes independent from Ne ...

, and win the 1963 Cup Winners' Cup.

International career

At international level, Norman made 23 appearances for

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

, including in the 1962 World Cup. He was also a member of the England squad at the 1958 World Cup, but did not play. He suffered a double fracture of

tibia The tibia (; : tibiae or tibias), also known as the shinbone or shankbone, is the larger, stronger, and anterior (frontal) of the two Leg bones, bones in the leg below the knee in vertebrates (the other being the fibula, behind and to the outsi ...

and

fibula The fibula (: fibulae or fibulas) or calf bone is a leg bone on the lateral side of the tibia, to which it is connected above and below. It is the smaller of the two bones and, in proportion to its length, the most slender of all the long bones. ...

playing for Spurs against a Hungarian Select XI in November 1965, which brought a premature end to his career.

Personal life and death

In 2014, Norman was diagnosed with vascular dementia. Norman died from cancer on 27 November 2022, at the age of 88.

Honours

Tottenham Hotspur * English 1st division: 1960–61 *

FA Cup The Football Association Challenge Cup, more commonly known as the FA Cup, is an annual Single-elimination tournament, knockout association football, football competition in domestic Football in England, English football. First played during ...

: 1960–61, 1961–62 * UEFA European Cup Winners' Cup: 1962/63

References

External links

A human colossus
article at MEHSTG, a Tottenham Hotspur fansite

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Norman, Maurice 1934 births 2022 deaths People from Mulbarton, Norfolk English men's footballers England men's international footballers England men's under-23 international footballers Men's association football defenders Norwich City F.C. players Tottenham Hotspur F.C. players English Football League players 1958 FIFA World Cup players 1962 FIFA World Cup players London XI players English Football League representative players Footballers from Norfolk People with vascular dementia Deaths from cancer in England