No. 15 — JIMMY MCMULLAN
— Alex James | 06/12/1930 —

I have several times listened to discussions as to the merits of those two famous left half-backs, Ernest Needham and Peter McWilliam. It seems to be agreed that they stood out among the players of their day, but we must leave the veterans to settle who was the better.

Who has been the best left-half since the war? I am not going to try to decide this question either, though since I have been in Lordon I have often been told that there never was such a player as Arthur Grimsdell. The Tottenham Hotspur man was, of course, a great half-back, powerful and accomplished in ball work, but I did not know him well enough to hold any decided views.

For my part, all I can say in this matter is that the best left-half with him I have played is Jimmy McMullan, of Manchester City.

McMullan passed out of a junior Sterlingshire club to Partick Thistle. The he came south to act as player-manager of the Kent club, Maidstone. Later he returned to Partick and was then transferred to Manchester City, with whom he has since remained.

A LINK OF SYMPATHY.

However you regard McMullan, he must be classed among the great men of football. To me he makes a special appeal because I think we have the same outlook and ideas as to how the game should be played. We have played together only in the Scottish teams, and yet on these rare occasions I have felt that we understood each other as thoroughly as if we had been club-mates. There was a link of sympathy solidly forged which I can neither define nor adequately express. It just existed in a perfectly natural way. In fact, I do not think I have ever been so happy on a field as when I have had Jimmy McMullan behind me.

I do not remember ever to have shouted to McMullan for the ball. I knew it was not necessary. If it were possible that anything could be done with the ball, it was certain that I should get it. A man who is hopelessly covered does not get the ball from McMullan. It has to go elsewhere.

But if I were covered I should know that I was in the wrong, or that I had failed to anticipate the possibilities of some situation. In the ordinary way he does not give you the ball directly. His scheme is to put it into space, so to speak, and so enable you to run into an unmarked position to obtain it. This, according to my idea, is the real science of half-back play.

THAT SWERVING PASS.

McMullan also is a half-back who serves his inside and outside forwards equally well, and I think Morton would appreciate playing in front of him just as much as I have done. He has one pass to a wing-man which I have never seen any other half-back make. In sending the ball low down the line it seems that it is sure to go out of play, but, instead, it swerves inwards and reaches the forward on his right-hand side. At first you may think this swerving ball an accident, but I have seen McMullan make this pass dozens of times, and usually it deceives the opponent intending to intercept it.

Spectacularly, McMullan is at his best in attack, but in a quiet way he is equally effective in defence. I have never seen him flustered. Unlike some men, when in a difficulty, it is not his way to kick blindly and make a present of the ball to the opposition. On every occasion he plays with a purpose. 

Though small, he is strongly built and he tackles finely. He also gets up well when the ball is in the air, and by his clever anticipation he saves himself a lot of running about. But I like to see McMullan best with the ball at his feet. As I have said, I have seen no half-back who could do so much with it.