John Bovill
Birthdate: 21 March 1886
Birthplace: Rutherglen, Lanarkshire, Scotland
Other clubs: Strathclyde Juniors, Rangers (1907-08), Blackburn Rovers (1908-09), Chesterfield Town (1909-11), Linfield (1914-19)
Bought from: Chesterfield Town
Signed for LFC: N/A, April 1911
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Liverpool debut: 04.09.1911
Last appearance: 25.10.1913
Debut goal: 04.11.1911
Last goal: 06.01.1912
Contract expiry: May 1914
Win ratio: 37.93% W: 11 D: 4 L: 14
Games/goals ratio: 4.14
LFC league games/goals: 27 / 7
Total LFC games/goals: 29 / 7
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Player profile
When Chesterfield lost its League status, fiery-tempered Bovill stayed with the club, scoring 31 goals in 77 Midland league games. Bovill made 29 appearances for Liverpool in the period leading up to World War I. The bulk of those games were in the 1911/12 season, when he scored seven times from 25 matches. He was to make only a further four appearances for the club in the next two seasons, the club programme complaining that his main fault was "lack of deadliness in front of goal", but his main strength being a "hard worker" and delivering "neat, low forward passes of value to his partners". The Liverpool Echo reported on his transfer: "John Bovill, the ex-Chesterfield and Scottish player, has gone to Ireland. He is to help Linfield, and Ireland will be all the richer in good fun, for this comedian of a player will delight the Irish folk even more than he did the Liverpool crowd."