6' 2.5" 11st.7lb.
b. Churwell 25 November 1920
d. Kingsthorpe 13 July 1991
 

Debut  10 November 1951 (30y 350d) Final Game 21 April 1956 (35y 147d)
CAREER:Churwell Council Sc;Halifax Town Mar'44[22];Bolton Wanderers Mar'47[31];Blackburn Rovers Nov'51 (£3,000);Northampton Town Jul'56-'59 (£500)[67].
 

FL         192 apps
FAC       16 apps
Total    208  apps
Penalty record  F 24 SC 17 Sv 4 M 1 Sv-R 2
Minutes per goal  61  Clean Sheet %  30
Longest unbeaten  322m First conceded 83m
Most goals one game  8
LC           3 apps
Minutes per goal  45

If the Australian cricketer Ken Grieves had not had an abscess on the base of his spine, Elvy would never have become a Rover. Desperate for a player to start immediately they dashed to Bolton to sign Grieves but finding him unwell signed Elvy instead. In doing so they acquired the prototype goalkeeper, tall, skeletal with huge hands he was one of the few goalkeepers of the day comfortable with the high shot that needs tipping over the bar. He also got down quickly for a tall man but his eyesight that required him to wear contact lenses was his Achilles heel. Strangely Elvy had commenced his schoolboy career on the wing, but genetics and family tradition (his father Reg Hatfield Elvy was Churwell's goalkeeper before the First War) had placed him between the posts before he played for Morley & District schools. After starting work as a cabinet maker, he joined the RAF in 1941. Recommended to Halifax by his station officer, the son of the Halifax manager, James Thompson, he was signed by the club and never went back to his old trade. For the Rovers he was a marvellous servant, unmoved by playing behind a team who always believed they could score one more than the opposition. He finished his playing days in Northampton, worked as a representative for a brewery and scouted occasionally for the Rovers.