There have been some tight finishes in fairest and best counts throughout the land over the years, but the 1967 Sandover Medal would have to be one of the closest ever. One vote separated the seven highest votewinners. Billy Walker(Swan Districts) and John Parkinson(Claremont) tied for first with eighteen votes, while Barry Cable(Perth), Brian France(West Perth), Lorne Cook(Claremont), Fred Lewis(East Fremantle), and Norm Cox(South Fremantle) all received seventeen. It was an elite group of players, any of whom would have been a worthy winner, but in the case of Cox, it was all the more meritorious because he was a first year player.  Sadly, though, he was to play only three seasons of league football, another example of a country player unable for various reasons to achieve his full potential in the city.  The twenty three year old Norm Cox burst onto the football scene in 1967, after South had beaten off advances from East Fremantle, West Perth, and Claremont to snare the rover from Kellerberrin, despite the fact that West Perth' s legendary administrator, Len Roper, was his uncle. “Corp Reilly, South's star ruckman/defender, was also an uncle, which made Graeme and John Reilly my cousins,” Cox said. “I'd committed to them that I'd be playing at Souths if anywhere.” Cox had already won a fairest and best at Kellerberrin,at the age of eighteen the youngest ever at the time, and the arrival of the ferocious, hard working rover at Fremantle Oval had been much anticipated.  After that exhilarating year of 67, in which he won the League's best first year player award as well as the Walker Medal as South Fremantle's fairest and best, and was instrumental in the club playing in the finals, Cox virtually disappeared for two years before returning for one more year in 1970, then giving the league scene away.  “I'd been warned about the “second year blues” by coach John Todd, and was determined to beat it,” he recalled. “We trained at Lancelin, I was jumping out of my skin, then I put a stake through my foot, jumping off the tractor.  I should have stayed at Kellerberrin till the foot was better, but I kept at it, ending up with shin soreness, which ended my season.” While Cox was laid up with his foot, the South Fremantle footballers went to Kellerberrin to lend a hand with the fencing. The big hands of ruckman Ivan Glucina were big assetts on the footy field, but Norm reckons he'd be worth his weight in gold on the farm. “Where the other blokes were struggling pulling one wire through the posts at a time, Ivan was doing five, no trouble at all,” he laughed.   In 1969, Cox took on the playing coach position at Kellerberrin, taking his side from last to first, eventually going down in the preliminary final, but his form at country week was good enough for new South coach Hassa Mann to want him back at South from the farm.  Back at the Bulldogs in 1970, he became part of the South revival, and the side qualified for the finals after finishing at the bottom the previous year. They went on to win the premiership, but it was without Norm Cox. “Second semi finalists, we had a scratch match on the weekend of the first semi, and when Greg Ryan broke a collarbone in the final stages, it was considered a good idea to call it quits,” said Norm. “But the coach asked for another ten minutes, and in that time I got a broken toe, which ruled me out of the finals.” Cox decided to return to the farm in 1971. “I'd had to travel to Perth and back each weekend,” he said. “I enjoyed my time with South, although shattered at missing out on a flag, but felt it was time to go back home. My one regret was being unable to be a “whole” part of the club, taking part in the week's training and sharing the ups and downs. That's the big disadvantage of living in the country and playing in the city.”   Captain coaching Baandee in 1971-72, Cox then returned to Kellerberrin and won two more fairest and bests, the last one in 1979 at the age of thirty five. Norm nominated Claremont's Darryl Kilburn as a tough man to beat. “He was always niggling at you,” while saying that East Perth's “Dobbie” Graham was a class act. He paid tribute to two team mates in Murray Macdonald and John Reilly as great players. Norm Cox has swapped farm life for the seaside, where he is now a lending manager for Homeloans Ltd at Mandurah and is a keen golfer and fisherman. He and wife Marilyn have two daughters, Sharon and Narelle, and a son, Greg. Both daughters were prominent tennis players, with Narelle competing on the European professional circuit. Sharon was a member of the victorious Western Australian contingent that won the Jack Pizzey Cup, an annual secondary school-based tennis event.  Greg concentrated on golf and played on a 2 handicap as a teenager. Norm Cox only played sixty games with South Fremantle, but proved himself in a fleeting career as a tough, hard working rover who made a habit of winning the hard ball, and in 1967 was right up there with Cable, Walker, Doncon, and Parkinson, as one of the best.