Luke McCormick
Encyclopedia
Luke Martin McCormick is a former English
football goalkeeper. He played for Plymouth Argyle
between 2003 and 2008, but his contract was cancelled by mutual consent in July 2008 after he caused a car crash which killed two children. On 6 October 2008, he was sentenced to seven years and four months in prison, for two counts of causing death by dangerous driving
and driving with excess alcohol
.
as a backup for Romain Larrieu
, but when Larrieu sustained an injury to his cruciate knee ligaments
, he soon proved himself a competent replacement. Upon winning a 2–0 game over Stockport County
on 24 January 2004, McCormick set a new club record of seven consecutive clean sheets, leading him to be voted the most promising player of the 2003–04 season by Plymouth Argyle fans.
Larrieu regained his place as first choice keeper shortly into the 2004–05 season. In October 2004, the Plymouth Argyle manager, Bobby Williamson
sent McCormick on loan to Boston United
of League Two
, so that he could continue playing first-team football.
Linked with a move away to Leicester with former Argyle manager Ian Holloway
, McCormick put in a series of important and impressive displays in the final matches of the 2007–08 season.
on suspicion of causing death by dangerous driving. Returning from the wedding of former team-mate David Norris
, McCormick's Range Rover
collided with a Toyota Previa
at 5.45am between junctions 15 and 16 of the southbound M6 motorway
, near to Keele
Services in Staffordshire
. The crash resulted in the death of Arron and Ben Peak, aged ten and eight, from the Partington area of Manchester
. Their father, Philip, the driver of the Previa, was taken to the University Hospital of North Staffordshire
with fractures to the neck, back, ribs and swelling of the lungs; while a 49-year-old man and his two sons, aged eight and fifteen, were treated for minor injuries. The group was travelling from the Manchester area to Silverstone
in Northamptonshire
to watch the World Series by Renault
motorsport event.
The following day, McCormick was charged by Staffordshire Police
with two counts of causing death by dangerous driving
, driving with excess alcohol in his blood
, and driving with no insurance. He appeared at Fenton
Magistrates' Court on 9 June and was granted conditional bail until 16 June when he appeared at Stoke-on-Trent
Crown Court. At this hearing the charge of driving without insurance was dropped against McCormick and the case was adjourned until 8 September and subsequently to 6 October.
On 2 July 2008, McCormick was suspended by Plymouth Argyle
, and his contract was cancelled by mutual consent on 22 July. He pleaded guilty to charges of causing death by dangerous driving and driving with excess alcohol, and received a sentence of seven years and four months' imprisonment on 6 October.
|-
|2000–01
||rowspan="5"|Plymouth Argyle
||rowspan="2"|Third Division
||1||0||colspan="2"|-||colspan="2"|-||1||0
|-
|2001–02
||0||0||colspan="2"|-||colspan="2"|-||0||0
|-
|2002–03
||rowspan="2"|Second Division
||3||0||colspan="2"|-||colspan="2"|-||3||0
|-
|2003–04
||40||0||1||0||colspan="2"|-||41||0
|-
|2004–05
||Championship
||23||0||colspan="2"|-||1||0||24||0
|-
|2004–05
||Boston United
||League Two
||2||0||colspan="2"|-||colspan="2"|-||2||0
|-
|2005–06
||rowspan="3"|Plymouth Argyle
||rowspan="3"|Championship
||1||0||colspan="2"|-||2||0||3||0
|-
|2006–07
||40||0||5||0||1||0||46||0
|-
|2007–08
||30||0||2||0||3||0||35||0
140||0||8||0||7||0||155||0
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
football goalkeeper. He played for Plymouth Argyle
Plymouth Argyle F.C.
Plymouth Argyle Football Club is an English professional football club, based in Plymouth, Devon, that plays in Football League Two.Since becoming professional in 1903, the club has won five Football League titles, five Southern League titles and one Western League title. The 2009–10 season was the...
between 2003 and 2008, but his contract was cancelled by mutual consent in July 2008 after he caused a car crash which killed two children. On 6 October 2008, he was sentenced to seven years and four months in prison, for two counts of causing death by dangerous driving
Death by dangerous driving
Causing death by dangerous driving is a statutory offence in England and Wales and Scotland and Northern Ireland. It is an aggravated form of dangerous driving...
and driving with excess alcohol
Driving under the influence
Driving under the influence is the act of driving a motor vehicle with blood levels of alcohol in excess of a legal limit...
.
Career
McCormick was a professional footballer who started the 2003–04 season at Plymouth ArgylePlymouth Argyle F.C.
Plymouth Argyle Football Club is an English professional football club, based in Plymouth, Devon, that plays in Football League Two.Since becoming professional in 1903, the club has won five Football League titles, five Southern League titles and one Western League title. The 2009–10 season was the...
as a backup for Romain Larrieu
Romain Larrieu
Romain Larrieu is a French footballer who is currently a goalkeeper/first team coach for Plymouth Argyle. Having joined them in 2000 from Valence, he is their longest serving current player and club captain.-Playing career:...
, but when Larrieu sustained an injury to his cruciate knee ligaments
Cruciate ligament
Cruciate ligaments are pairs of ligaments arranged like a letter X. They occur in several joints of the body, such as the knee...
, he soon proved himself a competent replacement. Upon winning a 2–0 game over Stockport County
Stockport County F.C.
Stockport County Football Club is an English football club based in Stockport, Greater Manchester. The club formed in 1883 as Heaton Norris Rovers, shortly afterwards merging with Heaton Norris F.C., and adopted the current name on 24 May 1890 on the creation of the County Borough of Stockport...
on 24 January 2004, McCormick set a new club record of seven consecutive clean sheets, leading him to be voted the most promising player of the 2003–04 season by Plymouth Argyle fans.
Larrieu regained his place as first choice keeper shortly into the 2004–05 season. In October 2004, the Plymouth Argyle manager, Bobby Williamson
Bobby Williamson
Robert "Bobby" Williamson is a former association footballer who is currently manager of the Uganda national football team. He previously managed Kilmarnock and Hibernian in the Scottish Premier League and Plymouth Argyle in the Football League Championship.-Playing career:As a player, Williamson...
sent McCormick on loan to Boston United
Boston United F.C.
Boston United Football Club are an association football club based in Boston, Lincolnshire, England. They currently play in the Conference North. The club is known as 'the Pilgrims' in reference to the Pilgrim Fathers, who fled from Boston to the USA and founded Boston, Massachusetts. The club's...
of League Two
Football League Two
Football League Two is the third-highest division of The Football League and fourth-highest division overall in the English football league system....
, so that he could continue playing first-team football.
Linked with a move away to Leicester with former Argyle manager Ian Holloway
Ian Holloway
Ian Scott Holloway is an English football manager and former player. He became the manager of Blackpool in May 2009. Holloway is well-known amongst football fans for his off-the-wall interviews, with a wide selection of quotes and soundbites being printed. Holloway's playing career spanned 18...
, McCormick put in a series of important and impressive displays in the final matches of the 2007–08 season.
Honours
With Plymouth ArgylePlymouth Argyle F.C.
Plymouth Argyle Football Club is an English professional football club, based in Plymouth, Devon, that plays in Football League Two.Since becoming professional in 1903, the club has won five Football League titles, five Southern League titles and one Western League title. The 2009–10 season was the...
- 2001-022001-02 in English footballThe 2001-02 season was the 122nd season of competitive football in England.-Arsenal cruise to title glory:In what had earlier been one of the most closely fought Premiership title races for years, Arsenal won the championship by seven points. Their crown was won in the penultimate game of the...
Division ThreeFootball League Third DivisionThe Football League Third Division was the 3 tier of English Football from 1920 until 1992 when after the formation of the Football Association Premier League saw the league renamed The Football League Division Two...
Champions - 2003-042003-04 in English footballThe 2003-04 season was the 124th season of competitive football in England.-Overview:Arsenal completed the entire campaign without losing a single league game....
Division TwoFootball League Second DivisionFrom 1892 until 1992, the Football League Second Division was the second highest division overall in English football.This ended with the creation of the FA Premier League, prior to the start of the 1992–93 season, which caused an administrative split between The Football League and the teams...
Champions
Car crash and conviction
On 7 June 2008, McCormick was arrested by patrol units of the Central Motorway Police GroupCentral Motorway Police Group
The Central Motorway Police Group is a co-operative operation between three police forces in the West Midlands of England. Officers from the three forces involved - Staffordshire Police, West Mercia Police and West Midlands Police - provide a dedicated policing service on several hundred miles of...
on suspicion of causing death by dangerous driving. Returning from the wedding of former team-mate David Norris
David Norris (footballer)
David Martin Norris is an English footballer who plays for Football League Championship club Portsmouth as a midfielder, having previously played for Boston United, Bolton Wanderers, Hull City, Plymouth Argyle and Ipswich Town....
, McCormick's Range Rover
Range Rover
The Range Rover is a large luxury four-wheel drive sport utility vehicle produced by British car maker Land Rover. The model, launched in 1970, is now in its third generation...
collided with a Toyota Previa
Toyota Previa
The Toyota Previa, also known as the Toyota Estima in Japan and the Toyota Tarago in Australia, is an MPV or multi-purpose vehicle produced by Toyota Motor Corporation since 1990...
at 5.45am between junctions 15 and 16 of the southbound M6 motorway
M6 motorway
The M6 motorway runs from junction 19 of the M1 at the Catthorpe Interchange, near Rugby via Birmingham then heads north, passing Stoke-on-Trent, Manchester, Preston, Carlisle and terminating at the Gretna junction . Here, just short of the Scottish border it becomes the A74 which continues to...
, near to Keele
Keele
Keele is a village and civil parish in northern Staffordshire, England. It is approximately three miles west of Newcastle-under-Lyme, and is close to the village of Silverdale...
Services in Staffordshire
Staffordshire
Staffordshire is a landlocked county in the West Midlands region of England. For Eurostat purposes, the county is a NUTS 3 region and is one of four counties or unitary districts that comprise the "Shropshire and Staffordshire" NUTS 2 region. Part of the National Forest lies within its borders...
. The crash resulted in the death of Arron and Ben Peak, aged ten and eight, from the Partington area of Manchester
Manchester
Manchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...
. Their father, Philip, the driver of the Previa, was taken to the University Hospital of North Staffordshire
University Hospital of North Staffordshire
The University Hospital of North Staffordshire is a major teaching & research hospital in Hartshill, Stoke-on-Trent, England, near the border with Newcastle-under-Lyme...
with fractures to the neck, back, ribs and swelling of the lungs; while a 49-year-old man and his two sons, aged eight and fifteen, were treated for minor injuries. The group was travelling from the Manchester area to Silverstone
Silverstone Circuit
Silverstone Circuit is an English motor racing circuit next to the Northamptonshire villages of Silverstone and Whittlebury. The circuit straddles the Northamptonshire and Buckinghamshire border, with the current main circuit entry on the Buckinghamshire side...
in Northamptonshire
Northamptonshire
Northamptonshire is a landlocked county in the English East Midlands, with a population of 629,676 as at the 2001 census. It has boundaries with the ceremonial counties of Warwickshire to the west, Leicestershire and Rutland to the north, Cambridgeshire to the east, Bedfordshire to the south-east,...
to watch the World Series by Renault
World Series by Renault
The World Series by Renault, formerly the World Series by Nissan from 1998 to 2004, is a motor racing series. The series consists of the flagship Formula Renault 3.5 Series , the Eurocup Formula Renault 2.0 and the Eurocup Mégane Trophy...
motorsport event.
The following day, McCormick was charged by Staffordshire Police
Staffordshire Police
Staffordshire Police is the territorial police force responsible for policing Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent in the West Midlands of England...
with two counts of causing death by dangerous driving
Death by dangerous driving
Causing death by dangerous driving is a statutory offence in England and Wales and Scotland and Northern Ireland. It is an aggravated form of dangerous driving...
, driving with excess alcohol in his blood
Driving under the influence
Driving under the influence is the act of driving a motor vehicle with blood levels of alcohol in excess of a legal limit...
, and driving with no insurance. He appeared at Fenton
Fenton, Staffordshire
Fenton is one of the six towns of the Stoke-on-Trent conurbation which were federated in 1910. It is situated in the south-east of the city. Arnold Bennett called his fictionalised version of Stoke on Trent the "Five Towns", and Fenton has been dubbed the town Arnold Bennett...
Magistrates' Court on 9 June and was granted conditional bail until 16 June when he appeared at Stoke-on-Trent
Stoke-on-Trent
Stoke-on-Trent , also called The Potteries is a city in Staffordshire, England, which forms a linear conurbation almost 12 miles long, with an area of . Together with the Borough of Newcastle-under-Lyme Stoke forms The Potteries Urban Area...
Crown Court. At this hearing the charge of driving without insurance was dropped against McCormick and the case was adjourned until 8 September and subsequently to 6 October.
On 2 July 2008, McCormick was suspended by Plymouth Argyle
Plymouth Argyle F.C.
Plymouth Argyle Football Club is an English professional football club, based in Plymouth, Devon, that plays in Football League Two.Since becoming professional in 1903, the club has won five Football League titles, five Southern League titles and one Western League title. The 2009–10 season was the...
, and his contract was cancelled by mutual consent on 22 July. He pleaded guilty to charges of causing death by dangerous driving and driving with excess alcohol, and received a sentence of seven years and four months' imprisonment on 6 October.
Career statistics
(correct as of 16 June 2008)|-
|2000–01
The Football League 2000-01
-Overview:The 2000–2001 season was the 101st completed season of the The Football League.- First Division playoffs :-First Division :...
||rowspan="5"|Plymouth Argyle
Plymouth Argyle F.C.
Plymouth Argyle Football Club is an English professional football club, based in Plymouth, Devon, that plays in Football League Two.Since becoming professional in 1903, the club has won five Football League titles, five Southern League titles and one Western League title. The 2009–10 season was the...
||rowspan="2"|Third Division
Football League Third Division
The Football League Third Division was the 3 tier of English Football from 1920 until 1992 when after the formation of the Football Association Premier League saw the league renamed The Football League Division Two...
||1||0||colspan="2"|-||colspan="2"|-||1||0
|-
|2001–02
The Football League 2001-02
-Overview:The 2001–2002 season was the 102nd completed season of The Football League.-Final league tables and results :The tables below are reproduced here in the exact form that they can be found at website, with home and away statistics separated...
||0||0||colspan="2"|-||colspan="2"|-||0||0
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|2002–03
The Football League 2002-03
The 2002–2003 season was the 103rd completed season of The Football League.-Football League First Division:Portsmouth won the First Division by some distance, passing manager Harry Redknapp’s old club, West Ham on the way down. Leicester City earned a somewhat controversial promotion, as...
||rowspan="2"|Second Division
Football League Second Division
From 1892 until 1992, the Football League Second Division was the second highest division overall in English football.This ended with the creation of the FA Premier League, prior to the start of the 1992–93 season, which caused an administrative split between The Football League and the teams...
||3||0||colspan="2"|-||colspan="2"|-||3||0
|-
|2003–04
The Football League 2003-04
The 2003–2004 season was the 104th completed season of The Football League.-Overview:This season was the last association football season in the football league where the divisions were known as "First", "Second", and "Third"...
||40||0||1||0||colspan="2"|-||41||0
|-
|2004–05
The Football League 2004-05
The 2004–2005 season was the 105th completed season of The Football League.-Overview:This season the league was contested through three divisions. 2004–05 was the first season to feature the rebranded Football League. The First Division, Second Division and Third Division were renamed the Football...
||Championship
Football League Championship
The Football League Championship is the highest division of The Football League and second-highest division overall in the English football league system after the Premier League...
||23||0||colspan="2"|-||1||0||24||0
|-
|2004–05
The Football League 2004-05
The 2004–2005 season was the 105th completed season of The Football League.-Overview:This season the league was contested through three divisions. 2004–05 was the first season to feature the rebranded Football League. The First Division, Second Division and Third Division were renamed the Football...
||Boston United
Boston United F.C.
Boston United Football Club are an association football club based in Boston, Lincolnshire, England. They currently play in the Conference North. The club is known as 'the Pilgrims' in reference to the Pilgrim Fathers, who fled from Boston to the USA and founded Boston, Massachusetts. The club's...
||League Two
Football League Two
Football League Two is the third-highest division of The Football League and fourth-highest division overall in the English football league system....
||2||0||colspan="2"|-||colspan="2"|-||2||0
|-
|2005–06
The Football League 2005-06
The 2005–2006 season was the 106th completed season of The Football League.-Overview:In this season of Football League, Reading was the only club in England to get more than 100 points and they also have won the League Championship...
||rowspan="3"|Plymouth Argyle
Plymouth Argyle F.C.
Plymouth Argyle Football Club is an English professional football club, based in Plymouth, Devon, that plays in Football League Two.Since becoming professional in 1903, the club has won five Football League titles, five Southern League titles and one Western League title. The 2009–10 season was the...
||rowspan="3"|Championship
Football League Championship
The Football League Championship is the highest division of The Football League and second-highest division overall in the English football league system after the Premier League...
||1||0||colspan="2"|-||2||0||3||0
|-
|2006–07
The Football League 2006-07
The 2006–2007 season was the 107th completed season of the Football League.-Overview:The Football League was contested through three Divisions in England and Wales. The divisions were the Football League Championship, Football League One and Football League Two...
||40||0||5||0||1||0||46||0
|-
|2007–08
The Football League 2007-08
The Football League is contested through three divisions in England and Wales. The divisions are the League Championship, League One and League Two. The winner and the runner up of the League Championship will be automatically promoted to the Premier League and they will be joined by the winner of...
||30||0||2||0||3||0||35||0
140||0||8||0||7||0||155||0