Club

Born in Jamestown, Dunbartonshire, Cowan was a half-back who played with local sides Renton and Vale of Leven before moving to England in 1888 to play for the Warwickshire County FC. The following season, he wished to pursue a professional career and joined Aston Villa and spent 12 years with the Birmingham side.^[1]

When Cowan played for the club in the 1890s and early 1900s, they were the giants of the Football League. While at Villa, he won five First Division titles (in 1893–94, 1895–96, 1896–97, 1898–99 and 1899–1900) and two FA Cup winners medals (1895 and 1897, after being a beaten finalist in 1892) and played 354 times in all;^[2] he is considered to be one of the finest players of the Victorian era. For four years, his younger brother John also played for Aston Villa.

International

Cowan was selected for Scotland on three occasions, in 1896 being one of a group of five men who were the first to be selected while playing for an English club, in the process becoming Aston Villa's first international for that nation.^[3] Controversy dogged him after a disappointing performance in a defeat England in 1898, in which he was the Scottish captain; it emerged that he had not been fit to play through illness (possibly alcohol-related),^[4][5] and both the player and the selection committee were heavily criticised in the press for failing to replace him before the match began.^[6] He was not selected for international duties again.