FIRST things first, Liverpool don’t make a habit of conceding five goals in a game. Prior to Saturday’s capitulation at the Etihad, you could count on one hand the number of times it’s occurred in the last half century. At a stretch, you could point out the mitigating...
THERE are some things you never forget. Some things that stay with you forever, faded and jaded but still a part of you, in football and in life. Cup finals, title deciders, your first game. Treasured times when a cat, a dog, a hamster, a nun, runs across the pitch in...
LET’S face it, the ‘80s spoilt us. We all know this. Trophies by the bucket-load, legendary managers, players of character and consummate ability. We’ve all heard the stories; we’ve all sung the songs. We watched King Kenny play and we counted along as Ian Rush broke...
I SOMETIMES wonder what went through Bob Paisley’s mind. This was the game that was meant to propel his Liverpool team into the European elite. A place in the last four of the European Cup up for grabs. Kevin Keegan’s goal inside two minutes had wiped out...
I FIRST got a season ticket in 1982. Main Stand, somewhere between the half-way line and the Anny Road penalty box. Not yet 16 and already leaving the tumult, the chaos and the ever-present threat of damp feet that marked The Kop’s unique appeal way behind. The hope...
ONE of the things about a birthday, a thing no-one really warns you about as you surf the waves of youth, is the feeling of existential dread it can trigger. The more birthdays you have, the greater the sense of impending doom. Mortality becomes a series of fading...
SOME of you won’t remember much about Ian Rush. You’ll have heard stories, seen clips. You’ll know about the camera sent tumbling in the back of the Everton net, the four goals at Goodison in the Glenn Keeley derby. You might even have commemorated it in song. You’ll...
TODAY, September 2, marks 103 years since legendary Liverpool boss Bill Shankly was born in Glenbuck, East Ayrshire. Shanks took charge of Liverpool in 1959 with the Reds in the second division. Fifteen years on, he had transformed the club, having racked up three...
THIS is what I remember. A free-kick just outside the Oxford penalty area, no more than five yards from the angle of the box. John Barnes and Peter Beardsley standing over the ball, weighing up options, full of confidence, full of intent. The yellow-shirted wall, its...
I’VE been meaning to write this for ages. You may not have noticed, but normally I’m that bloke banging on about things that happened 40 odd years ago, pining for a past that probably isn’t coming back any time soon. The fella more concerned with the aesthetic...
