My Liverpool Home (42 page)

One thing I do remember is being asked by my friends at nursery what my daddy did. I replied, ‘He stands in a little box on a Saturday, points and shouts.’ It was only once I had watched some of the replays on LFC TV that I realized what a great player Dad must have been. My three-year-old interpretation of his job definitely underestimated his footballing abilities.

However, I did watch Dad play at Anfield more recently. It was a charity match at Anfield a few years ago and Lynsey and I were sitting alongside the Hansens, Thompsons and Whelans, howling with laughter at our fathers’ attempts to run. Being used to the pace of Premiership football at Anfield, it was like watching a game in slow motion. I’m sure by their red, sweaty faces that they were trying very hard, and there were moments when we could see touches of their old brilliance, but to us it was hilarious!

CAREER RECORD

The facts and figures of Kenny Dalglish’s career at Liverpool FC.

Compiled by John Keith.

1977–78

Dalglish signs for Liverpool in a £440,000 transfer from Celtic on10 August 1977. He is Anfield manager Bob Paisley’s replacement for Kevin Keegan, earlier sold to Hamburg for £500,000.

Dalglish makes debut in goalless Charity Shield duel with Manchester United at Wembley three days later and scores on his first League appearance in 1–1 draw at Middlesbrough the following Saturday. He goes on to make 180 consecutive first team appearances spanning three years.

Dalglish wins his 50th Scotland cap on the familiar territory of Anfield in October in the World Cup qualifier against Wales. His header clinches a 2–0 victory and secures Scotland a ticket to the following summer’s World Cup finals in Argentina.

He crowns his first season at Liverpool by scoring their European Cup final winner against Bruges at Wembley and also collects runners-up medals in League championship and League Cup and a winners’ medal in European Super Cup.

1978–79

Dalglish plays in all three of Scotland’s games in the World Cup finals: a 3–1 defeat by Peru in Cordoba, a 1–1 draw with Iran in Cordoba and a 3–2 win over eventual runners-up Holland in Mendoza in which he scored one of the goals. The tournament also takes Dalglish past Denis Law’s 55-cap Scotland appearance record.

Two of the World Cup-winning Argentina team are on the receiving end of a drubbing by Dalglish and his Liverpool colleagues in September. Osvaldo Ardiles and Ricardo Villa are members of the Tottenham side toppled 7–0 at Anfield. Dalglish scores twice in what is regarded as one of Liverpool’s finest-ever performances and he and the club go on to lift the championship. They do so with a total of 68 points from 42 games, a record under the two-points-for-a-win system, and concede only 16 goals, also a record. Dalglish scores 21 League goals. During the season he passes the 100th appearance milestone for Liverpool and 50 goals. He is voted Footballer of the Year by the Football Writers’ Association.

During the season at international level, Dalglish is reunited with his Celtic manager Jock Stein who succeeds Ally MacLeod in October.

1979–80

Dalglish opens the curtain on the new season with a goal in Liverpool’s 3–1 FA Charity Shield win over Arsenal at Wembley. He completes his third successive ever-present season by contributing 16 goals towards Liverpool’s retention of the League championship. Dalglish scores in a four-game record FA Cup semi-final marathon against Arsenal only for Liverpool to lose in the third replay. On the very day of the club’s agonising defeat, 1 May, 1980, they make a signing which proves to be of huge significance. Ian Rush, who is to form a legendary partnership with Dalglish, arrives from Chester for £300,000.

1980–81

Dalglish’s long sequence without missing a first-team game since joining Liverpool ends when injury rules him out of the League Cup second-round, first-leg game at Bradford City in August. It ended his 180-game ever-present run. He returns to score twice in the return and in every round to the final when he hits one of the goals in a 2–1 success against West Ham in the Villa Park replay.

In Europe, Dalglish suffers damage to his left ankle and is substituted after only nineminutes in the European Cup semi-final second leg at Bayern Munich. A 1–1 draw takes Liverpool through on the away-goal rule and he is fit for the 1–0 win over Real Madrid in Paris to give Liverpool the trophy for the third time.

1981–82

Dalglish scores Liverpool’s 100th European Cup goal in a 7–0 rout of Finnish club Oulun Palloseura in the first round, second leg at Anfield in September. Liverpool go on to reach the quarter-final but lose on a 2–0 aggregate to CSKA Sofia. Dalglish helps Liverpool retain the League Cup, now called the Milk Cup, with a 3–1 conquest of Tottenham at Wembley. He scores in the 3–1 home League win over Tottenham in May that recaptures the championship.

Dalglish helps Scotland to reach the World Cup finals in Spain in the summer of 1982 and scores in the 5–2 opening win over New Zealand in Malaga. He goes on as a substitute in the 4–1 defeat by Brazil in Seville but misses their final group match when a 2–2 draw with the USSR put out the Scots on goal difference.

1982–83

Another ever-present League campaign by Dalglish, his fifth in six seasons at Liverpool, helps the club retain the title. He scores 18 goals in the championship triumph.

Dalglish also collects another Milk Cup winners’ medal after a 2–1 defeat of Manchester United at Wembley.

In Europe, his absence from the European Cup quarter-final second leg against Widzew Lodz through illness ends his unbroken run of 35 European games, including four Super Cup, since his arrival from Celtic. It was only his 11th absence overall from Liverpool in that time.

Dalglish is named Footballer of the Year for the second time to complete a personal double after his election earlier in the season as the PFA’s Player of the Year.

Bob Paisley, the manager who signed Dalglish, retires at the end of the season after an unprecedented haul of 19 trophies in nine seasons. He is succeeded by Joe Fagan.

1983–84

Dalglish helps Liverpool win the treble of League championship, Milk Cup and European Cup, a unique managerial feat by Fagan in his first season in charge.

Dalglish’s two goals against Danish side Odense in the first round, second leg at Anfield sets a new European Cup scoring record for a British player of 15, surpassing Denis Law’s previous best of 14. It was also Dalglish’s 54th European Cup appearance, more than any other British player.

He scores his 100th League goal for Liverpool at Ipswich in November on his 259th appearance. He is the first player in history to complete a League century in both England and Scotland with only two clubs. Neil Martin also scored 100 each side of the border but his goals came for Alloa, Queen of the South, Hibernian, Sunderland, Coventry and Nottingham Forest.

In January, Dalglish suffers a depressed cheekbone fracture in a collision with Manchester United’s Kevin Moran at Anfield and is out for two months but returns in March to help Liverpool to their triple success.

Their 15th championship win also completes the first post-war hat-trick and their European Cup triumph comes after a penalty shoot-out against Roma in the Italian club’s own Olympic Stadium.

Liverpool’s Milk Cup success, achieved by beating Mersey rivals Everton 1–0 in a Maine Road replay, after a goalless draw at Wembley, is the club’s fourth consecutive win in the competition, an unprecedented feat in English football.

1984–85

A season that ends in tragedy with the deaths of 39 supporters, mostly Italian, at Liverpool’s European Cup final against Juventus in the Heysel stadium, Brussels.

Dalglish makes his 400th senior appearance for Liverpool in a 3–1 defeat at Arsenal in September and the following month he is dropped for the first time by Liverpool when Fagan omits him from the live televised Friday night game at Tottenham, who win 1–0. It is only the 28th game he has missed for the club and he wins an immediate recall. November is a month of mixed fortune for Dalglish. He is sent off for the first time in his career after retaliating in the European Cup return with Benfica in Lisbon’s Stadium of Light. He receives a three-game ban but returns in the semi-final against Panathinaikos, making his 50th European appearance for Liverpool in the second leg against the Greeks.

A week after his dismissal in Portugal, Dalglish hits a memorable goal to give Scotland a 3–1 win over Spain at Hampden Park. It was his 30th at international level, equalling Denis Law’s record.

In the 1985 New Year Honours List Dalglish is awarded the MBE for services to football. He receives it at Buckingham Palace the day before his 750th club appearance for Celtic and Liverpool in the 7–0 FA Cup replay win over York City at Anfield in February. Three days later he makes his 300th League appearance for Liverpool in the 2–0 home League win over Stoke City.

The Brussels meeting with Juventus on 29 May is a sad watershed for English football and Liverpool. English clubs are banned from European competitions after the disaster. A Michel Platini penalty gave Juventus a 1–0 victory in a match rendered irrelevant by the tragedy. Less than 24 hours later Dalglish is named as Liverpool’s new player-manager in succession to Joe Fagan who informed the club he would be retiring as manager before the events of Heysel.

1985–86

Sadness for Dalglish early in his first season as player-manager when Jock Stein, his manager at club level with Celtic and international level with Scotland, dies immediately after the World Cup qualifier against Wales at Cardiff’s Ninian Park, which ends 1–1 and which Dalglish misses through injury.

Alex Ferguson takes over as Scotland manager and a goalless draw with Australia in Melbourne, a game Dalglish misses through club commitments, ensures qualification for the finals in Mexico.

At club level Dalglish responds magnificently to his new challenge in management by guiding the club to a championship and FA cup Double. He scores the goal at Chelsea in May that clinches the title, becoming the first player-manager to win the championship. A week later he plays in the FA Cup final when a 3–1 win over Everton completes the classic English Double, the first player-manager to achieve the feat. He is named Manager of the Year. During the season he passes the half-century of Cup goals for Liverpool, becoming the first player to score 50 or more in knock-out competitions in England and Scotland.