Liverpool’s Best Strikers (Part 8)
Kenny Dalgish
Whenever Liverpool’s greatest are discussed or any achievements are compared for ‘The Reds’ there is one name that is never missed and his stories are like no others, “The King” Kenny Dalgish.
After the ‘Keegan and Toshak’ forward duo that always seemed to strike fear in their opponents, Liverpool needed something to fill that gap these two players left and this is where Kenny Dalgish and Ian Rush come in.
The then Liverpool boss, Bob Paisley, actually paid four hundred and forty thousand pounds to sign Dalgish into Liverpool in 1977 and this was a British record at the time for the highest fee paid for a transfer into a football club.
Kenny Dalgish was basically Keegan’s replacement and Dalgish succeeded Keegan playing for the Celtics in two hundred and four appearances and a hundred and twelve goals scored.
Kenny Dalgish played at a special and rather unique position in the team, the position was called “deep-lying forward” and Dalgish preserved this spot as his own and his consistent goal scoring abilities made a Liverpool record.
Dalgish left Liverpool in 1989 and he had three hundred and fifty-five appearances with Liverpool and had scored a hundred and eighteen goals in that time span.
Kenny Dalgish’s time at Liverpool is marked as one of the club’s most triumphant period for the club. Their achievements span ranges over five domestic cups, seven league titles and three European Cups. Dalgish also played for the Scottish national team in the 1978 and 1982 World Cups.
Around the late eighties Kenny Dalgish’s career started to wind down. Dalgish had set ground breaking records for his national team by having a record number of international appearances and goals scored.
Dalgish is easily considered as perhaps one of the most successful strikers in Liverpool’s history and in the Scottish national team’s history. Kenny Dalgish hung his playing field boots and came on the field as a manager for Liverpool in 1985, right after the Heysel Stadium Disaster.
Dalgish successfully took the team and the league into the FA Cup double final in his first year as manager and they beat Everton in the process.
Dalgish had a six year stay as a manager at Anfield and throughout that time the club always finished up first or at least second in the league. Dalgish led the team into three League wins and FA Cup wins from 1985 to 1991.
During Kenny Dalgish’s tenure at Liverpool F.C. the club not only profited with perhaps one of the greatest players in their history but also gained a very successful manager and his personification became the mark that others would aspire to.
The Goal Scoring Machine, Ian Rush
Whenever it comes to naming Liverpool’s most successful striker in history, there is only one name that comes up that is considered worthy of being called the best in the club’s lucrative history, ‘the champion, the undisputed Ian Rush.’
Liverpool’s manager, Bob Paisely, paid a record setting fee for a teenager of three hundred thousand pounds and this remained to be Chester’s record setting sale for the next thirty years and shows just how big this deal was at the time for just an eighteen year old.
Rush’s Liverpool debut came on the thirteenth of December in that same year, in a division fixture against Ipswich Town at Portman Road.
The funny and ironical part in this match was that Ian Rush was standing with his future striker partner Kenny Dalgish, who is also considered one of the best strikers in Liverpool’s history and Jimmy Case the midfielder scored Liverpool’s only goal in that match to make it a one to one draw.
At this stage Liverpool was set on defending its own League titles and the League Cup. Also at the time they were contending for the European Cup and Ipswich was rising as title contenders.
(Continued in part 9 of the article)
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