UA-11624747-1

Nos 19-1

When Babe met Dixie.

May 5, 2011
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When Babe met Dixie.

  Eighty-three years ago today, Dixie Dean scored his famous sixtieth goal. Across the Atlantic baseball’s Babe Ruth also hit sixty. These two stars met twice, once in person and once in the record books. Before their talent rushed them into a sporting phone booth they were simply George Herman Ruth, Jr. and William Ralph Dean. They stepped out as supermen – “Babe” and “Dixie” and hit us with a swarm of achievements: 714 home runs (Babe), 37 true hat-tricks (Dixie), a headed goal from the half way line (Dixie), a ball in Detroit hit with such feral ferocity that it left the stadium (Babe), both men even clambered...

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Top 60 Everton Players:#1.Dixie Dean

May 22, 2010
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Top 60 Everton Players:#1.Dixie Dean

Bill “Dixie” Dean (1924-38) 431 appearances, 377 goals   “There was an atmosphere wherever Dixie went; there was excitement. I’ve seen around 2,000 people following him around in places like Switzerland, Germany and France. He was bigger and better than life.” – Joe Mercer The Babe Ruth of football, Dean cost Everton £3,000 from Tranmere Rovers in 1925 and became the greatest goalscorer in English history, recording 377 goals. Dixie was Deane’s nickname – but he disliked it – just as Edson hated Pele. Being in goal and seeing Dean bearing down on you must have been like looking down the barrel of a gun. Armed with a header...

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Top 60 Everton Players:#2.Alan Ball MBE

May 21, 2010
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Top 60 Everton Players:#2.Alan Ball MBE

Alan Ball MBE (1966-72)  249 appearances, 78 goals.   “No one was greater than their club, but you came pretty close.” – Tribute sent to Goodison after Ball’s death. ‘I was running back to the centre-circle after I scored the second goal against Liverpool and pure elation welled up inside me. I remember thinking: “I just love this place, I want this place forever.”‘ Alan Ball, August 1966 Ball, who chased his surname perpetually, like a Jack Russel chasing its tail – was a true Everton legend. The zest from this orange haired dynamo was extraordinary, and it was borne out of an utter hatred for losing. Remarkably he...

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Top 60 Everton Players:#3.Neville Southall MBE

May 20, 2010
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 Neville Southall MBE (1981-98)  578 appearances  “It was my first signing, and my best, in his prime, Neville was the best keeper in the world.” – Howard Kendall The bulky Nev of later years (although as a former hod-carrier, he was always a big man) repelled wave after wave from Manchester United in the 1995 FA Cup Final and the earlier, supremely elastic ‘keeper of the mid 1980s was the world’s best. Such was Everton’s domestic supremacy in 1985 that they gobbled up 60 per cent of all votes for the writers’ footballer of the year, with a deserving Nev eventually winning the award. Southall is the best Everton...

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Top 60 Everton Players:# 4.Tommy Lawton

May 19, 2010
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 Tommy Lawton (1936-39)  97 appearances, 70 goals  “Technically, surely the greatest number nine of all time” – Joe Mercer   A teen sensation, Tommy would be higher up this list if the war hadn’t halted his career and deprived him of six seasons of football. Underneath the centre parting and lashings of Brylcreem, lay an instinctive goalscorer. So prolific was Lawton that it seemed as if he had dipped his feet in gunpowder; including war fixtures, Lawton scored a ridiculous 222 goals in 209 first team games. Tommy refused to be bowed by the pressure of filling Dixie’s boots, and is only bettered by Dean as Everton’s greatest striker.

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Top 60 Everton Players:#5.Alex Young

May 18, 2010
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 5. Alex Young “The Golden Vision” (1960-68)  271 appearances, 87 goals  “I left Everton Football Club in 1968. But I can honestly say that Everton has never left me.” Alex Young was the beatific poster boy for the School of Science. Bought for £42,000 from Hearts, Young bewitched all with his skill and it soon became fluorescently obvious to Evertonians that they had someone truly special. “The Golden Vision” with his vicar’s collar and blonde locks was an elegant, gracile forward who – for a slight man – had wonderful heading ability. So acute was his reading of the game that he could deliver exquisite passes without even checking...

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Top 60 Everton Players:#6.Kevin Ratcliffe

May 17, 2010
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 Kevin Ratcliffe (1979-92)  472 appearances, 2 goals  In American sport-speak, Ratcliffe is the “most winningest” Everton captain ever and he won two league championships, an FA Cup, and the European Cup Winners’ Cup for the Blues. The Welshman initially played in a variety of roles, and it wasn’t until he was moved to centre half that he really excelled. Ratcliffe was blessed with pace and an exquisite reading of the game, and above all he was a born leader, becoming captain at 23 and the youngest man to receive the FA Cup since Bobby Moore. His name comfortably sits amongst the best British defenders of all time and he’ll...

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Top 60 Everton Players:#7.Brian Labone

May 16, 2010
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 Brian Labone (1957-1972)  530 appearances, 2 goals  “One Evertonian is worth twenty Liverpudlians”  Everton’s consummate defender and captain, Labone was firmly ensconced in the England set up of the 60s; however, ‘the Last of the Corinthians’ turned down a place in Alf Ramsey’s 1966 World Cup squad to marry his wife. Both a modest and loyal servant, Labone’s relationship with Everton was monogamous, and light years away from the modern crazed transfer carousel where players put multiple club badges to their lips.

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Top 60 Everton Players:#8.Ted Sagar

May 15, 2010
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 Ted Sagar (1929-1953)  495 appearances   Shunted down the list only because Southall is one of the best goalkeepers in history, Sagar is an Everton behemoth. Amazingly, Ted was just 11 months short of spending a quarter of a century on the Toffees’ books as a ‘keeper and unsurprisingly he holds the record of the longest time playing for one club in league football. The enormously athletic Sagar played 499 times for Everton – winning two division One Championships, an FA Cup, and a Charity Shield in the process. Although he was capped by England only four times, he remains a legendary Blue.

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Top 60 Everton Players:#9.Thomas Gwynfor “T.G.” Jones

May 14, 2010
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  Thomas Gwynfor “T.G.” Jones (1940-49)  175 appearances, 5 goals   This noble Welsh centre half was bought for £3,000 from Wrexham, and – alongside Tommy Lawton and Joe Mercer – was a key part of Everton’s resurgence, culminating in the 1939 League Championship. The Everton team of the time had youth and dynamism and Jones was a classy and technically-advanced defender. Dixie Dean once described Jones as “the best all-round player I’ve ever seen”. Stalked by Roma in the 1940′s, Jones instead stayed at Goodison after a £15,000 move collapsed. Known as the “Prince of Wales”, the unflappable Jones played 175 times for Everton.

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Next Game – Premier League, Saturday 11 February, kick-off 15:00, Chelsea @ Goodison

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