Football dynasties are sometimes founded on failure and heartbreak.
Liverpool are currently enjoying one of the most golden periods in Anfield’s long, decorated history but it hasn’t always been plain sailing for Jurgen Klopp and his Quadruple-chasing Reds. After succeeding Brendan Rodgers in October 2015, the German had to wait nearly four years to see the undoubted progress he’d inspired translate into trophies during a period which saw two cup final defeats in his first part-season in charge, an even more agonising loss in Kyiv after Mohamed Salah’s astonishing 44-goal debut season had Kopites dreaming of Champions League glory, and then their astonishing 97-point Premier League tally still not be enough to end the club’s near-three decade title drought before that breakthrough European Cup win over Tottenham in Madrid.
Much of that painful 30-year wait for the Reds’ 19th league title was spent casting envious glances east as Manchester United took over as the country’s pre-eminent side, their dominance built on and inspired in many ways by the anguish the Red Devils’ suffered themselves at Anfield of all places before they smashed through their own glass ceiling. It is thirty years ago this week that a Liverpool win over United condemned Alex Ferguson’s side to a 25th year without a league trophy and handed the last First Division championship before the advent of the Premier League to Leeds United and, with Klopp’s men this weekend hoping for a favour from their old Yorkshire rivals when they take on title rivals Manchester City on Saturday evening, Liverpudlians are hoping for some payback.
The 1991/92 season was a time of difficult transition at Anfield. The previous campaign had begun with Kenny Dalglish’s reigning champions breaking a club record by winning their first eight league matches to give every indication the ‘Red Machine’ - the club’s 18th title win in 1990 was the tenth in fifteen years - was rolling on remorselessly. But appearances were deceptive. The emotional and psychological toll of what Dalglish, his players and the club had been through following the April 1989 Hillsborough disaster when 97 Liverpool supporters were unlawfully killed in Europe’s worst ever sporting disaster proved overwhelming for the iconic Scottish manager who stunned football when he announced his shock resignation in February 1991 and, after Boot Room legend Ronnie Moran took caretaker charge for a couple of months, former Reds European Cup winning captain Graeme Souness having revitalised the fortunes of Glasgow Rangers initially as player-manager was installed as new boss a month before the end of the campaign.
He was unable to revive Liverpool’s fading title hopes as Arsenal regained the trophy they had won so dramatically at Anfield in May 1989 but the Anfield board gave their new man strong backing in the transfer market that summer as he began his rebuilding project, paying Derby County a British record £2.9m for their Welsh striker Dean Saunders and another £2.2m for England World Cup defender Mark Wright, with another £1.5m spent on bringing Rangers winger Mark Walters down from Scotland to link up again with his old boss. Although the season would result in silverware with the club’s fifth FA Cup secured after victory over Second Division Sunderland at Wembley, it would prove to be the beginning of a period of serious decline for the club with the club’s league placing of sixth - their lowest since 1965 - indicating the further woes which would follow.
35 miles down the East Lancs Road, Manchester United were gradually making steps to bring their on-field achievements on a par with their self-styled reputation as ‘the biggest club in the world’. Alex Ferguson had been brought in as manager in November 1986 shortly before the the club marked twenty years since their last championship win in 1967 and, while from the start it was clear his top priority was to “knock Liverpool off their f****** perch”, he made little headway at first. After finishing a distant second to Dalglish’s men in his first full season in charge in 1987/88, Ferguson’s position came under increasing threat as an exasperated Old Trafford board and fanbase watched their side fall even further off the pace with league finishes of 11th and 13th in the following two campaigns, the Scot’s job widely acknowledged to have been saved only by their 1990 FA Cup final replay victory over Crystal Palace.
They were only able to improve to sixth the following season but victory over Barcelona in the European Cup Winners Cup final in Rotterdam bought Ferguson more time and, with United’s traditionally strong financial backing having allowed him to bring in the likes of Gary Pallister, Peter Schmeichel, Brian McClair, Paul Ince, Steve Bruce and Neil Webb amongst others, the expectation at Old Trafford was that a serious tilt at ending the club’s embarrassing league title drought must surely follow as it approached the quarter-century mark. It did with three wins and a draw in their opening four league games taking United to the top of the First Division which is where they stayed for much of the campaign and with Arsenal, Liverpool’s chief title rivals in the previous two campaigns, also quickly falling off the pace, Leeds United - who had only been promoted in 1990 after eight seasons in the Second Division - emerged as the other main contenders for the championship.
After a 1-1 draw early in the season at Old Trafford, the Roses rivals played out a trilogy of matches at Elland Road across 18 days in late December and early January with the return First Division encounter also being drawn 1-1 before Ferguson’s men triumphed in both the FA Cup third round and a League Cup quarter-final to seemingly hand them a significant psychological advantage in the title race. That did not necessarily prove to be the case as the additional cup commitments, which saw them go all the way to Wembley and win the League Cup against Nottingham Forest, stretched United’s squad whereas Leeds, bolstered by the arrival on loan of maverick French striker Eric Cantona, were able to concentrate solely on First Division matters and led the First Division table for much of March.
Heavy Leeds defeats at Queens Park Rangers and Manchester City however handed the initiative back to Old Trafford and when Andrei Kanchelskis’ volleyed winner against Southampton on 16th April put them two points clear of their Yorkshire rivals with a game in hand, they were firmly in pole position with only five matches left to play. United’s cup exploits have given them a fixture backlog and, with the season scheduled for an early May finish due to that summer’s European Championships in Sweden, the FA’s insistence Ferguson’s men must play four times in eight days drew bitter complaints from the United manager and turned out to be extremely costly for them. After only managing a 1-1 Easter Saturday draw at Luton Town (whose ten year spell in the top flight would end weeks later), Nottingham Forest won 2-1 at Old Trafford two days later on Easter Monday to really boost Leeds’ hopes before two days after that United lost 1-0 at already-relegated West Ham to put Howard Wilkinson’s men back in the box seat with a one point lead and two matches each left to play.
The penultimate set of league fixtures the following weekend saw both sides face tricky away games to major rivals, with Leeds travelling to Bramall Lane to take on Sheffield United while United had to go to Anfield to face a Liverpool side awaiting their Wembley date with Sunderland to salvage their disappointing campaign but also knowing doing real damage to United’s title hopes would have a similar effect. Both matches were scheduled to be played on the Sunday with the clash of the two north west giants chosen for live television coverage on ITV while the Yorkshire derby was given a noon kick off on police advice but not broadcast live, meaning transistor radios came to the fore for United and Liverpool fans keen to learn what implications the result at Bramall Lane would have on events at Anfield later in the afternoon.
Having produced a great escape from relegation the previous season after being promoted, the Blades would finish a respectable ninth in the First Division in 1991/92 and showed their desire to hurt Leeds’ title bid by taking the lead through veteran striker Alan Cork should before the half hour mark. But Wilkinson’s men had shown their ability to respond to setbacks throughout the campaign and were level before the break when a series of pinball attempts inside the penalty area ended with Rod Wallace deflecting the ball home to equalise. They went in front early in the second half when Gary McAllister’s free kick was headed home by centre half Jon Newsome and, although the Blades drew level after a Lee Chapman own goal, the introduction of substitute Eric Cantona helped induce a defensive mix-up between goalkeeper Mel Rees and centre-back Brian Gayle which ended in the former Manchester City man heading into his own net to give Leeds the vital win they wanted to put them four points clear of their Manchester rivals at the top of the table with only their final match of the season at home to Norwich City still to play.
It meant United now had to win at Anfield to take the title race to the final weekend, the result helping set the pre-match tone where Liverpool supporters now knew their side had their chance of ending their bitter rivals’ title challenge there and then that afternoon. It had been a tumultuous month at Anfield which had seen the under-performing Reds qualify eventually for the FA Cup final after needing a replay and then a penalty shoot-out to overcome Second Division Portsmouth, with manager Graeme Souness announcing after the initial tie at Highbury he was having to undergo a triple heart by-pass which necessitated Ronnie Moran taking over as caretaker boss . The Scot then causing outrage after selling the story of his health drama to the reviled S*n newspaper, boycotted across Merseyside and beyond then as it is now after the repugnant and unfounded lies it printed about Liverpool supporters in the aftermath of Hillsborough three years earlier.
The Reds’ cup exploits - which also saw them reach the UEFA Cup quarter-finals on the club’s return to Europe after the six-year ban following the Heysel tragedy - had led to some wildly fluctuating league results as the season drew to a close with a battling home draw against championship contenders Leeds only the week before United’s trip to Anfield offset by a 4-0 hiding at Arsenal and abject home defeat to Wimbledon. So Reds fans might have wondering which Liverpool would turn up on the day but, fired up after a season during which the media narrative had created a seemingly inevitability over United’s title drought ending, created an atmosphere of such intensity that their infuriatingly inconsistent side - deprived through injury of Grobbelaar, Nicol, Whelan and McManaman - couldn’t fail to respond.
With the temperature raised by the sight of supposed injury victims Bryan Robson and Paul Ince taking their place at the heart of the United midfield, the Reds came flying out of the traps and took the lead after only twelve minutes with one of the most treasured goals of all 346 Ian Rush scored for Liverpool. The Welshman famously could not stop finding the net against Everton against whom he equalled Dixie Dean’s Merseyside derby goals record before he left for Italy in 1987 and then broke it on his return but, despite his prolific efforts all different kinds of opponents at home and abroad, he had not managed even one against the side from Old Trafford since breaking into the Liverpool side a decade earlier.
That was until Jan Molby received a throw in from the left flank from David Burrows and fed John Barnes whose astute through ball found the Welshman’s vintage diagonal run and he showed his peerless finishing prowess hadn't deserted him despite an injury-hit season and unheard-of goals tally by this stage of only seven by clipping the ball over the onrushing Peter Schmeichel in front of the United fans in the away end and into the net to put Liverpool in front. It was virtually his last involvement as he was replaced by Mark Walters before the half hour mark due to injury, already the second substitution caretaker boss Moran had been forced to make after centre back Nick Tanner was forced off with a foot injury, the blood and thunder nature of the game highlighted by Gary Pallister’s early substitution for United after a challenge left him with blood seeping through his boot.
The visitors pushed hard for an equaliser with Paul Ince’s shot from 25 yards striking a post and rebounding to safety while Andrei Kanchelskis posed a constant threat down the right. But, with Liverpool’s young right-back Rob Jones - a revelation after joining earlier in the season from Crewe Alexandra and making an impressive debut in the October goalless draw at Old Trafford - keeping United’s wonderkid and that season’s PFA Young Player of the Year Ryan Giggs in check, the home side came close to a second before the break when Barnes and Venison spurned chances after confusion in the United box and Dean Saunders managed to inadvertently block his own team-mate Walters’ shot on the goal line after more Barnes magic down the right flank.
The second half followed a similar pattern with United throwing everything at Liverpool in a bid to save their fading title dream with McClair and Kanchelskis both striking the woodwork but their desperation also left gaps for Liverpool to kill the game off with Saunders, Molby, Thomas and Barnes all spurning opportunities to ease the growing tension all round the ground and of course in West Yorkshire where some of the Leeds players following their victory earlier in the day over Sheffield United had gathered to watch proceedings at Lee Chapman’s house with ITV beaming some of their reactions into the live coverage. The moment they were all waiting for arrived four minutes from the end when Thomas surged forward from midfield into the box and his cross was slammed against the crossbar by Ray Houghton but finished off from close range by Mark Walters to put seal on a 2-0 victory and confirm the title would be going to Leeds for the first time since 1974.
The Anfield crowd celebrated with feeling by bellowing out the Monty Python classic 'Always Look On The Bright Side Of Life' United fans had appropriated on their European run the previous season as Ferguson's devastated players sunk to the turf in despair, having to listen to a series of chants and songs taking great satisfaction in the fact they had in effect lost the league on Merseyside and, having now not won the league for 25 years, may never do so again. A shell-shocked Alex Ferguson claimed on television afterwards his side had lost the title rather than Leeds having won it, although he was more gracious afterwards when saying, "We have been punished for our mistakes, particularly this week, but Leeds have won it because they made less mistakes than anybody else all along the way. Anybody who talks about it being an ordinary league is talking rubbish. It is still as difficult to win as ever. Losing it has had a numbing effect on us and I don't know how we will get over it but we will find a way. I'm still proud of my team.”
Ferguson later revealed he and his players could hear shouts of “f*** you" from the home dressing room while Ryan Giggs recalls it being the worst experience of his professional life, with one incident outside the ground after the match summing up the pleasure Liverpool had taken in the demise of their title hopes. "Someone asked me for my autograph and I signed it”, he said. “He ripped up the paper, in front of my face, and said, 'You're never going to win the league'. I was 18 at the time. I hope he kept the pieces. That story has been told so many times those scraps of paper would probably be worth something."
"Maybe it was the final lesson for us, the ultimate experience in humility," Ferguson told his players at the start of the following season having pinned a photograph in the dressing room showing the distraught faces on the United bench that day at Anfield he ‘titled’ Dante's Inferno to hammer home the message he wanted to channel throughout his squad, although that process began even as they began their sad journey home that sunny April day as Giggs recalled, "He made a point of saying it on the coach. This is what happened. Next year, we come back and we don't let this happen again."
They didn’t let it happen the next year, winning 2-1 at Anfield in early March en route to a Premier League title they would go on to lift by ten points and would barely stop winning for the next twenty years. That defeat left Souness’ free-falling Reds only three points clear of the relegation zone albeit also only three points behind Wilkinson’s Leeds, who would finish 17th in one of the worst title defences in top flight history. The two clubs at either end of the M62 corridor have followed pretty divergent paths since then but, thirty years on from when the stars aligned to help them both celebrate at the expense of Manchester rivals in between, Liverpool are hoping the favour can finally be returned.
