GWLADYS
BIG DUNC
By Ged McCalley
“Not the hero we wanted, but the hero we needed”
Much is made of the legendary
status
of
Duncan
Ferguson.
True we’ve had better and more
consistent players who’ve shown
more professionalism and played a
lot more games for the club, but not
many of those players have shown
just how much our great club can
grab hold of you or highlighted
just how much fans pine for a
hero. To an outsider looking at
Ferguson’s statistics of just 71
goals in over 250 appearances
there’d be no reason to understand
why the controversial Scot is much
lauded on the Gwladys Street, but
those statistics do not tell the
full story. When Ferguson first
arrived on loan at Everton from
Rangers it seemed more an act of
desperation from the then Everton
manager Mike Walker. Walker’s
side were without a league win
and the knives were out for one
of the worst performing Everton
managers of all time. Even in his
early performances for the blues
there was nothing to indicate
Ferguson would ever be a success
with the club. A year earlier
Rangers had just broken the British
transfer record to sign Ferguson
for £4 million but his career had
since stalled. A headbutt while
playing for Rangers had landed
the striker in trouble and his Ibrox
career was all but over, so a chance
to get back on track was taken as
he moved to Goodison, the path to
hero status had been laid.
After a string of forgetful displays
under Walker the big man’s, and
the club’s, fortunes were set to
change when former Everton
number nine, and club legend,
Joe Royle took over with Everton
bottom of the league and going
nowhere but down. If you look
back at the genesis of how players
become Everton legends, then
goals against Liverpool would be
number one on the list. In recent
times players such as Lee Carsley
and Kevin Campbell have been
elevated to the highest acclaim
after winning goals in derbies and
such it was on the 21st November
15
1994 when Duncan Ferguson
became a legend before he became
a player as Joe Royle famously
quipped about the striker.
At the time I was too young to
have any recollection about the
great Howard Kendall side of the
mid 80s. I’d heard the stories and
watched the videos to death, but
my Everton life’d coincided with
the slump from greatness and the
slide looked to be impossible to
stop. Two Everton number nines
were about to change all that
though.
Liverpool came to Goodison that
Monday night near the top of the
league and by far the better side.
Thanks to Everton’s new manager
we were on the back of our first
win of the season, which made us
an unknown quantity. With the
newly formed dogs of war battling
away the game was deadlocked
at 0-0 until a second half Andy
Hinchcliffe corner swung in and
found the head of big Dunc. As
the net bulged and the crowd
exploded, a new hero was born.
16