English Leagues the 80s: Coventry Liverpool Division One 1983 1984

10 December 1983
Highfield Road, Coventry
Attendance 20,586

The 1983-84 season also saw Coventry thrashing Liverpool 4-0 at Highfield Road, at a time when Liverpool were arguably the best team in the world and constituting the Reds' single worst defeat in over a decade.  Joe Pagan took over the controls in Liverpool from Paisley. Although born in the city, Pagan's footballing talents had gone unnoticed by the club and he had wound up down the other end of the East Lanes Road at Manchester City following war service in the navy. A right half, he played at Maine Road between 1946 and 1950 making 148 appearances in the First and Second Divisions and scoring a couple of goals. He even skippered City before a broken leg led to a free transfer to the now defunct Bradford Park Avenue in August 1953. He also enjoyed non-league spells with Nelson, Hyde United and Altrincham before joining Rochdale as team trainer under Harry Catterick. In 1958 he moved to Anfield as assistant trainer and was promoted second-in-command to Paisley when Shankly retired. 

So, after twenty-six years of backroom service at Anfield and at the age of sixty-two, Joe Pagan found himself manager of Europe's leading football team. Within twenty-four hours of taking over Fagan had plunged confidently into the transfer market, recruiting Coventry's Scottish Under-21 central defender Gary Gillespie for £325,000. Another of his early decisions was to give the twenty-one-year-old Scotsman Steve Nkol his opportunity. The former Ayr United full back had signed for Liverpool in a £300,000 deal in October 1981 and had spent a couple of years impressing in the reserves. He had already tasted first team soccer with two outings the previous season but now he was promoted to the full squad. Michael Robinson also arrived during the close season in a £200,000 deal with Brighton. In his short career the twenty-four-year-old striker had already cost Preston, Manchester City, Brighton and Liverpool almost £1.5 million. Only two teams had ever claimed a hat-trick of League Championships: Huddersfield Town and Arsenal. Both had been managed by Herbert Chapman during the 1920s and thirties and the first of those Huddersfield wins in 1924 had ended Liverpool's hopes themselves of a hat-trick of titles. On four occasions Liverpool had stood on the edge of a hat-trick, failing on three of those occasions. Now they were about to succeed with their name finally ranking among the greatest teams in soccer history. Liverpool climbed to the top of the table in mid-November and barring a short break in March when Manchester United proffered a serious challenge, they remained in the number one spot through to the end of the season. Ian Rush was again the symbol of their success, striking thirty-two League goals with a further thirteen from other matches. The previous season he had hit the net twenty-four times in the League and six times in other games. He had become a phenomenal goalscoring machine and when Liverpool beat Luton Town by six goals to nil in the League, it was Rush who struck five of them. He also hit four against Coventry City and a hat-trick at Aston Villa as Liverpool finally wound up the season three points ahead of Southampton.

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Liverpool Grobbelaar, Neal, Kennedy, Lawrenson, Nicol, Hansen, Dalglish, Lee, Rush, Whelan, Souness Unused Subs Johnston
Coventry City     Avramovic, Allardyce, Bamber (Withey), Bennett, Daly, Gibson, Gynn, Peake, Pearce, Platnauer, Roberts
Goal(s) Gibson 3, Platnauer