11th December

Happy birthday Chico
1961 - Steve Nicol was born in Irvine. The versatile Scot signed from Ayr United for £300,000 in October 1981 and played 468 reds games, scoring 46 times. He helped us to four League titles, three FA Cups, European Cup and an FA Charity Shield, and was named the Football Writers’ Player of the Year in 1989.

Worst ever defeat
1954 - Birmingham City trounced us 9-1 at St. Andrews in a Second Division fixture to condemn us to our worst ever defeat, with Eddie Brown netting the first three of his four goals past us. Billy Liddell grabbed our consolation. Peter Murphy and Gordon Astall each struck twice for the Blues, with Jackie Lane and Alexander Govan also getting on the scoresheet.

Another record for Stevie
2007 - Steven Gerrard converted the rebound from his own saved penalty at Olympique de Marseille to become the club’s all-time top European scorer on 23, as he struck in his seventh consecutive game. We became the first English team to win in the Stade Vélodrome as we triumphed 4-0, in the decisive final game in the group. Stevie’s goal was followed by strikes from Fernando Torres, Dirk Kuyt and Ryan Babel.

Other red birthdays
1969 - Stig Inge Bjørnebye was born in Elverum. The Norwegian left-back spent six and a half years at Anfield, scoring four times in 184 appearances and helping us to claim the Coca-Cola Cup in 1995 after signing from Rosenborg BK for £600,000 in December 1992.
1942 - Centre-forward Alf Arrowsmith was born in Manchester. He signed from Ashton United for £1,250 in August 1960 and netted 24 goals in just 56 games in his eight years with the reds, helping us to claim the League title in 1964, before injury blighted his reds career. He moved on to Bury in December 1968.

1986 - Lee Peltier was born in Aigburth. He made his senior debut in our Carling Cup Third Round defeat of Reading in October 2006, but made just four first-team appearances in total before moving to Yeovil Town in January 2008 after a successful loan spell.
1977 - Former youth winger Stuart Quinn was born in Whiston. He failed to make a senior reds appearance, although he featured in our victorious FA Youth Cup campaign in 1996, and similarly failed to make the grade at Altrincham and Southport.
1985 - Former reserves winger Ryan Wilkie was born in Glasgow. He was most recently seen playing for Scottish Third Division side East Stirlingshire.

Anfield trebles
1991 - Dean Saunders bagged a treble in our 4-0 UEFA Cup Third Round win over Austrians Swarovski Tirol, with Barry Venison also on the scoresheet with a twenty-yard scorcher on a frosty night as we progressed 6-0 on aggregate. This was Deano’s second hat-trick of a European campaign that ended against Genoa at the next hurdle.
1971 - Jack Whitham nabbed a hat-trick as we beat Derby County 3-2 in a First Division fixture, with John O’Hare netting two of his six strikes against the reds.

Sami’s milestone
2004 - Sami Hyypiä played his 200th League game as we lost 1-0 at Everton, to a Lee Carsley goal.

Derby honours even
1988 - The Anfield derby ended 1-1. Ray Houghton’s early goal was cancelled out by a Wayne Clarke penalty, who also had a header unfairly chalked off. However, Neville Southall was in fine form to deny the reds another goal.

Carroll on song
2010 – Dirk Kuyt bagged our consolation as we lost 3-1 at Newcastle United, with Andy Carroll capping his fine performance with the late third. Scousers Kevin Nolan and Joey Barton scored the other goals for the home side.

Reds on the way out
2000 - Mad Dutch striker Erik Meijer signed for Hamburger SV on a free transfer after seventeen months at Anfield, in which time he had only made 27 senior appearances, netting just twice.
1996 - Centre-half John Scales was sold to Tottenham Hotspur for £2.6m. He had struck four times in 94 appearances after being signed by Roy Evans from Wimbledon for £3.5m in September 1994, before his career was affected by injury.

1998 - Former youth keeper Roy Naylor signed for Clydebank, for whom he made just one first-team appearance. He never even made our first-team squad, although he featured in both legs of our victorious FA Youth Cup Final in 1996. On the same day, second string winger John Jeffers was sold to Port Vale for £30,000. He spent seven years at Vale Park, playing more than two hundred games.

Beating the Gunners
1965 - Peter Thompson, Ian St. John, ex-Gunner Geoff Strong and Roger Hunt all netted as we beat Arsenal 4-2 at Anfield. John Radford bagged the first of his seven goals against the reds, with Tommy Baldwin also scoring.

Number one Nando
2008 – Fernando Torres came out on top in a survey of 32,000 fans carried out by Barclays to find the Premiership’s most popular player. He polled 38 per cent of the votes, to beat his club skipper Steven Gerrard and Manchester United’s Cristiano Ronaldo.

B’s for England
1990 - Gary Ablett, David Burrows and future reds Nigel Clough and Michael Thomas all played as England B held Algeria to a goalless draw in a friendly in Algiers.

Disappointment against the Clarets
We have twice faced Burnley on this day in history, without tasting victory.
1920 - We lost a top-flight meeting at Turf Moor 1-0.
1943 – We were held to a 1-1 draw in a Wartime League fixture at Anfield. Andy Beattie was on target for the reds that day.

The best site
2006 - The club’s official website, liverpoolfc.tv, was named as best sports site in the UK’s Website of the Year awards.

Prudhoe twice on the move
Future reds loanee keeper Mark Prudhoe changed clubs on this day in consecutive years.
1986 - He joined Doncaster Rovers on loan from Walsall, making five appearances.
1987 - He then switched permanently from the Saddlers to Carlisle United on a free transfer, for whom he played 34 times.

Digger reaches another final
2008 – John Barnes managed Jamaica to victory as they reached the Final of the Digicel Caribbean Championships by beating Guadeloupe 2-0 in Kingston.