60-GOAL DIXIE DAY OF GLORY
Everton 3 Arsenal 3 Dixie Dean Shaw 2, 88 3, 5 (pen), 82 O’donnell (og) 35 First Division, May 5, 1928 Att: 48,715
EVERTON had already been crowned champions by the time they faced Arsenal at Goodison Park on the final day of the season.
The Gunners were in mid-table, but, with 90 minutes of the season left, there was still so much to play for.
Arsenal headed to Merseyside intent on stopping William Ralph Dean – better known as ‘Dixie’ – but, as defender Joe Hulme conceded, that was “easier said than done”.
Told by doctors he would never play again after fracturing his skull in a motorcycle crash, Dean – a £3,000 signing from Tranmere – had helped turn the Toffees into champions, 12 months after they had narrowly avoided relegation.
Everton had banged in 99 goals going into the last game of the 1927-28 season and 21-year-old Dean had scored 57 of them.
The previous season, George Camsell had netted 59 times for Middlesbrough in the second tier, a record haul for all four divisions.
The way Dean started the following season, the record looked under threat. He scored in each of Everton’s first nine matches, including all five in a 5-2 walloping of Manchester United.
Dean had plundered a hat-trick against Aston Villa and put four past Burnley, going into the last match of what Everton chairman W C Cuff called “the most wonderful season the game of football has ever known”.
Goodison was packed and every single one of the fans wondered whether Dean would get the hat- trick he needed to set a new record.
Only two minutes in, it was Arsenal who went ahead after Toffees keeper Arthur Davies let James Shaw’s shot through his fingers.
But Dean soon put the home side level with an emphatic finish.
And, a couple of minutes later, Dixie was about to pull the trigger again – when he was upended for a penalty.
The crowd were silent as Dean stepped up to take the spot kick, but he showed no nerves and scored.
Arsenal were level at the break through an own goal. However, Everton won a corner and Dean headed home to send Goodison wild.
Shaw came up with an equaliser – but, famously, it was Dixie’s day.