A Bullseye as third-tier hero slays Scotland
ROUS CUP, MAY 27, 1989: SCOTLAND 0 ENGLAND 2 HAMPDEN PARK, ATTENDANCE: 63,282
Bloody hell,’ says Steve Bull, ‘I’ve just scored for England, I don’t know how I’ve scored, the ball has hit me on the shoulder, fallen and I’ve just hit it first time. It’s in the back of the net, knocked a TV microphone over and now I’m running towards the Jocks! So I just fell on my knees.’
Bull is recalling his 60-minute, one-goal England debut from May 1989, when the then 24-year- old striker shocked more than the 63,000 inside Hampden Park.
The reason for the surprise was that Bull had just completed the 1988-89 season with Wolverhampton Wanderers in the old Third division.
Wolves had won the division and Bull had scored 50 goals. The previous season, in the old Fourth division, he had scored 52 goals — 102 in two seasons at whatever level attracts attention.
England took note. Bull, who now works for Wolves on matchdays, was called up to the Under 21s by dave Sexton as an over-age player. When there was an injury in the senior squad, Bull was drafted in by Bobby Robson.
‘I flew in and joined training the next morning,’ Bull recalls. ‘There was Peter Shilton, Bryan Robson, Terry Butcher, all these names, and then there’s Steve Bull from the Third division.’
But if Bull was questioning whether he belonged in such company, Bobby Robson was not. He named Bull on the bench for the traditional end- of- season clash with Scotland. It was now played in the name of the Rous Cup, the Home Championship having ended in 1984.
What will surprise some is that Robson’s forward line for the match consisted of Tony Cottee and John Fashanu. Fashanu won two England caps and this was his second. It was to last only half an hour due to injury.
‘John Fashanu twisted an ankle, I think,’ Bull says. ‘I was told to warm up, so I went down to where the England fans were. I wasn’t even really warming up, I was waving to the England fans.
‘It was pretty scary, Hampden Park. I remember the Jocks were banging on the bus and that it was about 100 yards from the bus to the tunnel. It was hostile.
‘So I was looking to the England fans. Amazingly, about 3,000 Wolves fans had made it up there to cheer me. I was thinking, “Why? I’m only going to be on the bench”. But they had more belief than me. Then Bobby Robson calls me over and tells me I’m going on. “Give it a go, son. Just play your normal game”.’ BUll’S
normal game entailed smacking the ball past goalkeepers. As Barry davies said in the BBC commentary: ‘It doesn’t matter the level, if you know where the goal is and your name is Steve Bull, you have a go.’
Chris Waddle had given England a first-half lead with a stooping header that risked ruining one of his hairstyles. The scoreline remained 1-0 until the 82nd minute when Gary Stevens sent a diagonal cross from right back, on the halfway line, towards Bull. dave McPherson and Alex Mcleish were in attendance for Scotland but Bull got between them and, as he says, the ball made contact with his shoulder.
The ball dropped and Bull’s instinct was always to strike firsttime and hard. There is something of the Jamie Vardy about Bull’s career trajectory, and he sees another parallel: ‘Vardy hits the ball quick, as quick as I did and as hard as I did.’
When Bull peeled away and fell to his knees, Paul Gascoigne was one of the first over to congratulate him. It was Gascoigne’s 22nd birthday, it was his fifth cap and he, too, was a substitute.
Bull and Gascoigne — ‘or Gazza as everybody calls him,’ as davies said in commentary — were the new boys. Gascoigne’s global fame was a year away. He and Bull would both go to the World Cup in Italy the following summer, where Gascoigne’s smiles and tears were unforgettable.
Remembered less is that Bull made four appearances at Italia 90. He went on for Gary lineker in the first match against the Republic of Ireland, he replaced Waddle against Holland, started against Egypt and replaced John Barnes against Belgium.
In the semi-final against West Germany, Bull was again due to leave the bench with 10 minutes remaining when lineker equalised. ‘“Get your top off,” Bobby Robson said to me,’ Bull recalls. “Get ready”. Then lineker scores. “Put your top back on”.
‘Then it goes to extra time and penalties. I thought he’d take a gamble on me.’
Having been released by West Bromwich and begun his 13 years with Wolves in the Freight Rover Trophy, Bull was in a World Cup semi-final.
He is the last third-tier player to be capped by England and that international career started here with the goal at Hampden. By pure coincidence Bull has been asked to bring out a 2018 calendar this Christmas. And december’s photograph? This one.