The 1987-88 season was not an easy one for Everton. Defending their title was always going to be difficult but Howard Kendall’s departure to Athletic Bilbao hit the club hard. Colin Harvey stepped up to the top job, but he was not the first or last assistant to discover that replacing a legendary manager can be a thankless task.

That first post-Kendall season was a tough watch for Evertonians. While they toiled to a fourth-place finish, their neighbours were sweeping all before them. Boosted by the summer signings of Peter Beardsley, John Barnes and Ray Houghton, Liverpool left the rest of the league standing. While John Aldridge and the new arrivals were hitting the net regularly up front, their defence was proving just as efficient at the other end of the pitch. They won five games 4-0 before Christmas and put together a run of seven straight clean sheets around the New Year, showing that every component in the engine was firing. Before long, talk turned to records this team could set.

The first target was to equal the 29-match unbeaten run Leeds had set in the 1973-74 season. Liverpool achieved that feat with a 1-1 draw at Derby in the middle of March, but Dalglish was not stopping there. “The record has only been mentioned by the media. As I have said many times before, there is more to go for than a record.” With just 11 games left to play, fans started to wonder if Liverpool could go the whole season unbeaten.

But first they had an opportunity to create history at the home of their local rivals. If Liverpool could avoid defeat in their next game, a trip to Goodison Park on 20 March 1988, they would break Leeds’ record and become – in the word of a Mirror headline – “the team of the century”.

With the match to be broadcast live on ITV, the hype started to grow. “We are capable of beating Liverpool, because we have already done it and that is something no one else can say,” declared Harvey. Everton’s win at Anfield in the third round of the League Cup five months earlier had been a rare moment of joy in his first campaign as manager, although Liverpool had since avenged that defeat by knocking Everton out of the FA Cup in the fifth round at Goodison.

The forthcoming derby – the fourth of the season – did at least give Everton “an opportunity to add something akin to a silver lining to a forgettable season of immense disappointment,” to use the words of Ian Ross in the Times. The title was on its way to Anfield, but the desire to beat Liverpool and stop them from breaking Leeds’ record gave Harvey and his players some extra motivation.

Steve McMahon goes after Peter Reid. Photograph: Popperfoto/Getty Images

The atmosphere inside Goodison was intense as Everton’s biggest crowd of the season, 44,162, witnessed a match that often threatened to boil over. The game was not high on skill but it was it certainly full of commitment. Steve McMahon, an injury doubt coming into the match, received a yellow card for a two-footed challenge on Neil Pointon’s backside. The combative midfielder was given a taste of his own medicine later in the game, when Kevin Sheedy lunged at McMahon long after the ball had gone. That challenge was worthy of a red card, even judging by the standards of the time. Houghton, in particular, was furious with his international team-mate.

In between these two incidents, Wayne Clarke scored the only goal of the game when Bruce Grobbelaar failed to deal with a Trevor Steven corner and the striker swept the ball home. Clarke had more than one reason to be happy. His older brother, Allan, had been a member of the Leeds side who set the record Liverpool were trying to surpass. The brothers had met before the game outside the ground, with the elder brother asking for a car-park ticket and a winning goal. “It’s nice to keep the record intact and in the family,” said Clarke.

Grobbelaar, however, was fuming. “You write what you think but I don’t blame myself at all. I was tripped by Alan Harper and impeded as I went for the ball.” Either way, a s strangely flat Liverpool – who were missing the injured Aldridge – did go close on a couple of occasions. Craig Johnston had an effort cleared off the line and Neville Southall thwarted the same man with his legs in the second half. But it wasn’t meant to be.

“Obviously we are disappointed to have lost because we deserved more from the game,” said Dalglish. “The record doesn’t mean anything. We went 29 games unbeaten to equal Leeds and will get recognition for that. The disappointment comes from losing the game, not from failing to make the record.”

While Everton and Leeds fans celebrated, so did the bookmakers. Before the game, William Hill had informed the press that they would lose more than £1m if Liverpool went through the season unbeaten.

Ultimately, Everton had only won a single battle while losing the war, but football fans live for the little moments like this. Even if their own team is struggling, getting one over a rival is delicious. The whole season was a letdown for Everton but derailing Liverpool’s high flyers gave their fans some comfort. They will be hoping for a repeat this weekend.

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