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It's rather surprising that George Camsell’s name is often omitted from the list when Boro’s all-time greats are discussed.

If nothing else, he stands supreme as the club’s all-time leading goalscorer, netting a remarkable 345 goals in 453 league and cup appearances.

No doubt Boro fans well remember one of Teesside’s schoolyard facts, that Camsell scored a record 59 league goals when Boro cruised to the Second Division title in 1926-27.

It’s also pretty well known that the record lasted for just 12 months because Dixie Dean went one better for Everton in the First Division the following season.

With the help of Dean’s goals, Everton won the title while Boro’s glory dreams evaporated quickly and they finished bottom.

Mind, Camsell’s haul of 33 league goals was not bad, though not enough to keep Boro in the top flight.

Those occasional references we read about Boro being a yo-yo team came home to roost the following season when they won the Second Division title again.

This time Camsell scored only 30 goals, but a sparkling contribution of 27 from winger Billy Pease ensured that Boro returned to Division One in style.

The successful 1928-29 season had started with a trip to take on Reading at Elm Park, with Boro winning there for the first time by a 3-2 margin.

Camsell scored two of the goals, with the other coming from wing-half Joe Peacock, who had been signed from Everton 12 months earlier.

Camsell scored again two days later in a 5-2 romp at Spurs, and Boro never really looked back after that.

Unlike many of his goalscoring contemporaries at the time, Camsell was not a home-grown player.

Initially he was not even a centre-forward, starting his career as a left-winger, even though he was a naturally two-footed player.

George was born at Framwellgate Moor in 1902 and played for one or two teams from the mining villages in County Durham before being picked up by Durham City as a 21-year-old.

City were in the Third Division North at the time and Camsell made an immediate impact, scoring 20 goals in 21 appearances.

Boro were alerted and forked out £600 for his signature, only to find that George struggled to make an impact among the experienced pros at Ayresome Park.

In the event a deal was struck to sell him to Barnsley for a cut-price £200. But the Tykes struggled to raise the cash and Camsell stayed put.

He was not even in the team at the start of the 1926-27 season in which he grabbed his record breaking tally.

Boro handed the No 9 shirt instead to the tough Scot Jimmy McClelland, who himself had set a Boro scoring record of 32 goals just two years earlier.

The offside rule had been changed during the summer of 1926, reducing the number of opponents needed to keep a player onside from three to two.

Everybody in football believed the change would lead to more goals being scored, and in many instances they were right.

However McClelland failed to take advantage in the opening four games and Boro managed just one goal in the 360 minutes played.

They suffered three defeats, picking up just one point from a goalless draw at South Shields.

In the event, McClelland was injured at South Shields and the directors had little option but to promote reserve centre-forward Camsell, who had scored three goals in his four senior appearances the previous season.

With McClelland sidelined for a while, this was the opportunity that George had been waiting for. He was prolific from the word “Go”.

Before Christmas he had bagged four hat-tricks among a tally of 26 goals.

On Christmas Day, Boro went to tackle Manchester City at the relatively new state-of-the-art Maine Road Stadium and won 5-3.

The Gazette, the following day, printed the legendary match report which revealed that “Camsell scored five goals but did little else”.

An Ayresome Park ground attendance record of 43,754 was set for the following game, on December 27, when Boro played the return fixture against City.

Boro won 2-1 on this occasion and, yes, George grabbed both goals.

Another four Camsell hat tricks followed before the end of the season, the last one coming in a 5-0 drubbing of Reading at Ayresome Park at the end of April.

With promotion in the bag, this time Boro held on to their place in the top flight and, more often than not, Camsell was Boro’s regular centre-forward all the way to the start of the Second World War.

His England breakthrough came in 1929, when he had the satisfaction of replacing Dean in the team.

On his debut, George scored twice in a 4-1 win against France in Paris.

Two days later he scored four goals as England beat Belgium 5-1 in Brussels.

Surprisingly, despite scoring 11 goals in his first four internationals, Camsell was left out of the England side for more than five years.

It was a healthy sign of the wealth of top goalscorers playing in England at the time.

George went on to play another five times for his country, scoring 18 goals altogether in his nine appearances.

This is the highest goals-per-game ratio of any England player who has played two or more internationals.

Camsell scored in every game he played for England, and those nine consecutive scoring appearances leave him second only on the list to Steve Bloomer, later to join Boro, who scored in his first 10 England appearances as a Derby County player.

Camsell played his final league game for Boro against Leicester City at Ayresome Park in April 1939, and scored the opening goal in a 3-2 victory.

The hostilities did not signal the end of Camsell’s illustrious Boro career, because he returned to the club after the War and joined the coaching staff.

He later worked as chief scout and also as assistant-secretary.

In all, he was top scorer for the Boro in 10 consecutive seasons, and in eight of those campaigns he reached 20 league goals.

In his late 1930s he found himself playing alongside teenage inside-forward Wilf Mannion, who was to go on to become the Golden Boy of English football and emulate Camsell’s claim as the best Boro player of all time.

If there is a slight disappointment from Camsell’s career, it is that he did not take all the penalties in season 1926-27.

He had the opportunity, but decided against taking spot kicks, particularly towards the end of the season.

As a result, Jackie Carr, Billy Birrell and Billy Pease all scored from the spot during the campaign.

If Camsell had taken their six converted penalties then surely he would have grabbed up to 65 goals in the season, and Dean would never have overtaken his tally the following year.

However we should not allow this fact to obscure one of the greatest Boro careers of all time.

Camsell has never quite been airbrushed out of Boro’s folklore, though his name is not promoted as often as it should be.

He remains a genuine contender for the club’s top player mantle.

Depending on which era in which you watched your football, then George Elliott, Mannion, Brian Clough, Graeme Souness and Juninho are among the many other possibilities.

No doubt George will be sitting and watching from some distant star and remembering some of his goals against Reading when Boro travel to the Madejski Stadium on Saturday seeking three valuable promotion points.

Boro don’t have anybody in their ranks with the calibre of Camsell’s amazing scoring prowess, but winning this game is well within Boro’s power.