HUNT AND DIVE BOMBER

 29th July 1959

Well this is something that doesn’t seem to happen nowadays. A big club signs a non-league player who helps that club into an era when they dominated English football. The non-league club was Stockton Heath (that later became Warrington Town). The big club was Liverpool and the player they signed on 29th July 1959 was Roger Hunt. A little over a month later he made his debut for the Reds, scoring in the Second Division defeat of Scunthorpe at Anfield. He finished that season as club top scorer. 

Hunt did the same in 1961/62, with the 41 League goals he scored in 41 League outings, that remains a club record to this day. The 1961/62 season was the first of eight seasons in a row when he finished as Liverpool’s top scorer. In total he scored 285 goals in 492 league and cup appearances for Liverpool – a club record goals figure until Ian Rush came along – while his 245 goals in 404 league outings is still a club record. The goals figure includes the first-ever goal seen on the ‘Match of the Day’ programme. In his stay at Anfield – which lasted until December 1969, when he joined Bolton – he won two League Championship medals, a Second Division Division Championship medal and an FA Cup winners' medal, not forgetting a World Cup winning medal for England in 1966. And he became a genuine Liverpool legend.    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nAhNqoggQV8&t=2s

Football on This Day – 29th July 1994
On this day, Spurs clinched a transfer coup, when they sign one of the stars of the World Cup, Jürgen Klinsmann. The German ‘Dive Bomber’ cost £2 million with the signing being completed on Alan Sugar’s yacht moored off Monte Carlo!! "Dive Bomber"!!!!

Klinsmann moved to Tottenham Hotspur in the Premier League for the 1994-5 season, where the fans and media were very critical of the German because of his reputation as a diver. He was signed by Spurs in July 1994 from Monaco for £2 million. On his debut against Sheffield Wednesday he scored the winning header and immediately won over fans with his goal by self-deprecatingly, celebration, diving to the ground. A Guardian journalist who had written an article called "Why I Hate Jürgen Klinsmann", wrote another two months later called "Why I Love Jürgen Klinsmann". Klinsmann went on to win the 1995 Football Writers' Association, player of the year.

Because of his humour, but also because of his athletic achievements and his combative playing style, Klinsmann quickly became extremely popular in England; over 150,000 of his shirts were sold. He now holds legendary status at Spurs and was inducted into Madame Tussauds Wax Museum.