Norwich City will kick off our return to the Premier League by hosting Liverpool at Carrow Road on Saturday, August 14. Ahead of the game, we’ve looked back to the first ever Premier League season to catch up with David Phillips, who scored the winning penalty the last time City beat Liverpool at home on May 1, 1993.
canaries.co.uk: The last time we beat Liverpool at Carrow Road was in 1992/93, the inaugural Premier League season, and you scored the game’s only goal with a penalty. What can you remember about that day and that game?
DP: When you look at the season that we had, it was a terrific season, albeit when it came to around Christmas, we didn’t win for quite a few games. But we wanted to try to finish off very strong. In respect of taking penalties, it was something that was not really my forte. I could strike a ball from 30 yards but for confidence reasons I didn’t take an awful lot of penalties, but I got to a stage when I thought I should be taking them. I decided to make that change. I know Mark Bowen had been taking penalties and the opportunity was there for me to go and do it. We’d already been beaten at Anfield earlier in the season.
I think Mike Hooper was expecting me to go and blast the ball (after David James had been sent off for punching John Polston), knowing that I could strike it from 25 or 30 yards with no problem. As it materialised, I ended up slotting it to the keeper’s left and he didn’t move. I had taken a previous penalty against Leeds about a month before against John Lukic and that was one which I hammered. He managed to get a fingertip to it but there was no way that he was saving it. Dare I say, Mike Hooper thought I was going to do exactly the same. He can think what he thinks, but it was quite nice to slot it home!
It was important to get ourselves back on track and it gave us the opportunity of finishing third in the league. I know that we were leading it up to around December and losing against Manchester United wasn’t great. Losing to our near neighbours also wasn’t particularly great and that was the one poor run really that we had. We went through a run of six games where we didn’t win a game at the wrong time.
We didn’t have the largest of squads, but we had an excellent squad. Nobody thought that we would finish anywhere near where we ended up, so to come third in the Premier League was a phenomenal result and position for us.
canaries.co.uk: Liverpool had the likes of Ian Rush and John Barnes in their attack, so our defenders must have been chuffed to keep a clean sheet!
DP: Mark Walters was playing as well, so when you look at the side that they had it was a host of internationals throughout the whole of the squad. To go and beat them was great but we were a good side. We had very good players and had been working up to the situation over the last two or three years previously. Yes, we had players like Andy Linighan or Robert Fleck who had moved on… Andy Townsend another one, but we had players in there good enough to replace them.
Chris Sutton was a young lad coming through. We bought Mark Robins from Manchester United, and we’ve seen how good a finisher he was. We still had pace on the wings with Ruel Fox. On the opposite side, I was in front of Mark Bowen and we had a very good understanding between the two of us.
canaries.co.uk: That particular game took place in front of nearly 21,000 fans. What did it mean to you playing in front of the Norwich City supporters?
DP: It was always great. Irrespective of where I played, playing in front of home fans was always a special occasion. When you go away, it means a lot as well because a lot of spectators have paid a lot of money to go and follow the team. At Carrow Road we virtually had full houses most of the time and it paid off because of the good football that we played that season under Mike Walker. Before that, it was under Dave Stringer and David Williams.
We knew how to play football and work ourselves out of situations. I remember when we used to go off to represent Wales, myself, Bowen, Jeremy Goss and Malcolm Allen would come along and we’d end up being in a team by ourselves and nobody would beat us because we had good movement, good understanding and we knew how to work the ball. That was down to a lot of work that we did on the training pitch, and it certainly benefited when we came onto the field of play on a Saturday or a midweek fixture.
canaries.co.uk: What do you think of the current team and its chances back in the Premier League?
DP: It’s always going to be difficult. We know, at the moment, that Norwich doesn't spend a shed load of money. When I came down just over a year or so ago, I happened to meet Delia Smith and Michael Wynn-Jones and went into the boardroom.
They were saying how great a job that Daniel Farke had done. There was not a lot of money to be spent but the way that he spent it on players who came from the second division of German football, for example, was good because they came in and did a job. The signings that he’s made have been excellent signings and they’ve done really well for Norwich.
The one thing I was impressed with was the fact that when the team got relegated everyone was talking about Max Aarons, Todd Cantwell, Emi Buendía and Teemu Pukki leaving the club because they’d have to balance the books. There’s not many clubs in the country who are in the black and Norwich are certainly one of those. They didn’t have to go and sell and that was a good thing.
They kept those players and got promoted once again and I’m absolutely delighted. We know that Emi Buendía has moved on. I know him from his days when he was at Getafe as a youngster. Sometimes, you have to make money out of these players who have done very well and if there is a club out there that wants to spend more money than you anticipate or expect then you possibly will accept it.
When you look at Norwich and what’s happened, you had Oliver Skipp come in on loan last season who did a phenomenal job, and now they’ve gone and got Billy Gilmour on loan from Chelsea who is an excellent player. He will only enhance everything that is good about Norwich in the midfield area. It will be a difficult season once again and if we can get stability and a run of a few years in the Premier League, then who knows what will happen.
This feature originally appeared in the Gillingham issue of OTBC. To pre-order our matchday programme for Liverpool, click here.