Forgotten Legends of Football: Ian Rush

Rush’s relegation to the reserves knocked the wind out of the player and soon he was starting to doubt if he would make the cut at Liverpool. But on hindsight, Rush is always full of praise for the Liverpool system and firmly believes that whatever happened at Melwood training ground helped him become the player he was. However, his patience finally bore fruit as injuries to Steven Heighway and David Johnson manufactured the perfect opportunity for Rush to have a second chance at impressing Paisley and up the claim for a spot. He played alongside Kenny Dalglish in the League Cup final replay which Liverpool won, but despite failing to score he did put in a good performance.

Paisley however, seemed far from impressed as he urged Rush to be more selfish in front of goal. And it is surprising how a simple advice turned Rush into a goal scoring machine, something even hours of training could never have possibly done that. The following season, he finished as the club’s leading scorer with 30 goals helping the club bring the league title back to Anfield and successfully defend the League Cup. Trophies, goals and honors galore as Rush continued to torment defenses around the continent as Liverpool won the League Cup treble in the 1983-84 season as the Reds edged past Roma 4-2 to lift the European Cup. PFA Player of the Year, BBC Wales Sports Personality of the Year and PFA Writers’ Footballer of the Year were the individual honors bestowed upon Rush for the terrific season he had.

Napoli came calling that summer, presenting Rush with the prospect of playing alongside arguably the best player in the world Deigo Maradona and earn a million pounds as well. Rush revealed that the money had unsettled him and he was upset to not have been granted the permission to make the move but he finally made the Italian switch in 1986 when he joined Juventus following the Heysel tragedy.

Heysel Tragedy and the Italian misadventure

In May 1985, as the then European powerhouse Liverpool were trying to retain their crown of being the best in the continent against the Italian might of Juventus, the ‘darkest event in the history of UEFA’ unfolded as 39 fans died and several others were injured following violence between the two sets of fans.

Despite the magnitude of the event, UEFA decided to carry on as anything else would have risked inciting further violence. The Turin side won the match 1-0 as Liverpool failed to hold on to the title and subsequently incurred a 6 year ban from European competitions. The financial loss that Liverpool were staring at due to their barring from European competitions could only be balanced by the sale of Ian Rush to Juventus, who readily pounced on the opportunity to play in the elite competition and test himself against what was considered back then the impregnable Italian defenses.

However, his stint with Juventus had to be delayed by an extra year as Michel Platini decided to retire a year later. So Platini and Michel Laudrup were filling up the foreign quota of two players at the club resulting in Rush being loaned to Liverpool for another season.