First Merseyside derby: Everton 3-0 Liverpool at Goodison Park (1894)
The first Merseyside derby in the Football League was played on Saturday 13 October 1894 at Goodison Park, where Everton beat newly promoted Liverpool 3-0 in Division One. Tom McInnes headed Everton in front after ten minutes, and Alex Latta and Jack Bell added second-half goals. The crowd of 44,000 was larger than the Football League had ever seen, the start of one of English football’s oldest local derbies.
It was the first league meeting of two clubs that had crossed paths only once before.
Key Facts
- Everton 3-0 Liverpool, Football League Division One, Goodison Park, Saturday 13 October 1894.
- Everton scorers: Tom McInnes (10 minutes), Alex Latta and Jack Bell (both second half).
- Attendance of 44,000, with gate receipts of £1,026, figures never approached in the League to that point.
- Everton finished 2nd and Liverpool 16th and last in 1894-95; the Anfield return that season was a 2-2 draw.
- Liverpool lined up with William McCann in goal and Jimmy Ross at inside right.
- The clubs had met once before, in the April 1893 Liverpool Senior Cup final at Hawthorne Road, Bootle, their first meeting.
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The afternoon 44,000 came to Goodison Park
How Everton won the first Merseyside derby
Everton came into the match having won their opening seven, and they did not slow down. The play had run only ten minutes when William “Soldier” Stewart sent over a cross and Tom McInnes headed it home for 1-0. Latta and Bell scored the second and third after the interval to make it 3-0. John Southworth led the home attack alongside the three scorers.
The visitors were not short of names either. William McCann kept goal for Liverpool, with Andrew Hannah and John McCartney at full-back and Jimmy Ross at inside right. Liverpool had arrived at Goodison Park as reigning Second Division champions, promoted after an unbeaten season, but the first top-flight campaign ended very differently for them: 16th of 16 and bottom, while Everton finished runners-up to Sunderland.
The crowd was the story as much as the football. A reporter at the ground that day described “the great football match played last Saturday at Goodison Park” and put 44,000 inside it, writing simply, “I never saw such a crowd.” A gate of £1,026 was taken, and nothing approaching either figure had been seen in the Football League before.
| Goal | Scorer | Timing |
|---|---|---|
| 1-0 | Tom McInnes | 10 minutes, headed from a Stewart cross |
| 2-0 | Alex Latta | Second half |
| 3-0 | Jack Bell | Second half |
Tom McInnes, the man who scored first
Tom McInnes was the first man to score for Everton in a Merseyside derby. He was a Glaswegian, born on 22 March 1869, who had started with Cowlairs and won a single Scotland cap, scoring in a 7-0 win over Ireland on 9 March 1889. He had played in the 1891 FA Cup final for Notts County before Everton brought him south. He made 47 Football League and FA Cup appearances for the club, scoring 18, then moved to Luton Town in 1895 and died in Luton in 1939.
Why this was the first league derby, not the first meeting
The 1893 cup final that came first
Calling 13 October 1894 the first derby of any kind would overstate it. The clubs first met in April 1893, in the final of the Liverpool Senior Cup at Hawthorne Road in Bootle, before a crowd of 10,000. Everton, with the season already over, fielded eight reserves stiffened by three first-teamers. Liverpool, in only their first season of existence and freshly crowned Lancashire League champions, put out their strongest side and won it: Tom Wylie, a former Everton man, scored the goal that settled a tie Everton finished by protesting for a penalty. So 13 October 1894 was the first meeting in the Football League, the first with both first elevens at full strength in a league match, rather than the first time the two had ever faced each other.
That distinction is easy to lose, because Liverpool’s route to the top flight ran straight through it. Liverpool won the 1893-94 Second Division undefeated, and promotion to Division One turned a local cup tie into a fixture the whole League table now carried.
A rivalry with a longer prehistory
The two clubs also share an address. Everton had played at Anfield until a dispute with the ground’s landlord, John Houlding, in 1892; the club moved across Stanley Park to Goodison Park, and Houlding founded Liverpool to fill the ground Everton had left. Before Liverpool existed, the city’s local derby was Everton against Bootle, a rivalry that faded when Bootle became the first club to resign from the Football League, in 1893. For the deeper background to fixtures like this, our Football Rivalries archive traces how these grudges began. No other English city has staged more top-level local derbies than Liverpool, and it started here.
READ MORE: How England’s fiercest local rivalries were born →
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) About the First Merseyside Derby
When was the first Merseyside derby in the Football League?
The first Football League Merseyside derby was played on Saturday 13 October 1894. Everton beat Liverpool 3-0 at Goodison Park in Division One. It was the clubs’ first meeting in the Football League, though not the first time they had faced each other.
What was the score in the first Everton v Liverpool league match?
Everton beat Liverpool 3-0 at Goodison Park on 13 October 1894. Tom McInnes opened the scoring, and Alex Latta and Jack Bell added the second and third goals.
Who scored Everton’s goals in the first Merseyside derby in 1894?
Tom McInnes, Alex Latta and Jack Bell scored Everton’s goals against Liverpool on 13 October 1894. McInnes headed the opener on ten minutes from a William Stewart cross, and Latta and Bell added the second and third after the interval.
Where was the first Everton v Liverpool derby played?
The first league Merseyside derby was played at Goodison Park, Everton’s home since 1892. Everton had moved there from Anfield after the 1892 dispute that led to Liverpool’s formation.
What was the attendance at the 1894 Merseyside derby?
The crowd for Everton against Liverpool on 13 October 1894 was given as 44,000, with £1,026 taken at the gate. Nothing approaching either figure had been seen anywhere in the League before.
Had Everton and Liverpool met before the 1894 league derby?
Yes. The clubs first met in the final of the Liverpool Senior Cup in April 1893, at Hawthorne Road in Bootle, before 10,000 people. Everton fielded mostly reserves and Liverpool won through a Tom Wylie goal. That is why 13 October 1894 is best described as the first Football League derby rather than the first meeting.
Who scored the first goal in a Merseyside derby?
Tom McInnes scored the first Everton goal in a Merseyside derby, heading in during the opening ten minutes at Goodison Park on 13 October 1894. In the earlier 1893 Senior Cup final, Liverpool’s Tom Wylie had scored against an Everton reserve side.
Why did Everton and Liverpool end up sharing a city and a park?
Everton played at Anfield until a rent dispute with the landlord John Houlding in 1892. Everton left for Goodison Park across Stanley Park, and Houlding founded Liverpool to occupy the ground they had vacated. The two grounds sit less than a mile apart, which is part of why the derby became one of English football’s closest.
Was Liverpool a strong side when they first played Everton in the league?
Liverpool arrived at Goodison Park in October 1894 as reigning Second Division champions, having won promotion unbeaten. Their side included William McCann in goal and the former Preston North End forward Jimmy Ross. Even so, they finished bottom of the First Division that season, while Everton finished second.
What happened in the Anfield return in 1894-95?
The return league meeting at Anfield in 1894-95 finished 2-2. That gave Everton three of a possible four league points from the first season of derbies. The Anfield fixture was played on 17 November 1894.
Is the Merseyside derby the oldest top-flight derby in England?
It is England’s longest-running derby at the top level, tracing the first official meeting to 13 October 1894. The fixture has run every season without a break since 1962-63, and no English city has staged more top-level local derbies than Liverpool.
Who was Tom McInnes, Everton’s first derby scorer?
Tom McInnes was a Glasgow-born forward, born on 22 March 1869, who came to Everton from Notts County. He had won one Scotland cap, scoring against Ireland in 1889, and played in the 1891 FA Cup final for Notts County. He made 47 Everton appearances and scored 18 goals before joining Luton Town in 1895.
How did the two clubs finish the 1894-95 season?
Everton finished second in the First Division in 1894-95, behind champions Sunderland. Liverpool finished 16th and bottom in their first top-flight season. The gap between the neighbours that year was wide, whatever the 3-0 derby result had already suggested.
The first Merseyside derby, more than a century on
The fixture that opened with a record crowd and a McInnes header has outlasted almost every rival it started alongside. If you want to follow how the rest of English football’s flashpoints landed on their own anniversaries, our On This Day archive picks them up date by date.
Sources: Everton FC Heritage Society, 11v11, LFChistory, RSSSF, Wikipedia.
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