Liverpool only exist because Everton walked out of Anfield. In 1892 Everton fell out with their landlord over the rent and moved across Stanley Park to Goodison, and a new club was formed to fill the empty ground. The first league derby came in October 1894. Everton won 3-0.
Liverpool have the European Cups, so if you pick this side on medals alone Everton get a goalkeeper and a polite nod. I haven't done that. Most of the eleven below did something that mattered in the derby itself, and where one didn't, I'll say so.
The team, 4-4-2 diamond
Southall; Neal, Hansen, Van Dijk, Baines; Gerrard, Souness, Ball; Dalglish; Dean, Rush.
Souness sits. Gerrard and Ball run either side of him, Dalglish plays at the tip and drops off the two strikers, and the full-backs have to give you all the width.
In goal
This is the closest call in the team, and I went back and forth on it.
Ray Clemence won three European Cups at Liverpool. Nobody would laugh at you for picking him. But Clemence played behind the best defence in Europe, and for long stretches he had very little to do. Neville Southall played behind some decent Everton sides and some poor ones, and he kept the poor ones in games they had no right to be in. Between 1984 and 1987 Everton won two titles, the FA Cup and the Cup Winners' Cup with him in goal, and he was Footballer of the Year in 1985. Nobody has played in more Merseyside derbies. Clemence was a great keeper in a great team. Southall was a great keeper, full stop, and I'd take him.
The back four
Phil Neal's derby record is nothing special. He's in because of two European Cup finals and two goals in them: a penalty against Borussia Mönchengladbach in Rome in 1977, and the opener against Roma, in Rome again, in 1984.
Hansen captained the 1986 double side, finished off with a 3-1 win over Everton at Wembley.
Van Dijk is in on ability alone. He wins everything in the air and has the legs to cover when Hansen wanders off upfield with the ball, which Hansen liked to do. His one big derby memory is Pickford's tackle at Goodison in October 2020, which wrecked his knee and cost him most of that season, and he'd rather forget it.
Left back is where I expect the stick. You'll want Robertson. Fair enough, he's won far more. But Leighton Baines was a goal threat from full-back at Everton for the best part of thirteen years, usually in sides that gave him very little to work with, and in the Premier League he scored 20 of the 22 penalties he took.
Midfield
If you want a derby reason for Graeme Souness, go to March 1984. The League Cup final finished 0-0 at Wembley, the replay went to Maine Road, and Souness scored the only goal. He was captain that season, the one that ended with Liverpool as European champions, and six years earlier he'd set up Dalglish's winner in the 1978 European Cup final.
Gerrard gets the armband anyway. Souness captained the better side, but only for a few seasons, and Gerrard had it for more than ten years. Everyone remembers Istanbul. I'd rather remember March 2012, when he scored all three in a 3-0 derby win at Anfield.
Ball turned up at Goodison in 1966, a few weeks after winning the World Cup, aged 21. The following March, Everton knocked Liverpool out of the FA Cup and Ball got the only goal. By 1969/70, with Colin Harvey and Howard Kendall alongside him, he had a league title. Everton sold him to Arsenal in 1971.
Up front
Dalglish had the job of replacing Kevin Keegan, and within a year he'd scored the winner in a European Cup final. As player-manager he won the double in his first season, beating Everton to the league and then beating them again at Wembley. Most of the derby damage of the 1980s came from him and Rush together. His last game in charge was the 4-4 FA Cup replay at Goodison in February 1991. He resigned two days later.
Ian Rush scored four at Goodison on one afternoon in November 1982, in a 5-0. He scored twice against them in the 1986 FA Cup final, then came off the bench in the 1989 final and scored twice more. His 25 derby goals are still the record, and it's hard to see anyone getting near it now.
Dixie Dean is next, with 19. He also scored sixty league goals in 1927/28, a number nobody in the English top flight has got near since, and he won two titles and the 1933 FA Cup.
Gary Lineker had one season at Everton, 1985/86, and scored 30 league goals in it. Some Blues would start him ahead of Dean on that alone. I wouldn't, but one season against a whole career isn't a fair fight, and I'm not completely sure I'd win the argument.
Salah
Mohamed Salah, Liverpool, 2017 to 2026. Four Golden Boots, and his curler against Everton in December 2017 won FIFA's Puskás Award. I'd love to fit him in, and the same goes for Barnes and Keegan, but a diamond has no wide men and I wasn't dropping Rush for anyone.
Who nearly made it
Kevin Ratcliffe led Everton out against Liverpool in two Wembley finals, the 1984 League Cup and the 1986 FA Cup, and lost both, which probably tells you more about those Liverpool sides than about him.
Graeme Sharp has the volley. October 1984 at Anfield, a dropping ball, hit first time from outside the box, and it won the derby. Ask an Evertonian over a certain age to name one derby goal and it's usually that one.
Duncan Ferguson, for his first Everton goal coming in a derby win in November 1994. And you could argue for Andy Gray, who was only at Goodison for under two years but still scored in the 1984 FA Cup final and the 1985 Cup Winners' Cup final.
So it's seven Liverpool, four Everton. Blues will say that's the European Cups talking, and they've got a point. Everton won the league in 1985, and after Heysel that May English clubs were banned from Europe, so they never got their go at the European Cup. Put Ratcliffe in for Van Dijk and it's six and five, which is probably closer to the truth.
Players who've worn both shirts
- Edgar Chadwick, Everton 1888 to 1899, Liverpool 1902 to 1904
- Dave Hickson, Everton 1948 to 1955 and 1957 to 1959, Liverpool 1959 to 1961
- Johnny Morrissey, Liverpool 1957 to 1962, Everton 1962 to 1972
- Steve McMahon, Everton 1979 to 1983, Liverpool 1985 to 1991
- Peter Beardsley, Liverpool 1987 to 1991, Everton 1991 to 1993
- Gary Ablett, Liverpool 1985 to 1992, Everton 1992 to 1996
- Nick Barmby, Everton 1996 to 2000, Liverpool 2000 to 2002
- Abel Xavier, Everton 1999 to 2002, Liverpool 2002 to 2003
Barmby's is the move people still argue about, straight from Goodison to Anfield in the summer of 2000.
Derby hat-tricks
Rush scored four in the 5-0 at Goodison in 1982. Gerrard scored three in the 3-0 at Anfield in 2012.
Your version
Live in a split house? Make your own version in the team builder, or do the XI from a derby you went to together. We send a proof before printing, and it arrives framed for £99 or £149 with free UK delivery.
If you'd rather keep the house divided, we've got framed Liverpool prints and Everton prints too.