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Kevin Sheedy on how he scored his best Everton free kick

One way of highlighting the impact Kevin Sheedy made for Everton in the 1980s is to look at the p...



Kevin Sheedy on how he scored...
Soccer

Kevin Sheedy on how he scored his best Everton free kick

One way of highlighting the impact Kevin Sheedy made for Everton in the 1980s is to look at the personal accolades he won.

In the teams that won the league titles in 1985 and 1987, the club legend was named in the PFA Team of the Year in both title-winning seasons.

It's particularly significant as that was an outstanding Everton era, essentially the best of the post-War era.

In all the former Ireland international, and scorer of that famous goal against England at Italia 90, would net just shy of 100 goals in all competitions for the Merseyside club.

He regards that first ever Irish goal at a World Cup as his greatest moment at club level, Everton fans were able to dine out on some wonderful free kicks that flew off Sheedy's boot and struck the backs of nets across the English top flight. 

Arguably the most famous of his set pieces came against Ipswich Town in 1985, and he regards it among his greatest finish and this week on Newstalk's Team 33, he took us back through that particular goal.

 

The reason that free kick was so remarkable was not only that it had to be taken twice. What was so impressive was that he scored both the disallowed finish and the goal within seconds of each other in opposite top corners of the net. The first was curled in with aplomb and the legal goal with delicate poise.

"I used to practice because when you've got 40,000 Evertonians chanting your name at a free kick, you'd better be able to deliver, so I used to practice all the time," Sheedy told us.

You can listen to the full interview with Kevin Sheedy on the podcast player or on iTunes:

Continuing, he said, "The one you're talking about was against Ipswich in the quarter final of the FA Cup. We were being beaten 1-0 and I was about 20-22 yards out and I used to try and get on the ball early and try to gain an advantage.

"So Ipswich's wall wasn't correctly put together, so I took it quickly and, as you say, bent it into Paul Cooper's left hand corner. The referee disallowed it."

If Ipswich thought they had escaped, they had another thing coming, namely Sheedy's reliable set piece prowess.

"So I put the ball down and Paul Cooper had sort of edged over to the side where I'd just put the ball into the net and he left a nice gap on the other side. So I managed to put the ball over to the other side," said Sheedy.

"And for most Evertonians of that era, when I meet them, it's the one they always talk to me about." 

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