Today, 20th January sees the 138th anniversary of Steve Bloomer’s birth; he was undisputedly one of the greatest strikers in football history.
It is to be hoped that Rams fans will always celebrate his achievements and remember Steve’s legacy.
Three years have already passed since the splendid bust of Bloomer was sited next to the home dug-out (Bloomer would wonder just what a ‘technical area’ was!) at Pride Park Stadium.
Steve’s rise from his impoverished West Midlands’ origins to the status of ‘football’s first superstar’ through his astonishing goalscoring exploits with Derby County, Middlesbrough and England are equalled or surpassed by only a handful of players.
Though slight in stature, Bloomer was a powerful, charismatic man, an inspirational captain and leader on and off the field - as well as a record goalscorer.
332 goals and 18 hat-tricks for Derby County are just two of the incredible Bloomer statistics that speak for themselves. How long have we been waiting for a Derby player to score just one hat-trick these days?
He was perhaps a similar ‘average’ build to the great Kevin Hector - who is second only to Bloomer in the Derby County goalscoring charts - but speaking of the ‘technical’, it is still incredible to recount Bloomer’s capabilities.
This is because, at the turn of the 20th Century, there was little of the sports science, fitness, and athletic psychology, dietary and tactical development that we have seen in the game over the last few decades. As a writer, Bloomer did later describe his techniques and approach to the game.
Yet Bloomer mastered the crude, heavy football, often sodden with water on wet days; he played in lumpy, ‘hobnail’-type boots that might have been more suited to a shift down the pit. They were certainly far removed from the lightweight accuracy of the balletic high-tech football ‘slippers’ that players wear today.
Yet, Bloomer scored goals at club and international level from the half-way line; not ‘lobs’, but low shots of such stunning power and accuracy that goalkeepers recounted their bemusement even after retirement.
Steve was a penalty-area poacher, too, and a masterful header of the ball, a supreme passer and world-class striker who scored great goals from all angles and distances.
He was an accomplished baseball player and cricketer as well, and at a time when all-round sportsmen were commonplace, stood out as a high-achiever in those games.
In Bloomer’s day, the only international games played were the ‘home internationals’ with the Scottish, Welsh and Irish sides, but Steve still once scored 5 in a match, when playing in an England - Ireland match (at Derby), which his national side won 9-0.
He remains in the top 10 all-time England scoring charts even today, with fine players like Michael Owen and Wayne Rooney only now catching him up having played multiples of the number of internationals that Bloomer played to attain or exceed Steve’s total.
The advent of the internet makes possible a comprehensive search to read up on football heroes from any age. Sadly, the video age came too late to capture Bloomer’s astonishing goalscoring career on film but Derby fans should spend time reading about the exceptional Steve Bloomer.
Keep his memory alive and be proud that within Derby County’s history, there is enshrined the life and times of the incomparable ‘Destroying Angel’, Steve Bloomer!