No. 72 – “Christ son, you look about seven foot tall….”

No. 72 – “Christ son, you look about seven foot tall….”

Legendary Liverpool skipper Ron Yeats, speaking to liverpoolfc.tv once recalled the momentous day at Anfield when Bill Shankly first introduced our now famous all-red kit (against Anderlecht!).

“We’d just finished training and I was on the way home when Shanks called me back,” says Yeats. “My initial reaction was that I’d done something wrong. Either that or I was getting a pay rise! Anyway, it was neither, ‘I want you to try on this all-red strip’ he asked, so I went into the dressing room and put it on.

I came out and the boss was nowhere to be seen so I went down the steps towards the players tunnel and I could him out in the middle of the pitch with Bob (Paisley). I made my way towards them and as I got closer Shanks came out with that immortal line, ‘Christ son, you look about seven foot tall, we’re going to play in all-red from now on’.

We wore it the next night against Anderlecht and beat them 3-0. That was that and Liverpool have played in these colours ever since. For Shanks it was all psychological and I think it rubbed off on the players as well. It may sound strange but playing in all-red did make us feel and look bigger. It was amazing what it did for us and I must admit, I loved playing in all red.”.