ON THIS DAY

The big transfer story at the start of the 1996/97 season was would Alan Shearer join Manchester United? He didn't - he moved from Blackburn to Newcastle - but United did sign an almost unknown 23-year-old forward from Molde in Norway, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer. The Norwegian scored twice in his first match for United reserves at Oldham reserves and four days later - on Sunday 25th August 1996 - he made his first team debut for the Reds. He scored the equaliser just six minutes after coming on as a sub, replacing David May, in the 2-2 draw against Blackburn Rovers at Old Trafford. He became something of a 'super-sub' in his 11 years at Old Trafford and scored 91 goals in his 235 Premier League appearances for United. Spells as manager at Cardiff City and back at Molde preceded his return to Old Trafford as manager when taking over from Jose Mourinho in 2018. 26 th August

Just 10 days after the Premier League had kicked off Eric Cantona became the first player to score a hat-trick in the competition. The Frenchman - then a Leeds United player - scored three times in the 5-0 defeat of Tottenham at Elland Road. Earlier in the month Cantona had scored a hat-trick for Leeds in their 4-3 victory over Liverpool in the Charity Shield at Wembley.

Eccentric was a word often used to describe the former Everton and Wales goalkeeper Neville Southall. One of those eccentric episodes came on the opening day of the 1990/91 League season when newly-promoted Leeds had taken a 2-0 half-time lead at Goodison. Rather than return to the dressing room Southall sat in the goalmouth throughout the interval. There was speculation that he was fearful of a bollocking from manager Colin Harvey or that it was an incredible sulk but Southall later said he did it to 'clear his head'. Taking a Paracetamol would have been a cheaper option - Everton fined him a weeks' wages!

The opening day of the 1928/29 League season saw Bradford City beat Rotherham United 11-1 at Valley Parade – still Bradford City’s record League win and Rotherham’s record League defeat.

Arsenal (Division 1 at Sheffield Wednesday) and Chelsea (Division 2 v Swansea) became the first Football League sides to have numbers on their shirts to help identify players.