ON THIS DAY

When Denis Law left Old Trafford in 1973 he held the record for goals scored for Manchester United in European competitions. He had scored 28 goals in 33 matches although sadly a knee injury had prevented him playing in the most important European tie in his career at United - the European Cup Final victory over Benfica at Wembley in 1968. Fast-forward to September 15th 2004 and going into United's first Champions League group match of the season Ruud van Nistelrooy started the match in Lyon sharing the 28 goal record with Denis Law. Manchester United were 2-0 down at the break but a van Nistelrooy double in the second half gave United a share of the points and the Dutchman a new goalscoring record. Coincidentally, like Law he set the record in his 33rd European match for United and sadly also like the Scotsman he was never a part of a United side who won a European competition. Van Nistelrooy increased the record to 38 goals in 47 European matches, a total bettered by Wayne Rooney in 2016. 16 th September

Swansea City recorded their record victory, 12-0 against Sliema Wanders of Malta in the European Cup Winners Cup. Eight different Swansea players got on the scoresheet in the biggest victory by a Welsh club in a European competition. Link (match details) - Clubs scoring 10 goals in Cup matches

Derby County were knocked out of the 1975/76 UEFA Cup by Real Madrid but in their next European tie - the First Round of the 1976/77 UEFA Cup - they were up against more modest opposition....Finn Harps from the Irish Republic. The Rams didn't manage a win in their first eight League matches of the 1976/77 season but against Harps on 15th September 1976 they made up for that. In front of a 13,353 Baseball Ground crowd Derby were 9-0 up at the break and eventually won 12-0 with goals from Kevin Hector (5), Charlie George (3), Leighton James (3) and Bruce Rioch. That was a new record score for Derby beating two 9-0 League victories recorded back in the 19th Century. Derby won the return leg 4-1 but were beaten 5-2 on aggregate by AEK Athens in the Second Round. The low point for Derby in the 1976/77 was that newspaper-style programme - should have been banned!