On This Day – 24th August
Michael Thomas. A name that will will bring a smile on the face to any Arsenal fan over the age of 40 and a grimace to a Liverpool fan of the same age!
Thomas scored a last-gasp winner on 26th May 1989 for Arsenal to win the league title at Anfield, their first championship in 18 years.
Liverpool were the league champions at the time and were widely expected to retain their league title. The press had written Arsenal off and one newspaper ran with the headline ‘Not a chance’.
In the end it was Thomas and Arsenal who had the last laugh, coming away with the most dramatic end to a season ever. Despite what Sky Sports claim with Sergio Aguero’s last-minute winner for Manchester City in 2012, the 1989 triumph will always eclipse that!
Michael Thomas started his career at Arsenal, signing professional forms in 1984 and made his first team three years later against North London rivals Tottenham Hotspur in the League Cup Semi Final.
For the rest of the 1986/87 season and the entire following season, Thomas played in the right back position. He was moved into midfield when Lee Dixon joined the club in the summer of 1988 and played for the next three years there.
It was during this time that he won his only two caps for England, away to Saudi Arabia in 1988 and in a 2-1 win over Yugoslavia a year later at Wembley.
A few months after lifting yet another league championship in 1991, Thomas fell out with manager George Graham. In a shock move, he joined Liverpool for £1.5 million. Liverpool manager decided that he would sign the man who had scored the goal that took the title from Anfield!
Less than five months later, Thomas won the FA Cup with the Merseysiders, scoring the first goal in a 2-0 win over Sunderland at Wembley.
After a series of niggling injuries, he fell down the pecking order at Anfield. He won a League Cup winners medal in the 1994/95 season as an unused substitute but first-team opportunities were becoming harder to come by.
Thomas went out on loan to Middlesbrough before Graeme Sounness signed him for a second time, this time for Portuguese giants Benfica.
Two years later, Thomas joined Wimbledon who were going through financial hardships and finally hung up his boots at the end of the 2000/01 season.
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