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The best player ever to play for Sheppey United? Probably. I can think of no other way to describe Eddie Harper. Born on August 22 1902 in Sheerness, he started out as an apprentice shipwright and first started playing in local junior football for Sheppey Junior Athletic before playing for the Sheppey in 1921. He left Sheppey United in May 1923 to join Blackburn Rovers after a local business man, Mr Jack Marsden, invited the Blackburn manager at the time, J Carr, down to watch him and another ex-Sheppey Junior Athletic player, C Millen, who was also playing for the Sheppey at the time. The Blackburn manager was so impressed by both players in the final league game of the season against Woolwich - Eddie scored a hat-trick in the game - at Botany Road that they were both signed on the following Monday. C Millen will also, hopefully, have a page devoted to his time in the game in this section. During his time at Sheppey Junior Athletic he once scored a Kent junior record 102 goals in one season and also helped the side win the Kent Junior Cup by beating St Patrick's Juniors of Plumpstead 9-1 in the final. Eddie scored a hat-trick in the game. He was then picked to play for Sheppey in the Easter game against Gillingham reserves in the Kent League in 1921 in which he scored 2 goals in a 5-1 win. He was allowed to go back to junior football but was given a trial in August 1922 by Sheppey - which might have something to do with the 102 goals he scored for Junior Athletic as mentioned above! He went on to score 31 league goals for Sheppey that year even though he missed some games through injury. This was to plague Eddie throughout his league career too. In his first season at Blackburn Eddie scored 18 goals in 42 league games. A good return for a first season in league football. His second season was less succesful as he only scored 2 league goals all season and he played less games as a result. It wasn't until Blackburn signed Sydney Puddefoot from Scottish side Falkirk, however, that Eddie's league career took off.
In the following season Eddie set a new scoring record for the top flight of 43 goals in one season in just 37 appearances. The record was clinched when Eddie scored a hat-trick against Manchester United in the final game of the season. The following season Eddie went on to score a further 35 goals in 39 appearances, averaging more than a goal a game in the 2 seasons concerned. Sheffield Wednesday then bought Eddie from Blackburn during the 1927/28 season for a then transfer record of £4000 and he then promptly scored twice for his new side in a 6-4 win over Derby County. Eddie was at Sheffield Wednesday when they won the league title but Eddie only played 6 games during the campaign so would not have received a Championship Winners medal - 20 appearances were required at the time to qualify for a league winners medal - as he was sold to Tottenham Hotspur during the season. While at Spurs, he set a club single season goalscoring record that stood for over 30 years when he scored 36 goals in just 30 games - but this was still not enough to help Spurs win promotion from division 2 that year. Tottenham Hotspur then sold him with Dick Rowley to Preston North End for a combined fee of £5000 - and he then broke Preston's single season goalscoring record too with a tally of 41 goals in 37 games in the 1932/33 season. Finally, in the next season, he rejoined Blackburn Rovers where he stayed until he retired from football in 1935.
Said to have a ferocious shot - he once scored a penalty against Wolves which burst the net and the crowd thought he had missed! - Eddie has been described as being a player of little finesse - even Blackburn have said that he was a player of little or no skill who was bought solely for his ability to score goals, which he could do and then some! - but if the ball was put in the danger zone then he could be relied on to score. He is on record as twice having scored 5 goals - including away at Newcastle United while playing for Blackburn Rovers in a 7-1 victory - in a league game and also scored 3 hat-tricks in his first season for Preston North End. He set - and still holds - the single season league goalscoring records for both Blackburn Rovers (43 goals in the 1925/6 season) and Preston North End (37 in the 1932/3 season). He also held the single season league scoring record for Tottenham from 1930/31 until Jimmy Greaves surpassed his tally for that season of 36 in 1962/63 by scoring 37 goals in a league season. For 2 seasons Eddie was the single season record league goal scorer for the English top flight - until Dixie Dean came along and spoilt it all by scoring 60 in the 1927/28 season! His overall league record was 264 goals in 327 games which is a truly great record. The pinnacle of Eddie Harper's career must surely be representing England in the annual England v Scotland Home International Championship game at Old Trafford on the 17th April 1926. Unfortunately Scotland won the game 1-0, Eddie failed to impress and he never played for his country again as his place in the England side was taken by a certain Dixie Dean of Everton. To the best of my knowledge, Eddie is the only island-born player ever to have represented England at full international level. On his retirement he was employed on Blackburn's groundstaff until 1948 and then worked for English Electric until he passed away on July 22nd 1959 in Blackburn. His League record - such as I have it, I'm still waiting to hear back from Blackburn Rovers to fill in his record for the last 2 seasons of his career, is shown in the table below. They haven't replied as yet and so I'm also exploring other avenues in order to complete his overall league record. Iw ill look to add his cup scoring record at a later date so that his entire record is online.
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