Arsenal great made Villa pay to set incredible scoring record that still stands

09 December 2023 , 06:45

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Villa Park saw top-flight football history made in 1935 (Image: EMPICS Sport)

When Arsenal striker Ted Drake walked out onto the Villa Park turf on December 14, 1935 he would have been confident of victory, but also wary of what the afternoon would have in store.

Opponents Aston Villa were struggling and bottom of the table at the time, but they had just spent the massive figure of £24,000 on new players, all established internationals, and so the idea that they could spend their way up the First Division was a very real one.

Drake had personal concerns too. He took to the pitch with a heavily strapped knee after a recent injury, and the Gunners were missing star inside forward Alex James, the main creative source for Drake's goals and a player later described by Tom Finney as the England and Football League legend's inspiration.

So Drake would have to do it all on his own on that afternoon at Villa Park then, and that is exactly what he did.

The forward - who had bagged 42 league goals to take Arsenal to the title the previous season - achieved the high point of his career when he hit a remarkable top-flight record seven goals in a 7-1 Arsenal victory at Villa Park.

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Drake was one of the best centre forwards of the 1930s (Bob Thomas/Popperfoto via Getty Images/Getty Images)

Drake struck seven goals in one game at Villa Park (Central Press/Getty Images)

Shrugging off that knee injury, Drake had struck a double hat-trick by the hour mark, and he could - and many people say should - have added a seventh when he hit an effort which bounced down off the crossbar and seemingly over the line.

The seventh goal would arrive in the final minute, and from his ninth shot of the game, to crown a remarkable and still never repeated feat at the highest level, even though somewhat incredibly Tranmere's Bunny Bell would score nine goals in a third tier match against Oldham just 12 days later.

It was remarkable feats such as this which mark Drake out as one of the greats in Arsenal's history, and a 2017 official website countdown placed him as No.31 in a list of Gunners' best players of all-time.

An article on Gunners website states: "His pace, bludgeoning power and ruthlessness in front of goal earned him a fierce reputation, with Drake topping the scoring charts in each of his five full seasons in north London, ending his spell at the club with a tally of 136 goals from 182 games. Were it not for the outbreak of the Second World War in 1939 his record would almost certainly have been greater."

It was certainly great enough on one afternoon at Villa Park.

Mark Jones