To celebrate 30 years of the Premier League, The Athletic is paying tribute to the 50 greatest individual performances in its history, as voted for by our writers. You can read Oliver Kay’s introduction to our Golden Games series (and the selection rules) here — as well as the full list of all the articles as they unfold.
Picking 50 from 309,949 options is an impossible task. You might not agree with their choices, you won’t agree with the order. They didn’t. It’s not intended as a definitive list. It’s a bit of fun, but hopefully a bit of fun you’ll enjoy between now and August.
Paul Scholes was secretly three different players across his professional career.
There was Second Striker Paul Scholes, who played for Manchester United from his 1994 debut to about 1997, and then again from 2001 to 2006.
This Scholes combined deft feet, quick thinking and sublime body control to wrong-foot defenders and seize goalscoring opportunities. He’s your “late arrival in the penalty area” and “shooting from the edge of the box” Scholes. If you dropped this version of Scholes into a modern United side, you’d likely play him in the No 10 position and ask him to run into the half spaces to make a nuisance of himself.
This was the iteration of Scholes that had his best games in an England shirt, albeit it was not the player we wanted to see or the football expected from him.
Box-To-Box Paul Scholes arose following a season-ending knee injury for Roy Keane in September 1997 and ran things in the middle of the pitch until 2001, before a brief re-emergence from 2006-08.
This Scholes is perhaps the one most fondly remembered by United fans: the canny midfield sparkplug who helped everything zip along at Sir Alex Ferguson’s required pace. United won it all with Scholes partnering Keane; two all-time greats who ran the midfield and enabled an array of wonderful wingers to do their thing. Both men were capable of breaking the lines with their passing before popping up at the edge of the box to either shoot on goal or help United sustain attacking pressure on opponents.
If you put this version of Scholes in a modern United team, he’d be one of the two central midfielders in a 4-2-3-1 (but not the deepest of the pair), or as the shuttler in a 4-3-3.
Then there’s the third Scholes. The one world football speaks of in glowing terms and misremembered quotes from other top players: Deep(er) Lying Midfielder Paul Scholes.
This iteration played in the years from 2008(ish) and onto his eventual retirement(s); a player who had knowledge of nearly every attacking pass in the book but also had the veteran nous to understand when a short five-yard ball forwards could help his team attack better than a long 25-yard crossfield switch.
All three versions of Scholes were far better in the air than his 5ft 7in frame would suggest.
All three versions of Scholes have at least a game each that could and probably should be included on this 50 Golden Games shortlist.
Not one of these versions of Scholes knew how to make a slide tackle.
Today, we’re looking at Newcastle 2-6 Manchester United on April 12, 2003 — perhaps the best performance of Second Striker Scholes’ career, but coming at a time when he wasn’t too pleased with his football.
To set the scene for this match, United arrived at St James’ Park four days after losing a Champions League quarter-final first leg 3-1 to Real Madrid in the Bernabeu (that performance from the original, Brazilian, Ronaldo would come in the second leg).
The United of 2002-03 were an odd team.
Rio Ferdinand’s arrival that summer had bolstered Ferguson’s defence but a September injury to David Beckham left the side without a sprinkle of attacking quality in the months up to Christmas. A 31-year-old Keane missed almost all of the first half of the league campaign recovering from hip surgery then returned to the team with a new approach to games, focusing more on dictating play from deeper areas of central midfield rather than covering every blade of grass.
Juan Sebastian Veron continued to have teething problems in central midfield. The Argentinian was purchased in the summer of 2001 to calm the “tactical anarchy” United played with in big games, but he looked out of step with his colleagues who were reluctant to give him complete control of the team’s midfield.
A 4-4-1-1 formation at St James’ Park that day of Barthez; O’Shea (G Neville 49), Ferdinand, Brown (Blanc 65), Silvestre; Solskjaer, Keane, Butt, Giggs (Forlan 45); Scholes; Van Nistelrooy makes fun reading for 2022 eyes.
Butt is there to do Keane’s running for him in the middle of the park. Ole Gunner Solskjaer is moonlighting for Beckham on the right-wing. Scholes is playing off Ruud van Nistelrooy, and is thought to be mildly irked that he’s not allowed to be his team’s controller in midfield. This should be a team of square pegs in round holes, yet there is a lean brilliance to Ferguson’s side.
Newcastle are third, six points behind co-leaders United and Arsenal at kick-off and were something of a “Great Entertainers” side. Only one other team have beaten them at home before United’s mid-April arrival (Leeds United, back in September), and when Sir Bobby Robson’s team go ahead in the 21st minute thanks to a long-range Jermaine Jenas effort, things look concerning for Scholes and company, but they rally thanks to a wonderful performance from Solskjaer.
The Norwegian striker would spend the majority of that season playing on the right and he looks comfortable getting chalk on his boots and causing chaos at St James’ Park. He equalises in the 32nd minute, a goal that initially looks offside before the replays reveal his match-reading intelligence, and then assists Scholes two minutes later.
Scholes’ opening goal of the game provokes initial reactions that only become clear when watching the strike on instant replay.
Drifting left after Newcastle fail to clear their lines following a throw-in near the penalty area, Scholes looks like he is covered. But as he moves backwards in the direction of the Newcastle goal, he takes a glance over his right shoulder and bends his run slightly to find space.
When the ball gets played to Scholes, he knows he’ll be able to take the two closest defenders out of the game if he plays a first-time pass into the middle of the pitch.
Solskjaer meanwhile senses that, once Scholes gets the ball inside to him, there will be space behind those two defenders his team-mate has already sent running the wrong way.
Scholes’ pass reaches Solskjaer just past the D, who flicks a (quite brilliant) return ball up and over with the outside of his right boot for him to chase down and finish first time.
So you have Solskjaer, a striker filling in as a winger, exchanging passes with Scholes, a central midfielder playing the role of a striker. Modern United fans will have heard both men voice a desire for the club’s current players to be able to “do a bit of everything”.
Watch the move play out – incidentally, it is Scholes’ first goal in 13 games going back to January – and you’ll understand why.
Scholes’ second, three minutes later, also comes from Newcastle’s failure to clear their lines after some sustained United pressure.
Ryan Giggs dribbles into the penalty area before the ball is given to Wes Brown, who softly nudges it into Scholes’ path at the edge of the D.
It is the sort of set-up every footballer dreams of. It is the, “Ball comes out to… (Shout your name)!!” attempt that most civilians try, before sending a shot ballooning comically off target.
But note Scholes’ body shape in the screenshot below. He avoids the common mistake of leaning back too much when taking the shot, and his left arm is stuck way out to help with balance. (This is an old piece of advice from Johan Cruyff for players, particularly when they pass with their weaker foot. Try it in your next game.)
It all goes together to create an out-swinging strike that goes into keeper Shay Given’s top left corner.
“Trademark Scholes” is the verdict from Andy Gray on Sky Sports’ commentary. “If you got a gap, and it’s only a yard wide, this boy will find it.”
United’s fifth, and Scholes’ third, comes early in the second half after Giggs (who made it 4-1 in the 44th minute) is replaced at the break with Diego Forlan, a substitution that sees Scholes move onto the left-wing.
It’s a goal that is the result of Newcastle’s defenders being so fixated on stopping an overhead cross to one of Forlan or Van Nistelrooy near the penalty spot that they forget everything else — including the talented midfielder who is on a hat-trick and is in a world of place at the back post.
Gary Neville makes an overlapping run on ball-carrier Solskjaer within Newcastle’s penalty area, before delivering a low cross through the gaggle of Newcastle players in the six-yard box to a grateful Scholes, who has the time to pick which part of half an unguarded net he wants to slot his hat-trick goal into.
It is the softest of his three finishes that day, yet still an authoritative display of his talent.
Scholes’ hat-trick against one of the better Newcastle sides in Premier League history is akin to a veteran tennis player dismantling an up-and-comer in straight sets. There are few wasted moments.
He doesn’t move at a particularly great pace across the 90 minutes, but that’s because he can make passes that do the hard yards for him. He is constantly scanning during this match; 40 seconds in, he looks left and right by the centre circle before getting onto the ball, only to hit a long 20-yard pass forwards to Van Nistelrooy when most of the opposition (and indeed his team-mates) are still feeling the game out.
Scholes has the most complete picture of the play in his head, and the ability to change that picture with his passing and movement. He’s been deployed in an attacking role but thinks about everything like he is still a box-to-box midfielder, often dropping deeper towards the halfway line to help with United’s counter-attacks, conjuring space in areas of the pitch where there was none previously before asking team-mates if they fancy getting involved.
In true Scholes style, there is a muted reception to his performance.
Focus immediately turned to the “six-pointer” away to Arsenal four days later and his post-match quotes after being awarded Man of the Match read like those of a player who’d much rather carry on with his cool-down routine than have a microphone shoved in his face.
“We’re very pleased to have won the way we did,” he said.
“When we were a goal down we probably would have taken a point, but we scored four goals in the last 15 minutes of the first half.
“We knew Arsenal’s goal difference was five ahead before the game. Seven or eight wasn’t beyond us but unfortunately, it didn’t happen.”
Scholes got a hat-trick on this day by using some of the most straightforward goalscoring moves a player could make, yet watch the game in its entirety and small glimpses of his attacking personality shine through.
There is a moment close to the hour mark where he again runs towards the back post as United counter down the right. He again doesn’t want to reveal his position to Newcastle defenders so, rather than fling his hands aloft and signal obviously for the pass, he spreads his arms out like a child imitating a plane about to take flight. When Van Nistelrooy then fails to give him said ball, he sheepily withdraws his arms and gets back to “proper” football.
There is another moment later in the game, where United are playing at a near-walking pace and quite clearly trying to get Forlan a goal to lift his morale, where Scholes tries an effort from long range — a rare indulgence from a player who tries his best to avoid such things.
United dismantled Newcastle in this match because of Scholes’ mastery of pass-and-move football.
A 2-2 draw with Arsenal at Highbury in that midweek meeting of the top two would help them eventually finish as champions, overcoming the eight-point lead Arsenal had held in early March to regain the title from the north Londoners with 83 points to their 78.
Scholes himself would make 52 appearances for United in all competitions that campaign, scoring 20 goals and assisting seven more. It was his most productive season in terms of numbers, yet he was thought to be unhappy with his more advanced role in the team, wishing to instead have the central midfield responsibilities given to Veron.
Ferguson’s side were at an interesting crossroads in 2003, not yet finished with the 4-4-2 attacking players of the 1990s, yet still some years away from the positionless attacking football Wayne Rooney and others would bring later. Scholes wasn’t doing the things he truly wanted to, and yet still found ways to be effective.
Think of a good goalscoring Scholes performance as a rare treat.
A player who often shied away from the limelight, deciding to take centre stage for a fabulous spring weekend.
(Photos: Getty Images; design: Sam Richardson)
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