From star man against Liverpool to career over at 21

From star man against Liverpool to career over at 21 - 'I was Everton’s guiding light'

A day before the 247th Merseyside Derby, Friday September 19, 2025 is former Everton player Billy Kenny’s 52nd birthday

Along with several other summer signings on the substitutes bench, Jack Grealish and Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall could make their Merseyside Derby debuts against Liverpool tomorrow, but for one Everton home-grown hero, starring when facing the neighbours for the first time proved to be the high point of his all-too-short career.

A decade before Wayne Rooney, widely regarded as being the most gifted player Everton’s academy has produced, burst onto the scene with his “Remember the name” wonder-strike to beat Premier League champions Arsenal at Goodison Park, another precocious teenage Scouser was bossing it for the Blues.

But whereas everyone in the global game acknowledges the lad from Croxteth who went on to win every major trophy in club football with Manchester United before returning to Everton as all-time top scorer for both the Red Devils and the England national team, few beyond Merseyside can recall Billy Kenny, and when they do, he is the ultimate cautionary tale of what not to do when it comes to squandering your talent.

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A day before the 247th Merseyside Derby, Friday September 19, 2025 is Kenny’s 52nd birthday. If he had kept his nose clean, the one-time wonderkid, dubbed ‘The Goodison Gazza’ by team-mate Peter Beardsley – for his footballing rather than partying ability – might now have found himself etched in the pavestones of Everton Way at the Blues’ magnificent new home, Hill Dickinson Stadium, which is even closer to Goodison Park than Burlington Street where he grew up, but instead he’s been left with a lifetimes of ‘what ifs’ and regrets.

Kenny’s Everton career would amount to just 22 first team appearances and a single goal. But before his fortunes took a rapid downward spiral, he was named Man-of-the-match in the 2-1 comeback win over Liverpool on December 7, 1992, after a dominant display in the engine room against the likes of Jamie Redknapp, John Barnes, Steve McManaman and future Blue Don Hutchison.

However, issues with drink and drugs would see Kenny sacked by the Blues barely 15 months after his sparkling display against the Reds and then out of football full stop at just 21 years of age. Speaking to Joe Thomas ahead of the run of a stage play called Whatever happened to Billy Kenny at the Royal Court Theatre in 2023, he explained how things got so bad it took his mother’s death to give him a new life having put mum Bella and dad, Billy Kenny senior, who himself played 13 games for Everton, through hell for more than 20 years.

Kenny told the ECHO: “That is what changed my life – when we buried my ma. The worst bit for me was putting me ma and dad through it because I was off my face.

“Right now, when I think about what I put my ma and dad through. I was selfish as f*** on the drink and the drugs. That’s my biggest regret, and it doesn’t go away – what I done to my ma and dad.

“My dad loves footy, he is a footy fella. He couldn’t go out the house for years because he felt ashamed and kept getting asked about me everywhere he went: ‘Is Billy ok?’ It killed him.”

“It must have been my mother giving me the strength because I couldn’t do it alone. I couldn’t tell you, sitting here, how I have done it.

“I have my bad days as well, where I have got to work hard to keep sane and sober but life for me at the minute is great. I’m sober and it’s great.

“I am aware of where I went wrong when I was younger now and there is a lot that was just not me. I can see now I clearly needed help, but the help wasn’t there for me.”

Asked why he thinks it was his mum’s death that proved to be the catalyst for his revival, Kenny said: “Losing your mother is a lot bigger than losing your job. Playing football to me was just fun, and then it got a bit serious and turned into a job.

“At the end of the day, I lost my job, and it dominated my life for 25 years. I was Everton’s guiding light through the ‘90s and then I suffered with that for years.

“When my ma died it put everything into perspective. I said to my dad: ‘I will make you proud one day again.’

“And now he is buzzing with the play, and he is proud of me again, so I am absolutely buzzing. I’ve had a second crack at life… I played for Everton, and no-one can take that away from me.

“I enjoyed it. Now this is another part of my life where I’m starting to have a bit of fun about it.”

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