From 1892 Onwards
Houlding and the new Liverpool F.C. had an international standard ground, but no team. John McKenna was appointed a director of Liverpool, and went to Scotland, where he signed thirteen professionals for the new club. The team was labelled "the team of the Macs" because eight of the thirteen Scottish signings had a "Mc" prefix. They played their first game against Rotherham Town, winning 7–1 with Malcolm McVean scoring their first ever goal, the match being the first occasion that an English domestic team had fielded a side consisting entirely of non-English players.
An ambitious application to join the Football League was rejected. Liverpool kicked off life in the Lancashire League with an 8–0 win at Anfield against Higher Walton with a team composed entirely of Scottish players. John Smith scored the first competitive goal. Ending the first season as champions and beating Everton 1–0 in the first Merseyside derby, in the 1893 Liverpool Senior Cup final at Bootle F.C. Liverpool F.C. was elected to the Football League alongside Woolwich Arsenal.
McVean scored the club's first league goal in a 2–0 win over Middlesbrough Ironopolis and ended the season unbeaten and Second Division Champions, winning a test match 2–0 against Newton Heath (soon to be renamed Manchester United) and promotion to the First Division.
Upon the arrival of manager Tom Watson, a 3-time-championship-winner at Sunderland, the strip changed from blue and white quarters to the famous red and white, and in 1901 Scottish international Alex Raisbeck was the first Liverpool captain to collect the Football League championship. League champions again in 1906, when Everton also won the FA Cup, the ground capacity was increased with the building of a huge cinder bank behind the south end goal. It was christened the Spion Kop, after a Boer War battle of 1900 where over 300 men of the Lancashire Regiment died, with many being from Liverpool.
Liverpool played their first FA Cup final, the last at Crystal Palace, and the first attended by the reigning monarch, George V, losing 0–1 to Burnley in 1914. However, the club were also involved in the 1915 British football betting scandal, one of the earliest match-fixing scandals which saw four Liverpool players banned, although the bans were rescinded in 1919. Liverpool soon bounced back; in 1921-2 and again in 1922-3, captained by England full-back Ephraim Longworth, Liverpool were champions and have changed 17 different managers in the last 7 years.
Read more about this topic: History Of Liverpool F.C.