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A framed portrait of Payne showing his record credentials

IN APRIL 1936 A FORMER MINER FROM THE DERBYSHIRE VILLAGE OF BRIMINGTON PULLED OFF A REMARKABLE FEAT WHICH IS A FOOTBALL LEAGUE RECORD TO THIS DAY. PETER SEDDON CHARTS THE LIFE AND CAREER OF JOE PAYNE, WHOSE MOVE FROM BOLSOVER COLLIERY TO LUTON TOWN HAD UNEXPECTED CONSEQUENCES.

Football has ever been an unpredictable game. Once in a while, usually when least expected, an occasion comes along when something happens that no one present will ever forget. Such a day was Easter Monday, 13 April, 1936, when Luton Town played host to Bristol Rovers in a routine fixture in the Third Division South. After the match there was only one name on everybody’s lips – that of 22-year-old scoring sensation Joe Payne – this is his remarkable story.

Joseph Payne was born on 17 January 1914 in Brimington Common, near Chesterfield. The house on Manor Road where he was brought up no longer stands. Like many boys from North Derbyshire at that time, his working options on leaving school were limited - so he followed the standard route and went down the pit. Likewise in the pursuit of leisure – in common with most active young men he took to football and cricket because there was little else to do.

Joe found himself to be good at both, making a particular impression in the Bolsover Colliery football team, where he played at centre-forward. It was a good stage on which to be ‘spotted’, for the colliery side boasted a long tradition of sporting excellence. One of their best former players was the Staveley-born centre-forward Sam Raybould. Although Raybould played five times for Derby County, his lasting fame was earned at Liverpool, where between 1900 and 1905 he became the first player to score 100 goals for the club. Derby County had let him go after he had scored just two goals, and he was neither the first nor the last high-scoring local who the Rams let escape!

With success stories of that nature being widely known in football circles, no talent scout worth his salt could afford to ignore Bolsover Colliery. Whether Derby County cast an eye over Joe Payne isn’t known, but if they did they missed the boat in a big way. In September 1933 Payne scored Bolsover’s only goal in a 4-1 defeat against Chesterfield ‘A’ team at Saltergate – someone present liked the look of him, contacts were made, he was watched again, and on 1 July 1934 the 20-year-old forward joined Luton Town.

It was a big step for a down-to-earth Derbyshire lad to suddenly move south, and Payne was nurtured gradually in what was then Luton’s ‘nursery club’, the non-League side Biggleswade Town. He did well enough without being outstanding, and was tried out in a number of roles. By the time he graduated to Luton’s reserve team the coaching staff had decided their capture lacked the striker’s instinct, and instead groomed Payne as a wing-half.

He finally made his League debut for Luton Town on 29 December 1934, in a 3-3 draw at Southend. After that he was picked only occasionally, and had made only six appearances before the Easter Monday game in 1936 which was to write his name in history. Yet on the day Payne’s name did not even appear in the programme, for he was a late emergency replacement. Due to injuries to two Luton strikers, he was hastily selected at centre-forward, the first time he had played there for the first team.

As ‘what happened next?’ conundrums go, the match would take some beating. The visitors Bristol Rovers began solidly enough, and there was no early hint of what was to come. Payne collected a goal in the 23rd minute and Roberts soon made it 2-0 to Luton, but, as half-time neared, the game could have gone either way. Then the incredible happened – Payne netted a further nine times in 46 minutes, without anyone else scoring. So with three headers and seven shots he had scored ten goals on his full baptism at centre-forward. Martin scored one in the last minute to make the final score Luton Town 12 Bristol Rovers 0.

The previous individual scoring record was nine. Payne’s record has never been equalled, no other player having ever scored ten in a Football League game. Not surprisingly the former Derbyshire miner was quickly dubbed ‘Ten Goal Payne’. A crowd of 13,962 had witnessed the celebrated match, but 23,142 turned up for the next home game against Coventry City! Could young Payne do it again? Of course not – although he did score in the 1-1 draw.

Those who know football will be aware of how unlikely his feat was. To give it context we need only dip into the record books of Derby County. The great Steve Bloomer leads the field, but the most goals even he could muster was six, in a 9-0 win against Sheffield Wednesday at the Baseball Ground in January 1899. Kevin Hector scored five times in a 12-0 UEFA Cup drubbing of Finn Harps in September 1976. Roger Davies did likewise against Luton Town in March 1975, prompting manager Dave Mackay to utter the immortal words that ‘if it had been his day he might have had ten!’ Hughie Gallacher and three earlier players also ‘went nap’ (scored five) for the Rams, but that is it, in almost 120 years of the club’s League history. Will a Derby County player ever score ten in a game? Don’t bet on it….most don’t manage ten in a season.

It goes without saying that Joe Payne kept his place as Luton’s centre-forward. The following season his form continued and this time he broke a club record – his 55 goals in 39 League games eased the Hatters to promotion as champions of Division Three South. He continued to score regularly in Division Two, and in 1937 made what was surprisingly his only appearance for England, scoring twice in the 8-0 friendly victory away to Finland.

Inevitably bigger clubs coveted his signature, and in March 1938 he was bought by Chelsea for a large fee. Between 1934 and 1938 he had scored 83 League goals for Luton in only 72 appearances, one of only a handful of players in football history to average over a goal a game for his club.

What Joe Payne might have achieved for Chelsea can only be guessed at. He managed 21 goals in 36 appearances before League action was brought to an abrupt halt in 1939 by the outbreak of war. During the conflict he showed flashes of his brilliance, playing once for Chesterfield as a guest on 23 December 1944, when he scored a hat-trick in an 8-0 thrashing of Notts County. But he twice broke an ankle during the hiatus, and the enforced rest took its toll – when peace was declared he moved to West Ham United, where in a nine month spell he scored only 6 goals, four less than he managed in 63 minutes on that sensational day at Luton.

He was briefly associated with Millwall and Worcester City before hanging up his boots, by which time he had added a few cricket appearances for Bedfordshire to his final sporting tally. But although the name of Joe Payne was written indelibly in the record books, he became in a sense ‘a mere statistic’. When he died aged 61 in April 1975 the media attention was scant, and his Derbyshire roots were scarcely acknowledged.

But in recent times the balance has been redressed. In 2005 members of the Payne family still living in Derbyshire suggested to the local council that a memorial might be a fitting tribute. The scheme was agreed, and on 13 April 2006, exactly 70 years after Payne’s ten-goal flurry, a commemorative plaque was unveiled on the wall of the Miners’ Arms public house in Manor Road, Brimington Common. The site was chosen for good reason, for not only had the hostelry been the focus of enthusiastic celebrations in 1936, but its car park occupied the site of Joe Payne’s former home.

Footballers are often described as ‘heroes’. But Joe Payne was by all accounts a model of modesty who favoured a more balanced view. He was simply ‘an ordinary man who once did something remarkable’. Whichever way his achievement is viewed, Derbyshire can be justly proud of ‘Ten Goal Payne’.

• Payne, Joe - Brimington Footballer Played For England

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