This season, Prostate Cancer UK is the Official Charity Partner of The Football League. To celebrate this partnership, and in recognition of the fact that prostate cancer affects one in nine men in the UK, we've asked some of the country's most acclaimed football writers to tell us about their favourite No9 in the history of the beautiful game.

This week, Guardian sport writer and Manchester United fan Rob Smyth controversially doffs his cap to Liverpool legend (and former Leeds, Manchester City, Cardiff and Blackburn striker) Robbie Fowler.

Read on for Rob's eulogy to Robbie and let us know your thoughts in the comments section below.

The Anfield rapscallion: Fowler celebrates another Liverpool goal. Photo courtesy of Action Images

 

In recent times the red and white of the St George’s Cross has been accompanied by a tinge of green. Nineteen teenagers have played for England since 1990, as many as in the 100 years before that. It's a surprise that the list does not include Robbie Fowler, because no England player of the modern era – perhaps of any era – has encapsulated youth as Fowler did.

He had spells of varying success at Leeds, Manchester City, Blackburn and Cardiff, but Fowler’s career and life will inevitably be defined by his time at Liverpool – and particularly the three consecutive seasons between 1994 and 1997 when he scored more than 30 goals each term.

In that period Fowler was like a Scouse version of Ferris Bueller, full of anarchic mischief and deriving enormous pleasure from goading and embarrassing his elders. He was the Anfield rapscallion. Manchester United fans aren't supposed to like Liverpool legends, but the raw, swaggering, totally natural brilliance of Fowler's play – part puckish, part punkish – was irresistible. If Walter Mitty had daydreamed about being a footballer, he would have been Robbie Fowler.

The first time I saw Fowler was during England's romantic victory in the European Under-18 Championship of 1993, when he top-scored with five in the tournament, including a booming long-range lob against France. His best season was 1995-96, when he spent nine long months dehydrating opposition. At Old Trafford in October, Eric Cantona made his comeback after an eight-month suspension. It was Le Dieu against God, as Liverpool fans called Fowler. He didn't quite steal the show from Cantona – not even the second coming of the real God could have done that – but he had a damn good go, scoring twice in a 2-2 draw. The second goal was a delicious fusion of attitude and aptitude: Fowler shoved Gary Neville aside with contempt before arrogantly chipping Peter Schmeichel with his weaker right foot.

Fowler loved humiliating opponents. It was nothing personal, just a bit of fun. In March 1996 he scored a stunning goal against Aston Villa, making a total fool of Steve Staunton with a flick behind his standing leg before sweet-spotting insouciantly into the far corner from 25 yards. Everything he did looked effortless. A month later he scored twice in the famous 4-3 win over Newcastle, the second a devastatingly accomplished finish from the edge of the box. It was probably the high watermark of his career; it was six days before his 21st birthday. In football terms Fowler lived fast and died young. That only adds to the appeal.

For more in our Best No9s series, read Michael Cox's ode to Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink, Jacob Steinberg's tribute to Dean Ashton and check out our definitive list of the best (and worst!) strikers from the Football League in the sidebar on the right. 

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