England’s fastest recorded goal was scored on this day.

Tommy Lawton, one of England’s greatest centre-forwards, may have scored England’s fastest ever goal on this day in 1947.

He had made a scoring debut nine years earlier, when he was still only 19, and finished his career with 22 goals in 23 official internationals, a fantastic ratio.

His very early goal, the first of four scored by the Chelsea man in the match, came in a friendly with Portugal before 62,000 fans in Lisbon’s National Stadium. It was England’s first encounter with the Portuguese and they won 10-0, Stan Mortensen also notching four on his debut!

Lawton, who but for the war may now be England’s all-time record scorer, had his first goal in Lisbon timed at 17 seconds. He crashed a shot past Azevedo and Mortensen had repeated the feat within a couple of minutes for 2-0.

England rattled in five goals in each half and it was the fourth time in history that they had made it to double figures in a match.

In England’s next international, the first of the following season, Lawton scored from Stanley Matthews’ pass after just 34 seconds as Belgium were beaten 5-2 in Brussels.