Brighton’s last line of defence in Graham Moseley’s hands

Mose Cale GRAHAM MOSELEY once played in a FA Cup semi-final for Derby against Manchester United but went one better with Brighton and made it to the final.

Considering Derby’s pre-eminence in the mid ‘70s compared to Brighton’s more modest status, Moseley’s chances of making a Wembley final were fairly remote after leaving the Baseball Ground .

Even more so considering some turbulent times at the Goldstone during which he very publicly fell out with the manager who signed him. A detailed account of that disagreement, his time at Brighton and what followed can be found in A Few Good Men, the excellent Albion dream team book written by Spencer Vignes (Breedon Books, 2007).

Born in Stretford, Manchester, on 16 November 1953, Moseley started out as a centre-forward for his junior school side but because he was the tallest lad in a team that conceded more than it scored, he was put in goal. By the age of 15, he was playing for Stretford Boys and a selector for the Lancashire county side called Neil Diamond invited him to play in a match at the Ewood Park home of Blackburn Rovers.

He did enough in the match to be invited to sign on as an apprentice at Rovers and, although he played mainly in their B team, he was promoted to the reserves for a match against Derby County. Brian Clough’s loyal sidekick Jimmy Gordon liked what he saw of the opposition goalkeeper and before long Moseley was on his way to the Baseball Ground.

He was installed as the reserve team goalkeeper in a side which won the Central League title and his performances caught the eye of the England Youth selectors. He first played in a 4-1 friendly win over Spain on 15 March 1972 and manager Gordon Milne retained him in goal for all five of England’s games as they won the 25th UEFA Youth Tournament in Spain that May.

After an opening 0-0 draw against Belgium, Moseley kept clean sheets as England won the other four games, against the Republic of Ireland (4-0), Yugoslavia (1-0), Poland (1-0) and West Germany (2-0). Teammates in that side included Kevin Beattie, Phil Thompson and Trevor Francis who all went on to become full England internationals.

While Moseley had been unable to budge Clough’s first choice no.1, Colin Boulton, at Derby, when Clough departed (ironically to become manager of Brighton), his successor Dave Mackay decided to give Moseley his chance. He had a three-game loan spell with Aston Villa at the start of the 1974-75 season but he played 44 matches in four years for the Rams, including the 1976 FA Cup semi-final defeat to Manchester United.

When Mackay was replaced with ex-United boss Tommy Docherty in the summer of 1977, the ebullient Scot made it clear both Boulton and Moseley could look for other clubs. Moseley fancied the idea of joining Vancouver Whitecaps but his wife at the time didn’t want to uproot to Canada and they swapped the East Midlands for Sussex instead.

Alan Mullery paid Derby £20,000 for the England Under 23 ‘keeper in November 1977 but he had to wait until the following April before making his debut. In the 1978-79 season that saw Albion finally win promotion to the First Division, Moseley featured 20 times while goalkeeping rival Eric Steele played 27 games.

Vignes touched on the rivalry between the two in A Few Good Men and, by his own admission, Moseley acknowledged Steele was a lot more dedicated to improving himself. “He would train every day after everybody else had finished. He’d go through his routines whereas I was just relying on my natural ability. That’s my big regret. If I had worked much harder, I probably could have gone a lot further,” he said.

Once in the top division, Mullery lambasted some of Moseley’s performances in the press, understandably causing a rift which ended up with the ‘keeper being transfer-listed. However, it was the manager who would leave before him.

semi final stop

Moseley had a new lease of life under Mike Bailey following Mullery’s departure in 1981, although he often shared the goalkeeping duties with Perry Digweed.

Nevertheless, under Bailey’s successor Jimmy Melia, he was in possession – and in terrific form – for the memorable 1983 FA Cup semi-final at Highbury against Sheffield Wednesday and retained the jersey for the final.

That he was to be a loser to United both at that semi-final stage with Derby in 1976 and in the replayed final in 1983 was a supreme irony – because United were the team he had supported since a boy.

Competition for the green jersey at the Goldstone was a regular feature of Moseley’s years on the south coast and restricted his league appearance total to 189 in nine years.

Although he successfully saw off Steele as a rival for the shirt, the bulk of former England international Joe Corrigan was a bigger hurdle in the 1983-84 season.

Nevertheless, when injury curtailed big Joe’s career, Moseley stepped back into the top spot and his heroics in the 1984-85 season earned him the player of the season accolade.

It was his misfortune that another managerial change saw the return of his nemesis Mullery and his Albion career came to a close. He moved on to Cardiff, where his career was cut short in 1987 when injured in a road accident, and he subsequently became a postman.

Scrapbook photos from the Argus, Shoot! and the matchday programme

Crooks v Moseley BBC TV football pundit Garth Crooks in his playing days scoring for Spurs past Moseley.

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Eire striker John Byrne’s three spells at the Albion

FOOTBALL things came in threes for striker John Byrne. He had three different spells playing up front for the Albion and he featured for three different clubs under manager Denis Smith.

Add to that, on three occasions, he was signed by clubs who he’d played well against. And, for QPR fans, he was also the third no.10 who got the crowd off their feet at Loftus Road, following in the footsteps of Rodney Marsh and Stan Bowles.

Ironically, it was former Albion boss Alan Mullery who took Byrne to Rangers, in 1984, during his six turbulent months as manager. Mullery took over from his former Spurs teammate Terry Venables, who’d left to manage Barcelona.

While Mullers’ reign at Loftus Road was brief, the skilful forward he brought in stayed four years and won plenty of admirers amongst the Hoops supporters.

Alongside former Albion striker Michael Robinson, he was part of the QPR team that lost to Oxford (a club he would play for later in his career) in the 1986 League Cup Final (QPR’s sub that day was Liam Rosenior’s dad, Leroy).

Wembley wasn’t to be a happy hunting ground for Byrne, though. That 1986 defeat was the first of three occasions he made it onto the iconic turf, each time ending up on the losing side.

Byrne’s career had begun with basement side York City at 16 after Mike Walker, a taxi driver pal of York’s boss, the former Manchester United manager Wilf McGuinness, spotted him playing local football in Manchester (he was born on 1 February 1961 and raised in Wythenshawe).

Charlie Wright, the former Bolton and Charlton goalkeeper took over as manager and gave Byrne his first pro contract but it was his successor, Denis Smith, the ex Stoke City stopper, who arrived in 1982, together with his coach, former striker Viv Busby, who set Byrne on the road to success.

He scored an impressive 55 goals in 175 appearances for York between 1979 and 1984 and his signing by Mullery for QPR came after he did well in a two-legged Milk Cup tie against the Hoops.

In an odd symmetry, his later move from QPR to Le Havre came after the sides had met in a friendly, and the pattern continued when his eventual move to Brighton came after they too had played Le Havre pre-season.

But back to London where, in his four years at Loftus Road, he scored 30 times in 126 appearances.

QPR fans recall fondly a game when Byrne scored twice in a 6-0 thrashing of Chelsea and, some years later, in an interview with QPRnet, he explained how the drubbing riled the Chelsea, and later Brighton, defender Doug Rougvie to the extent that Byrne and fellow striker Gary Bannister finished the game playing out wide to avoid getting a kicking!

He also scored a winner against Manchester United, the team he’d followed as a boy, and in an interview with Sussex Life in 2010, he said: “I felt a bit like a traitor!”

It was in the year following his move to QPR that he made his international debut for the Republic of Ireland – he qualified to play for them because his dad, Jim, was from County Carlow.

He was an international teammate of Chris Hughton and Mark Lawrenson and between 1985 and 1993 collected a total of 23 caps, scoring four goals, two of which came in a 3-1 win over Turkey.

JB Eire

Although part of Eire’s Euro 88 and 1990 World Cup squads, he didn’t play a game.

Byrne had three spells with Brighton but undoubtedly the most memorable was in the season that ended in heartbreak in the Wembley play-off final against Neil Warnock’s Notts County.

Manager Barry Lloyd had brought him back to the UK from Le Havre for £125,000, shortly after he had been to the World Cup in Italy with the Republic, and successfully partnered him up front with the prolific Mike Small.

Byrne admitted in a 2010 matchday programme interview how he thought he was joining Sunderland that summer but his agent Paul Stretford’s demands put off the Wearsiders and the striker ended up writing to all the English First and Second Division clubs looking for an alternative club.

Surprisingly, he didn’t get many replies, but Brighton did. “Barry Lloyd got in touch and the rest is history,” said Byrne.

It turned out Lloyd had long been an admirer. He wrote in the matchday programme: “I first tried to sign him two years ago, before he went to Le Havre. He was at QPR then and I was vying with Sunderland for his signature when he finally decided to broaden his footballing experience by moving to France.”

Lloyd revealed how he had consulted with Republic of Ireland boss Jack Charlton to check Byrne had lost none of his old skills and ambition. “He is an intelligent player who moves well across the line and I am sure he is looking on his move to us as an ideal opportunity to regain his place in the Republic’s squad for the European Championships in two years’ time,” said Lloyd.

Albion have had some decent striking partnerships over the years but not since Ward and Mellor in the Seventies had a pair captured the imagination in quite the same way as Byrne and Small. Between them they spearheaded Albion’s push for promotion to the elite.

J Byrne The climax to the season was a classic case of ‘if onlys’ where ‘Budgie’ was concerned: if only he hadn’t been injured in that final game against Ipswich, he would have been fit to play from the start in the final.

There again, if he hadn’t been fouled on the edge of the box, Albion wouldn’t have won the free kick from which Dean Wilkins scored to earn Albion the play-off spot!

With his right leg heavily strapped, Byrne appeared as a substitute in the final. When the Albion story came to an unhappy ending, and the expected financial boost of playing in the top division didn’t materialise, Lloyd had to cash in his prize assets: Small went to West Ham for £400,000 and Byrne was sold to Sunderland for twice what Brighton had paid for him.

Reflecting on Byrne’s impact, Lloyd told Albion’s matchday programme: “He was outstanding for us, he really was. His workrate was excellent.

“He could pass a ball, cross a ball and he knew where the back of the net was. We didn’t have a lot of money to spend but we got something special with him which very nearly got us into what is now the Premier League.”

Byrne famously scored in every round of the FA Cup as Sunderland marched to the final in 1992, and, almost as famously, missed a great chance from six yards as the Wearsiders lost to Liverpool.

After a season at Sunderland, Byrne moved to Millwall, where things didn’t work out for him, and in 1993 he returned to Brighton on loan for a brief seven-game spell in which he scored twice.

He then had two seasons at Oxford, when he scored 18 times in 55 appearances, before returning once more to the Albion to play 39 games in the 1995-96 season. He scored six times, but, it would be fair to say, he was a shadow of the player who graced that 1990-91 season.

Byrne didn’t let the grass grow under his feet when he packed up playing – he learned how to take care of other people’s by becoming a podiatrist.

Followers of the Albion also got to hear his dulcet Mancunian tones on the radio as a summariser on the local radio station’s coverage of Brighton games.

Welsh wizard Peter O’Sullivan an all-time Albion great

WHILE Peter Ward rightly attracted much of the attention during Albion’s rise to the top in the late ‘70s, few would deny that midfield maestro PETER O’SULLIVAN also deserves a place amongst the club’s all-time greats.

Sully had a long career with the Seagulls before a short stint with Fulham towards the end of his playing days.

The statisticians of the modern football era would have needed their calculators to record the ‘assists’ racked up by Sully, who, from the left wing or left midfield, found goalscoring teammates with unerring accuracy throughout a remarkable 11 years with the Albion.

Managers came and went, a huge swathe of teammates were discarded, but Sully stayed put, showed his worth to whoever sat in the manager’s chair, and entertained the watching faithful.

He played in the same position as the Brazilian genius Rivelino and even sported the same style of moustache in homage to him.

As Brighton rose through the footballing pyramid, Sully was a constant, displaying the talent to make an impact in the third, second and top tiers. One of his former teammates, Andy Rollings, maintained: “He should have played at the top level all the time, he was that good a player.

“He had natural ability and great fitness,” Rollings told freelance journalist Spencer Vignes. “What he did at this club was incredible, and as an individual player he was one of the best I ever played with. He’s a lovely, smashing guy.”

In the excellent Vignes’ book A Few Good Men (Breedon Books Publishing), Sully admitted there had been occasions when he couldn’t wait to get away from Brighton, and he had some serious arguments with all of the managers he played under.

Sully shared his thoughts in a Goal magazine article of 22 December 1973, a couple of months after the arrival of Brian Clough and Peter Taylor. Having won promotion from the Third Division, won five Wales under 23 caps and made his full international debut against Scotland, he was disillusioned after relegation from Division 2.

“I was bitterly disappointed at that,” he said. “It seemed at last I was getting over the depression of being in the Manchester United reserves for four years when life began to turn sour again.”

However, with the arrival of Clough and Taylor, O’Sullivan changed his outlook and told the magazine: “I’ve been impressed with their ideas and they have completely overhauled the set up down here. Now I am more than happy to stay – that is if Mr Clough still wants me – and help Brighton back into the big time.

“The potential down here is enormous and I am sure we will realise it under Mr Clough.”

Vignes’ 2007 interview with Sully explained exactly how he ended up at Brighton having been given a free transfer from Manchester United. None other than the great Bobby Charlton was responsible.

sully man u

Young Peter crouches alongside George Best in a Manchester United team photo

Born in Colwyn Bay, north Wales, on 4 March 1951, Sully had trained alongside the United legend while at Old Trafford as a youngster and, on being released on a free transfer in 1970, was considering offers from several different clubs.

He’d gone to Bristol to have a trial with Bristol City when, on a neighbouring pitch, Charlton was taking part in an England training session prior to the 1970 Mexico World Cup.

The kindly maestro exchanged the time of day with his recently departed colleague and asked which clubs were in for him. On hearing that one of them was Brighton, managed by his former Busby Babe teammate, Freddie Goodwin, Charlton advised him to link up with his old pal……and the rest, as they say, is history.

What Charlton and Sully didn’t know, however, was that no sooner had he arrived on the south coast than Goodwin was heading for the exit, en route to Birmingham City. Sully hadn’t even kicked a ball in anger for him.

“I was a little apprehensive about joining Brighton and it was unsettling when Freddie Goodwin left the club before I had even played for Albion,” he said. “I wondered what was going on and how it would affect me.

“But then Pat Saward arrived and I was overjoyed when he put me in the team. My hopes were quickly dashed again, though, when he dropped me after about six games.”

A homesick Sully struggled to settle at first but he stuck at it and went on to cement his place in the side. He ultimately featured under four different managers, Saward, Clough, Taylor and Alan Mullery.

He was part of the promotion-winning teams in 1972, 1976 and 1979, and was player of the season in 1978. He won promotion with Fulham too, going up to the old Division 2 in 1982 when the former Newcastle, Arsenal and England centre forward Malcolm MacDonald was in charge.

Sully had one amazing period with the Albion in which he made 194 consecutive appearances, an Albion record for an outfield player.

The performances of the lad from Colwyn Bay also saw him earn three international caps for Wales, two against Scotland and one in a rout against Malta when he also got on the scoresheet. Unfortunately for him, during the same period, a superb left-sided player called Leighton James was the first choice for the national side.

“When I joined Manchester United from school it was always one of my ambitions to play for Wales,” he told the Albion matchday programme. “But I thought those hopes had been dashed when Manchester United released me.” PO Wales

Sully’s 491 appearances for Brighton made him the club’s longest-serving post-war player. He actually left the club in 1980 to play in America for San Diego Sockers but a £50,000 transfer fee saw him return just five months later.

Eventually Sully moved on to Fulham in 1981 and notched up 46 appearances. There were short loan spells with Reading and Charlton in 1982-83 and his Football League career came to an end when he made 14 appearances for Aldershot in the following season.

Peter Grummitt a contender for Brighton’s best ever no.1

grummitt portrait ONE OF the best goalkeepers I’ve ever seen play for Brighton and Hove Albion previously spent a decade with Nottingham Forest and was an England under 23 international.

Peter Grummitt was outstanding between the sticks and racked up an impressive career total of more than 650 league and cup appearances, virtually half of them in what is now the Premiership.

Born in Bourne (the Lincolnshire market town) on 19 August 1942, he was the last line of defence for Forest between 1960 and 1969, and credited Forest reserve team coach Joe Mallett, a former Southampton stalwart as a player, as the biggest influence on his career.

GrumForest But he also made 158 appearances for the Albion between 1974 and 1977. Signed on loan initially from Sheffield Wednesday in the wake of the famous 8-2 defeat to Bristol Rovers, he went on to be a key part of the side that was on the up in the mid ‘70s until injury cut short his career, albeit that he was in his mid 30s by then.

Grummitt headed south having been edged out as first choice at Wednesday, where he’d played 130 games after leaving the City Ground. He knew Brian Clough’s sidekick Peter Taylor well having played in the same Nottingham Taxis cricket team, and Taylor had called him to ask if he fancied the move.

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“The fact Brighton were in the Third Division didn’t bother me at all, ” he said. “I knew what sort of managers they both were and I knew straight away that I wanted to go. I met Clough at a motorway service station, we had a chat, and I signed there and then.”

His arrival at the Goldstone was Clough and Taylor’s direct response to that horrendous home defeat to Rovers in front of the TV cameras. Long-standing no.1 Brian Powney was axed and Grummitt was drafted in for the next game – but in his first match even he had to fish the ball out of his net four times as Tranmere ran out 4-1 winners.

As it turned out, Powney did reclaim the ‘keeper’s jersey when Grummitt was injured in a game against Shrewsbury in a challenge with Ricky Marlowe, who the following season became a teammate.

Looking back, though, the signing of a goalkeeper of Grummitt’s undoubted pedigree was very much the beginning of what was to become a memorable era in the club’s history.

Mrs Grummitt was pleased with the move too, as the matchday programme enlightened us. Jill said the couple had find a house in Saltdean with a sea view. “Both of us have always wanted to live by the sea,” she said.

Their mutual love of horses was also satisfied by Brighton’s closeness to Hickstead, where they were visitors to see shows. Additionally we learned: “Peter’s main interest outside football is golf. Apart from that he is really a home-bird. He’s a master at relaxing and can just switch off by settling fown for a night in front of the television.”

Handyman Grummitt had also concreted part of the garden at the house in Mannings Vale and built in stone fireplace in the lounge.

In the 1960s, he was a contemporary of Chelsea’s Peter Bonetti, and they vied for the number one spot for the England Under 23 team.

Grum Eng Grummitt made his debut in a 5-2 win over the Netherlands in Rotterdam on 29 November 1961 when his teammates included future England World Cup winning captain Bobby Moore and future Brighton manager Alan Mullery.

While Bonetti reclaimed the shirt for the next seven matches, Grummitt was back between the sticks two years later when on 13 November 1963 he played in England’s 1-1 draw against Wales at Ashton Gate, Bristol. Those other West Ham World Cup winners, Martin Peters and Geoff Hurst, were in that under 23 line-up, together with Graham Cross, who would also later play for Brighton.

A fortnight later, Grummitt was again in goal when the national under 23s beat West Germany 4-1 at Anfield. But that was his last cap as Bonetti and Jim Montgomery (Sunderland) were selected ahead of him.

However, in 1971, Grummitt went on an end-of-season tour to Australia with an English FA squad that also included Barry Bridges (then of Millwall) and Dennis Mortimer (of Coventry at the time). The group played the Republic of Ireland in Dublin, drawing 1-1, before heading Down Under where they won all nine of the matches they played in various locations across a month.

Looking back through my scrapbooks, I found a feature from Shoot! magazine in which Grummitt and Bonetti, by then both 35, exchanged views and memories.

Grummitt revealed how he ended up being a ‘keeper. “My fate was decided at an early age because my brother was a budding inside forward and he used to stick me in goal so that he could practice his shooting on me,” he told the magazine.

In the same article, Grummitt said he hoped he would be able to carry on for another four or five years. Sadly that wasn’t to be. His last game was against the same opponents he’d made his Brighton debut against, Tranmere, and he suffered a knee injury which, together with an arthritic hip, prevented him regaining full fitness and forced him to retire in December 1977.

Grummitt explained in an interview with Spencer Vignes in a 2015-16 matchday programme how his right knee completely let him down. “I’d been going down on the hard ground on my knees for years and I think it got to the point where it just couldn’t take any more,” he said. An operation he underwent involved drilling and scraping the knee to try to make it grow again.

“It did grow eventually, but it was too late for me to stay on at the club,” he said. “If I’d had nine months to recover, then maybe I’d have been okay.” He subsequently had a knee replacement.

Grummitt added: “I’d have liked another two or three years at Brighton, what with us starting to go places, but it wasn’t to be.”

On 2 May 1978, a testimonial for him took place between Albion and an Alan Mullery All Stars XI in front of a crowd of 5,615. In the match programme notes, Mullery admitted when he took over as manager he thought Grummitt might be too old to continue in the first team, but he pointed out: “Until he got his injury, he was as good a goalkeeper as there was in the country at that time.”

Describing him as “a first class goalkeeper”, Mullery praised Grummitt’s character and loyalty. “With players of Peter’s quality they are never forgotten. He has had a tremendous time here at the Goldstone and I certaiinly don’t think anyone will forget him.”

Vignes discovered in his interview how Grummitt used the proceeds from the testimonial to buy a newsagent’s shop in Queens Road, Brighton, as well as briefly managing Lewes and working as a youth coach at Worthing. He also had brief spells playing part-time for Worthing and Dover Athletic but eventually returned to the East Midlands, settling in Newark.

One small claim to fame on my part – I once played in the same team as Grummitt at Withdean Stadium.

Former Argus sports reporter Jamie Baker put together a team of Sussex sports writers for a game and, as one who reported on local football at the time, I was invited to play.

Imagine my surprise as we were getting changed before the match to discover sitting alongside us in the dressing room was Peter Grummitt, who Jamie had drafted in as a “ringer” to try to ensure at least our last line of defence was sound!

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Grummitt, now contending with dementia, on a visit to the City Ground, Nottingham, in May 2025

Willie Bell rang last orders on his playing career at Brighton

*High-flying Willie Bell in night game action versus Rotherham at the Goldstone Ground*

LEFT-BACK Willie Bell was a key part of the first successful Leeds United side built by Don Revie. A Scottish international, his illustrious playing career ended with the then Division Three Brighton.

Bell missed only two games during Albion’s 1969-70 season having been signed as a player-coach by his former Leeds United teammate, Freddie Goodwin, from the 1969 FA Cup Finalists Leicester City.

Screen Shot 2019-03-03 at 08.51.01 Goodwin (pictured below alongside Bell in a Leeds line-up) obviously knew the pedigree of the player and mightyleeds.co.uk covers in depth how Bell was an unsung hero of that famous Don Revie side as it rose to prominence between 1962 and 1967.

Legendary Leeds hardman Norman Hunter is quoted as saying: “Willie Bell was one of the bravest men I have seen in my life. He never blinked, he never flinched, he just went for it.”

And Scottish international winger Eddie Gray remembered something similar. “Willie was a natural defender; a big, strong player who epitomised the old school of British full-backs in his discipline in sticking rigidly to the basic defensive requirements of his job.”

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However, he stands accused of contributing to what Welsh Evertonian Roy Vernon labelled one of the most “savage confrontations” on a football pitch: an Everton v Leeds match in November 1964.

Everton full-back Sandy Brown had been sent off in only the fourth minute when he decked Johnny Giles for a tackle that left stud marks in the defender’s chest.

“Things came to a head in the 35^th minute when full-back Willie Bell launched a two-footed tackle at Derek Temple near the touchline,” it was said in Blue Dragon: The Roy Vernon Story. “It was around neck high and one of the worst seen outside a wrestling ring.” The Everton winger had to be stretchered off by St John Ambulance attendants.

Born in Johnstone, Renfrewshire, on 3 September 1937, Bell began his career as a wing-half and in 1957 transferred from Neilston Juniors to Scottish amateur side Queens Park. While he was there, he won two Scottish amateur caps which attracted the attention of Leeds manager Jack Taylor.

Bell, aged 22, joined Leeds in the summer of 1960 after they had been relegated to the old Second Division. The Scot struggled to adapt to the English game initially and only featured sporadically in the Leeds first team. It was Taylor’s successor Revie who switched him to left-back to replace the long estanlished Grenville Hair and he only became a regular in the 1963-64 season.

He developed a great understanding with left winger Albert Johanesson as Leeds won the Second Division title and, by the end of the following season, he was part of the Leeds side that reached the 1965 FA Cup Final, only to lose to Liverpool after extra time.

England international Terry Cooper eventually replaced him at Leeds, but his performances for the Elland Road outfit earned him two full caps for Scotland in 1966, against Portugal and Brazil.

Leeds transferred Bell to Leicester in 1967 for £40,000 and he was their captain for a while but the emerging, future England international David Nish became their first choice left back and, in the summer of 1969, Bell linked up with Goodwin at Brighton.

It was halfway through the season when Bell was put in charge of Albion’s reserve side and they couldn’t have made a better start for him because they hammered Southend United 6-1 with goals from Andy Marchant, Brian Tawse, Paul Flood, Ken Blackburn, Barrie Wright and Dave Armstrong.

Bell headshot The matchday programme noted: “Willie is continuing his career as a player, but devotes a good deal of his time to the reserve side. He’s thoroughly enjoying this new phase to a fine career in the game.”

When Goodwin left Brighton for Birmingham, he took Bell and youth coach George Dalton with him, but Goodwin was so eager to hire his old pal that he made an illegal approach to him while he was still under contract at Brighton and Birmingham were later fined £5,000 for the offence.

Goodwin and Bell launched the career of Trevor Francis, the first £1m footballer, as a teenage starlet at Birmingham. In 1972, Francis, Bob Latchford and Bob Hatton spearheaded promotion for the Blues and a place in the FA Cup semi finals.

When Goodwin was sacked at the end of the 1974-75 season, Bell became caretaker manager and, after a successful spell in temporary charge, got the position on a permanent basis.

Bell brought in Syd Owen, the former Leeds United trainer, as a coach, but the team struggled, finishing one place above the relegation zone at the end of their 1975-76 centenary season.

He led them to an improved 13^th in the following season but after losing the opening five matches of the 1977-78 season, Bell’s managerial career at St Andrews came to an end. His successor was none other than former England boss Sir Alf Ramsey, who was by then a Birmingham director.

Bell meanwhile went on to manage Third Division Lincoln City, following the unsuccessful George Kerr in trying to emulate the heights enjoyed by the Imps under Graham Taylor, who had gone on to manage Watford. It wasn’t to be, though, and on leaving Lincoln in October 1978, Bell emigrated to the USA and coached at Liberty University in Virginia.

After suffering a heart attack in 1993, he turned to religion and became active in the church. In 2001 he and his wife Mary retired to Yorkshire and in 2014 published an autobiography called The Light At The End of the Tunnel.

Bell died aged 85 on 21 March 2023 after suffering a stroke.

Willie Irvine restored Irish international career at Brighton

NORTHERN Ireland international Willie Irvine has encountered the highs and lows in life and I would urge anyone who hasn’t yet read his autobiography, Together Again (written by Dave Thomas) to add it to their book collection.

The Albion provided a platform for a brief resurgence in Willie’s career in the early 1970s but in the mid Sixties he was a big star scoring goals for fun as Burnley strutted their stuff amongst English football’s elite.

He scored 97 goals in 144 games (plus four as a sub) for the Lancashire side between 1962 and 1968 and in the 1965-66 season notched 29 league goals (37 including cup games) in what was the equivalent of today’s Premiership.

On the excellent Clarets Mad website, Tony Scholes wrote: “In my time watching the Clarets, none have been quite able to match the goalscoring exploits of Willie Irvine who, for two and a half years, was as good as anyone in English football when it came to putting the ball in the net.”

Sadly his highly-promising career at Burnley was never the same after he suffered a broken leg in a tackle with Johnny Morrissey in a FA Cup third round match at Everton in 1967.

A year later, the Turf Moor club turfed him out, transferring him to nearby Preston North End. By 1971, he was surplus to requirements there, and Pat Saward brought him to Third Division Albion on loan.

His first game, on the evening of 10 March 1971 at home to Fulham, couldn’t have gone much better because he marked his debut by scoring two in a 3-2 win.

He also scored in 1-0 wins over Shrewsbury and Bury, in a 3-0 win at Reading and in the last game of the season, a 1-1 draw with Plymouth Argyle. Not surprisingly, those goals led to him signing on a permanent basis that summer and the following season saw him play a key role as Brighton secured promotion to the second tier as runners-up to champions Aston Villa.

Irvine described warmly how Saward attracted him to up sticks from the North West and move to Sussex. “Pat sold me the place with his charm and persuasive ways,” he said, describing the former male model as “extrovert, infectious and bubbly”.

He added: “Pat Saward was a gem of a manager and a pleasure to play for. He said what he thought, but never offensively; in a matter-of-fact, plain-speaking kind of way, rather than aggressively.”

Irvine continued: “Saward had the knack of making people feel important. He instilled pride and a sense of identity…..Pat loved attacking, entertaining football and worked tirelessly for the club. I would have run through that proverbial brick wall for him.”

As Brighton neared promotion, Irvine said: “Saward, with a joke or a smile, an arm around the shoulder or a bit of geeing up, knew just how to keep a dressing room happy or dispel any tension or nerves.”

Fans of a certain vintage will recall a memorable goalscoring season for Irvine was capped off (literally!) by a most magical strike against Aston Villa in front of the Match of the Day cameras.

Willie’s goal was judged by the legendary manager Jock Stein as the third best goal of the season shown on Match of the Day and Brighton went on to win promotion. It was undoubtedly the best of the 17 he scored in 40 matches that season.

It was the first time I had experienced the excitement of going up, but there was one further thrill in store for me before the season came to a complete close.

In those days, there was an end-of-season tournament played between the “home” nations (England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland). I had already been to a couple of England internationals at Wembley but the England international on May 23 1972 was extra special because lining up for Northern Ireland was Albion’s very own Irvine.

Now, I had not been a football supporter for very long, but even I knew that it was virtually unheard of for Third Division teams to have current international players playing for them.

Born at Eden in County Antrim on 18 June 1943, Irvine was the youngest of 18 children, and was brought up with seven siblings in the seaside town of Carrickfergus by his mother, Agnes, after his father Alec died during a wartime blitz in Belfast.

He had played five times for Northern Ireland’s under 23 side before stepping up to the full international team and winning 21 caps at the height of his career. But I never dreamt – and, on reading the autobiography many years later, neither had he – that he would re-appear for his country after dropping down to the third tier of English football.

My allegiances were split that day and I have to say it didn’t really upset me that Northern Ireland ended up 1-0 winners thanks to player-manager Terry Neill’s solitary goal – laid on by Irvine!

Here is how The Official FA Year Book (1972-73) described the goal: “From Hegan’s corner, Irvine beat Shilton to the ball and headed it down to Neill, the Irish player-manager, playing in his 50^th international, to shoot into an empty net from two yards range.”

The game saw England give international debuts to Colin Todd and Tony Currie, and Colin Bell was England captain in the absence of Bobby Moore. Two players who would later join the Albion – Martin Chivers, as a substitute for Malcolm Macdonald, and Sammy Nelson, the Arsenal left-back – were also on show.

“I was delighted to have won my place back in my national team and I thought I did reasonably well,” Irvine told the Albion matchday programme. “When I reported back for international duty Derek Dougan welcomed me like a long lost uncle. He is a little older than I am. But I feel that at 29 I still have something to offer to the Irish side.

“It’s a wonderful experience playing for one’s country. I always get a great thrill when I hear I have been selected. My last three appearances, I believe, were solely due to that much publicised and televised goal against Aston Villa.”

Irvine also said he hoped to earn more caps, especially as he opened the new season with four goals in three games. But he wasn’t selected again, and his days as an Albion player came to an end before Christmas that year.

It’s no surprise that Irvine played alongside George Best in some matches for their country and in a 2010 interview with Suzanne Geldard in the Lancashire Telegraph, he recalled how they became roommates in 1964.

“I was 18, George was only 16, so because we were the babies in the team they put us together,” said Irvine. “He was the kindest, nicest lad you could ever meet in your life.

“People adored him. I’ve even seen people cutting pieces of his hair off for keepsakes, but he would just shrug his shoulders.

“George Best was without doubt an amazing footballer. You had to get on his wavelength, but that was difficult because he was way above everyone else. He picked me out two or three times and helped me score.”

Life has been rather unkind to Irvine since his glory days but, as the title of the book implies, he has got it back together after reaching a very low ebb.

Together Again reveals how it all turned sour for him at the Albion when his relationship with Saward deteriorated badly. Despite scoring five in 13 league and cup appearances in the opening months of the new season, in December 1973, against his wishes, he was transferred to Halifax Town in part exchange for Lammie Robertson.

On reading that he had no memorabilia of his time at the Goldstone, 35 years after he left the Albion, I sent him my copy of the Albion programme for that famous win over Villa and he kindly returned an autographed photo showing him in action with Chris Nicholl, which I had sent with the programme.

Irvine died aged 82 in July 2025.

In parallel lines

Memories from 55 years following Brighton & Hove Albion

Month: April 2016