Month: September 2021

How the career of high rise Flatts came tumbling down

MARK FLATTS was destined for a glittering career after breaking into Arsenal’s first team when only eighteen.

It was the season when George Graham’s side finished in a disappointing 10th place in the league but won the League Cup and the FA Cup, beating Sheffield Wednesday in both competitions.

Flatts got seven starts plus four appearances off the bench and the following season, after he’d been troubled with a few injuries, Graham sent him out on loan to get some games under his belt.

His first loan was at Cambridge United, then in January 1994 Flatts joined forces with former Gunners legend Liam Brady at Brighton.

The former midfield maestro who’d graced the game at the highest level as a player had not long arrived at the Goldstone Ground, creating a buzz of anticipation amongst the largely disillusioned Albion faithful.

Brighton were bumping along around the foot of the third tier table when he arrived and it augured well that Brady could use his connections with his former club to secure the services of a prodigious young talent who’d already played a handful of matches in the Premier League.

He made his debut in a cracking 4-1 New Year’s Day home win over Cambridge United when Kurt Nogan scored a hat-trick and he was only on the losing side twice during his two months at the club, helping the Albion move away from the relegation zone.

Brady wrote about it in his autobiography Born To Be A Footballer, describing how “livewire” Flatts had heated up “a freezing Goldstone” on that debut day. “He’s a lovely young kid off the field but on the park there’s a strut about him. That’s exactly what we need. He’s full of tricks.”

Flatts started nine matches, came on as a sub once, and scored one of Albion’s goals in a 3-2 home win over Blackpool, but it was his skill on the ball and pace that fans enjoyed most.

After he had returned to Highbury, Brady thanked him for his contribution and said in his programme notes: “He gave the place a tremendous lift. He’s a very confident lad and he did us a real favour and hopefully he’s got something out of it as well. I think he has and I think he enjoyed his time with us.”

Flatts confirmed as much recently. Although he has kept a low profile for many years, in 2020, online from his home in Norfolk, he appeared in two podcasts talking about his career.

On the Shoot the Defence podcast in April 2020, Flatts talked admiringly of his time under Brady at Brighton – “He still had it in training” – as well as the experience of playing alongside senior pros Jimmy Case and Steve Foster at the Goldstone Ground.

“Loyal fans as well. It was a good time,” he said. “I got on well with the fans and a few of them still text me, so that’s nice. Liam Brady and Jimmy Case had seen me in a few games, said they wanted me on loan, and I went there and enjoyed it.”

Born in Islington on 14 October 1972 and brought up in Wood Green, Flatts played for Haringey Borough and Middlesex County school teams and he was playing for Enfield Rangers when he caught the eye of professional clubs.

He spent time training with Watford and West Ham, but his mum and older brother were Arsenal fans so, when they invited him to join them, it was no contest. The scout responsible for picking him up for the Gunners was the former Brighton wing-half, Steve Burtenshaw.

Flatts was one of the country’s top talented 14-year-olds who went through the FA National School of Excellence at Lilleshall before becoming a trainee at Highbury after graduating.

In the first edition of a new fans’ podcast Over and Over and Over Again on 20 August 2020, Flatts talked about how he, Andy Cole and Paul Dickov up front, Ray Parlour and Ian Selley in midfield, Scott Marshall at the back and Alan Miller in goal were all going through from youth team to reserves at the same time. “It was a good strong youth team,” he said. “Pat Rice was the youth team manager who brought us through. He was a good coach.”

Flatts signed professional in December 1990 and he progressed to the reserve side who were managed by another Arsenal legend, George Armstrong.

One particular reserve match stands out as memorable – but not because Flatts scored a goal in a 2-2 draw. Ordinarily, Flatts was accustomed to playing in front of a few hundred supporters for the second string, but on 16 February 1991 it’s reckoned more than 10,000 turned up.

The Ovenden Papers Football Combination game against Reading was originally scheduled to be an away fixture but freezing conditions meant the game was swapped to Highbury because it had undersoil heating.

The reason for the surge of interest was the match saw the return to playing of Tony Adams after his release from prison, having served half of his four-month sentence for drink driving. The amazing response of the Arsenal faithful was remembered in this football.london article in February 2018.  

Often niggled by injuries, Flatts was sidelined by one he hadn’t even been aware of, other than what felt like a small discomfort. “I got a stress fracture on my ankle and was playing on it for a month without realising,” he said.

Physio Gary Lewin arranged for him to see a Harley Street specialist and it was only after he was put through tests on a running machine that the problem was diagnosed. The injury required surgery that put him out of action for over a year.

Flatts got his first real involvement with the first team on a pre-season tour of Norway ahead of the 1992-93 season, getting on as a substitute against Stabaek and Brann Bergen. He was a non-playing sub in two subsequent pre-season friendlies away to Wolves and Peterborough.

It was back to reserve team football at the start of the season but Graham selected him to travel with the squad for an away game at Sheffield United on 19 September and he made his competitive debut as a 71st minute substitute for Anders Limpar, shortly before Ian Wright netted an equaliser for the Gunners.

His next involvement came in a third round League Cup encounter with Derby County. He was a non-playing sub in the away tie but started in Limpar’s place for the replay on 1 December 1992, when Arsenal edged it 2-1.

Flatts (right) celebrates Arsenal’s League Cup win with some familiar faces

He kept his place for the league game which followed four days later but was subbed off as Arsenal lost 1-0 at Southampton.

At one point, the Islington Gazette declared Flatts, Neil Heaney, Parlour and Dickov as the “next crop of Arsenal starlets who will take the club forward”.

As the year drew to a close, on 19 December, Flatts earned rave reviews for his showing in a 1-1 home draw against Lennie Lawrence’s Middlesbrough.

“It’s very unusual to have a quick player with a brain,” said manager Graham. “Mark has skill but he also has the application to go with it.”

Writing about how brightly Flatts shone in the game, Trevor Haylett, of the Independent, said: “He possesses an easy and deceptive running style which frequently carried him away from markers, and has a confidence that few of his colleagues shared in a desultory first 45 minutes.”

Haylett observed: “The problem for Graham is that his most productive line-up, with Merson in the ‘hole’ to distribute and ghost into scoring areas, leaves no room for Flatts, who amply justified his manager’s contention that he has a ‘very big future in the game’.”

Flatts kept his place for the following match, a goalless Boxing Day home draw against Ipswich Town, and was back on the bench away to Aston Villa three days later but came on for the second half in a game Arsenal lost 1-0.

The game he remembers most fondly came just over a fortnight later away to Manchester City at Maine Road. He sped past two players and crossed it for Paul Merson to score with a near post header that gave Arsenal a 1-0 win.

But competition for places was intense and he didn’t next get a start until 1 March against Chelsea at Stamford Bridge, another game that finished goalless.

He had to wait until May for his next involvement, as a sub in a 1-0 defeat away to Sheffield Wednesday, who his teammates would play twice in the space of five days later that month to win the FA Cup on penalties, both games having ended in draws.

With the first of those matches only four days away, Graham put out a young side to face Spurs in the last league game of the season, and Flatts was part of a side who lost the north London derby 3-1, Dickov getting the Arsenal goal.

After his loan spell at Brighton, Flatts got back into the first team picture at Arsenal towards the end of the 1993-94 season, featuring in three successive league games: as a sub in a 1-1 draw with Wimbledon and starting in a 2-1 win at Villa and a 1-1 home draw against QPR.

While he travelled to Copenhagen with the squad for the European Cup Winners’ Cup Final on 4 May 1994, he didn’t play in the Gunners’ 1-0 win.

Flatts wasn’t back in the Arsenal first team set-up until December 1994, when he had a four-game spell, starting in a 2-2 draw away to Nottingham Forest, being a non-playing sub away to Manchester City and then coming on as a sub in a 3-1 defeat at home to Leeds on 17 December and in the goalless Boxing Day home match with Aston Villa.

He came off the bench in a third round FA Cup replay defeat to Millwall on 18 January 1995 but the following month the manager who had supported his development was sacked, and the young wideman went out on loan to Bristol City.

Flatts didn’t reckon much of the man management skills of Graham’s temporary successor, Stewart Houston, but it was the manager who eventually succeeded him who showed the youngster the door.

“Bruce Rioch took over, and said: ‘No, you’re not good enough’ and that was it,” Flatts recalled. He had another short loan spell, this time at Grimsby Town, in the 1995-96 season, but when his contract was up in 1996, he was given a free transfer.

When Flatts left the famous marble halls of Highbury, all that early promise rapidly evaporated and despite a handful of trials at several clubs, his career fizzled out, the player admitting he fell out of love with the game.

Initially, he headed off to Italy to try his luck with Torino in Serie B. He said while he enjoyed his few months there, a limit on the number of foreign players who could play at any one time edged him out of the picture.

According to arseweb.com, back in the UK he had trial periods with Manchester City (September 1996) and Watford (October 1986), although the scathing Hornets fans website, Blind, Stupid and Desperate has a less than flattering summary of his efforts to impress at Vicarage Road. He was briefly at Kettering Town in December 1996, then Barnet (1997-98 pre-season) and Colchester United (1999-00 pre-season) but none of them took him on.

Former Arsenal striker Martin Hayes, manager at Ryman League Division One side Bishop’s Stortford, signed him during the 1999-00 season.

And his last appearance on a team-sheet was as an unused substitute for Queens Park Rangers in a 2000-01 pre-season 4-2 away defeat at Dr Martens League Premier Division side Crawley Town.

Flatts told host Richie Wakelin on Over and Over and Over Again that he kept on picking up niggling injuries too regularly. “With fitness concerns, I just lost interest,” he said. “I ain’t got no regrets. I loved it at Arsenal. I loved playing football. George Graham had faith in me and he gave me a go.”

He said his teenage son and daughter both play football and he has done some coaching at a local level and has considered setting up his own coaching school. He has also done some scouting work for Cambridge United and Norwich City.

Flatts looks back at his football career during a 2020 podcast

Pictures from Albion’s matchday programmes and various online sources.

Eventful Albion stopover for on-loan Calvin Andrew

JOURNEYMAN striker Calvin Andrew is unlikely to forget his eventful months playing for the Seagulls on loan from Crystal Palace.

The Luton-born forward got off to a great start in January 2009 when he scored a 90th-minute winner on his debut for the Seagulls.

In only his fourth game, he damaged a hamstring against his hometown club – a match that turned out to be the last for the manager who’d brought him in on loan.

While Andrew was back at Selhurst Park recovering from the injury, a new boss – but familiar face – took charge at the Withdean.

Andrew rejoined the Seagulls but couldn’t force his way into the starting line-up because Lloyd Uwusu had arrived to take centre stage. However, the loanee scored two vital goals in Albion’s ‘Great Escape’ when going on as a substitute.

To cap it all, in the nail-biting last game of the season, when Brighton just preserved their League One status with a 1-0 win over Stockport County, Andrew suffered a horrific injury which sidelined him for six months.

Andrew, who had lost his place at Palace after picking up an injury at the start of the season, had joined the Seagulls as part of a major January transfer window overhaul Micky Adams oversaw in an attempt to revive the club’s flagging League One fortunes.

When he signed, Adams said: “Calvin is a young centre-forward and will complement our existing forwards by giving us an added physical presence up front.

“He is over six-foot tall and the type of striker who makes things happen and can be a real handful for opposing defenders.”

The player himself, who had only joined Palace the previous summer for a £30,000 fee, said: “I went there and at the start of the season I was playing games and I was doing well. But then the situation changed. I got injured and since then I haven’t been able to get back in the team.

“The team has been doing really well and it’s totally understandable from my point of view. Neil Warnock still rates me highly, but he wants me to go out and get some games and get myself ready for when my chance does come.

“It was quite an easy decision. There were a few clubs in for me, but Brighton is relatively close to where I’m living so it was an easy choice. It’s a good club.

“I didn’t know any of the players, but I knew the manager. He’s a great manager and I’m looking forward to playing for him. Everybody knows about Nicky Forster. He’s an experienced player and there’s always something to learn as well as forming a good partnership.”

With Forster scoring Albion’s first against Hartlepool United at the Withdean on 31 January 2009, the script looked like it had been perfectly written when Andrew netted a winner in the last minute to seal a 2-1 victory.

Unfortunately, successive home defeats – 4-2 to Peterborough United and 2-0 to Carlisle United – in five days followed by elimination from the Johnstone’s Paint Trophy at Luton the following week was too much for Adams to stomach and he decided to quit after meeting chairman Dick Knight the day before the next match, which ironically saw Albion win 1-0 at Millwall.

Andrew wasn’t involved because he’d picked up a hamstring injury at Kenilworth Road, a ground where he’d made a first team debut as a 17-year-old in the 2004-05 season. Born in Luton on 19 December 1986, Andrew was a prolific goalscorer as a youth player at his hometown club.

When he was sent out on loan to gain experience at League Two Grimsby Town in 2005, he played nine matches under manager Russell Slade.

And it was Slade who was parachuted in at the Withdean to try to steer Albion away from the League One relegation trapdoor in the Spring of 2009.

Even though Albion picked up only four points from Slade’s first seven games in charge, the former Yeovil boss slowly turned things around with four wins in the next five games to lift the Seagulls out of the bottom four.

Andrew spoke about the change in fortunes in an Argus interview. He told reporter Steve Hollis: “We have shown different qualities which I don’t think we had when I was at the club before my injury. There is some real resilience now.

“I know Russell Slade quite well and he asks all of his teams to show some grit when the going gets tough. He demands you stick in there when you are struggling and to keep going.”

Andrew was buoyant having headed the winner from Gary Hart’s cross in the 52nd minute at Bristol Rovers after leaving the bench before half-time to replace the injured Dean Cox.

“That was a big goal,” he said. “It was important for me because I am coming back from injury but it was more important for the club and the town.

“I usually hang around the back post when I am playing on the left but Dean White told me to get into attacking positions and it was a cross you dream about from Hart.”

He told Hollis: “When I initially had the injury, my fear was that I wouldn’t play again this season. I had a very bad tear in two places in the hamstring and was told it would take a very long time to repair.

“Fortunately, I seem to recover pretty quickly, and I am glad because I want to play a part in helping Albion stay up. It means a lot for me that Brighton stay up, even though I am only on loan.

“I have been made to not only feel part of the team but part of the town and it would be awful to go down.

“The supporters have been great and welcomed me even though I am from a rival team, so it is my duty to give 110 per cent. Just because I am on loan doesn’t make any difference.”

Andrew had to contend himself with another appearance from the bench in the following match but, again, he made a positive impact after replacing Hart, who limped off injured after only nine minutes of the game at Huddersfield.

The young striker levelled up the game after Town had taken the lead and Owusu continued his purple patch of form by netting a second equaliser to give Albion a share of the spoils.

Palace boss Warnock had been contemplating recalling Andrew but was told he would start in Albion’s crunch final home game against Stockport County. In fact, Slade once again opted to use Gary Hart in the starting line-up instead but Andrew was sent on in injured Hart’s place after only 17 minutes and went close to breaking the deadlock with a header that hit the top of the bar.

Forster, who had also been troubled by injury throughout the season, had to replace Andrew for the second half because he picked up an anterior cruciate knee ligament injury which ultimately prevented him playing for six months.

It wasn’t until October 2009 that Andrew got back playing for Palace reserves, and their assistant manager, Mick Jones told the club’s website: “Calvin played for half-an-hour on Monday. He is miles ahead of schedule following one of the worst injuries I have ever seen.”

The 2009-10 season saw Palace in all sorts of trouble: going into administration, Warnock departing as a result, Paul Hart taking over as manager, and the side only narrowly avoiding relegation. Andrew got 13 starts as Palace battled at the wrong end of the Championship, but he was more often a substitute, coming off the bench on 19 occasions.

With game time limited under new boss George Burley the following season, Andrew once again went out on loan: briefly to feature in three games for fellow Championship side Millwall in November, and in the New Year to League One Swindon Town, where his old Palace boss Hart was in charge.

Although he was involved in the Palace set-up at the start of the 2011-12 season, by the following March he went out on loan again, this time reuniting with Slade at Leyton Orient. He only started two matches, though, and didn’t score in any of the 10 games played while he was at Brisbane Road.

At the end of the season, Palace boss Dougie Freedman didn’t offer Andrew a new contract. His next stop saw him link up with League Two Port Vale on a two-month deal under former Albion boss Adams.

While he managed to earn a contract until the end of the season, he only started eight matches and was used as a substitute on 15 occasions.

With no new deal in the offing, he then switched to another League Two side, Mansfield Town, for the first part of 2013-14 before joining York City in the closing months.

It was in the summer of 2014 that he finally found a more permanent berth, at Rochdale, who’d been newly promoted to League One.

In six seasons at Spotland, Andrew scored 28 goals in 231 appearances and over four years was recognised as a ‘community champion’ for the amount of work he did in the local community, including school visits and involvement with the club’s women’s teams. In 2020, he was declared the League One PFA Community Champion.

One blot on his copybook came in 2016 when he was handed a 12-match FA ban (later reduced to nine games) after video evidence found him guilty of elbowing Oldham’s Peter Clarke in the face in an incident the referee missed.

After leaving Rochdale, he didn’t get fixed up with a new club until March 2021, when he joined Barrow AFC until the end of the season.

• Pictures from matchday programmes.

‘Talent in his boots and balance sheets in his briefcase’

ROBERT CODNER, Brighton’s first black captain in the early ‘90s, was an enigma for plenty of managers throughout his playing days but, by his own admission, the much-maligned Barry Lloyd got the best out of him.

A dynamic midfielder with a terrific shot in his locker, Codner made way more appearances for the Albion than any other club he went to and his attachment to the Seagulls continued into the modern era when he was Solly March’s agent.

Of Lloyd, he told Albion’s matchday programme: “Barry Lloyd was good for me and I don’t think he gets the acknowledgement he deserves as he steered the club through some difficult times. I know I had my moments on and off the pitch, but he always stood by me and backed me all the way.”

Born in Walthamstow on 23 January 1965, nearby Tottenham Hotspur were Codner’s first club and, although he featured in their youth team alongside future first-teamers Ian Crook, Mark Bowen and Tony Parks, he didn’t take the next step with them.

“It is very difficult to come through at White Hart Lane, they always seemed keener to go and buy someone than risk a youngster,” Codner told Shoot! magazine.

And in a matchday programme interview with Dave Beckett, he said: “At 18, Tottenham told me that they wouldn’t put me on a professional contract, so I ended up at Leicester under Gordon Milne for about 18 months.

“I never managed to make a break into the first team which I thought I deserved, and that’s why I left in the end.”

In a slightly different telling of the story, he said: “At the end of my contract he (Milne) didn’t offer me another one which was a bitter disappointment. I felt let down and was disillusioned with the game.”

After a spell working on a building site, he tried to get fixed up with Luton Town but their manager, David Pleat, urged him to get experience playing non-League football while they kept tabs on him.

“That’s why I joined Dagenham for four or five months, but I didn’t particularly like it there, so when Barnet offered me a good deal and Luton said they couldn’t top it, I switched clubs,” he said.

His form for Barnet brought him selection for the England semi-professional side; Wimbledon showed some interest but in a pre-season game in August 1988, as a triallist for Millwall, he played against the Albion.

Brighton boss Lloyd was sufficiently impressed that he was prepared to fork out what at the time seemed like an amazing sum of £115,000 for a non-league player to give him another chance to make it as a professional. (Only a matter of days previously, Lloyd paid the same sum to secure the services of centre back Nicky Bissett from Barnet).

The ebullient Barry Fry, Barnet manager at the time, said: “Codner is a super athlete with two good feet, pace and an ability to score goals.”

The conundrum at the time was that away from football Codner had begun to pursue a successful career in the City, having turned the tables on a would-be finance salesman suggesting he could do a better job.

The salesman’s employers agreed and Codner was suddenly thrust into the world of advising on unit trusts, pensions, mortgages and insurance.

It prompted a description of him in that Shoot! article as the ‘City whizz-kid with talent in his boots and balance sheets in his briefcase’.

In an interview with John Vinicombe in the Argus, Codner denied he was not utterly dedicated to playing.

“That is not so,” he said. “I’m more dedicated because I choose to play. I always believed I would get a second chance after what happened at Leicester, and Brighton have given me that chance.

“Players have to look ahead, and, ten years from now, I want to be comfortably off.

“Of course, I’m ambitious. I want to be a millionaire as a footballer and be a millionaire financial consultant too.

“I’m lucky because I don’t have football as the be all and end all, I play because that’s what I enjoy doing.”

He added: “People may ridicule me sometimes for carrying on in business as well, but a lot of footballers end up on the scrapheap; I’m determined not to be one of them.

“Having been given a second bite of the cherry, I’ll make sure I don’t end up with nothing.”

His time with the Seagulls was certainly not a smooth ride, however, and even the club’s own mouthpiece – ie the matchday programme – said: “His time at the Goldstone has not been without controversy. Earlier this season he failed to report on time for the game at West Bromwich Albion.

“At the beginning of the season the manager said he was hoping that Robert would be one of those players who, having benefited from the experience of more than a season in the league, would play a prominent part in the club’s performances this campaign. However, he is still striving to reach a high level of consistency and his name has now been circulated to other clubs as being available for transfer.”

A retrospective article in a subsequent matchday programme also didn’t spare the midfielder’s feelings. “Codner made an immediate impact and went on to score some brilliant goals, but his relationship with the supporters, like his form, eventually blew hot and cold.

“Several clubs were interested in Codner during his time with the Albion, including West Ham, who were reported to have bid £500,000 for the player in 1991.”

Codner was almost a permanent fixture in the no.10 shirt as Albion reached the 1990-91 end-of-season play-offs with the chance to return to the top tier. He scored in both the home and away semi-final legs against Millwall as the Seagulls guaranteed a place in the Wembley final v Notts County with a 6-2 aggregate win.

After the disappointment of losing 3-1 to Neil Warnock’s County, Codner said: “We’d put in so much to get to the final and unfortunately we didn’t really turn up when it mattered most. We had phenomenal support that day at Wembley but it just didn’t happen for us.”

Albion began to implode financially and were relegated at the end of the next season. Codner was still a mainstay of the midfield, though, making more appearances than any other player, and it was a spot he shared with Mark Beeney and Gary Chivers in the 1992-93 campaign.

Perhaps it was fitting that both Codner and Bissett should be the scorers in the first game after Lloyd parted company with the Albion (Martin Hinshelwood was in temporary charge). Bissett’s 89th-minute goal salvaged a point in a 2-2 draw at Hartlepool on 11 December 1993 but Albion supporter The Groundhog remembered Codner’s 54th-minute goal for the Seagulls thus: “You can’t not love a guy who, at Hartlepool’s Victoria Ground in 1993, while the away fans were shielding themselves from freezing sideways daggers of rain blowing in off the North Sea onto the exposed corner terrace, unleashes a 35-yard thunderbolt thwang-er-wang-er-wanging off the underside of the bar to score. You just can’t.”

While Codner appeared in new manager Liam Brady’s first game in charge, a 1-0 defeat at home to Bradford City, his off-field demons caught up with him when he had to serve three weeks in Lewes Prison for driving offences.

Codner was restored to the side towards the end of January and retained his place through to the end of the season.

A subsequent matchday programme noted: “He emerged from prison a more focused player, but, after an alleged bust-up with (Liam) Brady, was dropped in early 1995 and then released at the end of the season.”

Although Codner had been a regular under Brady in the first half of the 1994-95 season, he didn’t play for the first team again after being part of the side thrashed 4-0 at Crewe Alexandra on 14 January. Brady maintained in his programme notes: “The attitude on the day was not what we were looking for and that’s what contributed largely to losing as badly as we did.”

After finally leaving the Albion with more than 260 appearances for the club under his belt, Codner popped up at a multitude of clubs subsequently (Wikipedia lists 17 he was associated with), playing a handful of games for Reading, Peterborough and Southend United, and having a slightly longer spell back at Barnet in the 1996-97 season.

Codner now operates his own Epsom-based football agency, RC Ballers Ltd.

Putney printer Pearce went to Wembley with the Albion

HE took a circuitous route back to his hometown club but full-back Graham Pearce eventually made it to Brentford’s first team after Brighton had resurrected his career and given him a chance to play at the top level of the English game.

Pearce was first on Brentford’s books as a teenager between 1971 and 1976, but he didn’t make it as a pro with the Bees and, after also being turned down by QPR, he went non-league, initially with Hillingdon Borough for three years and then Barnet.

When Pearce lined up for Barnet in a FA Cup third round tie on 2 January 1982, it must have been beyond his wildest dreams to imagine just over a year later he’d be playing in that competition’s final at Wembley.

But the steady, assured performances 21-year-old Pearce put in as Alliance Premier League Barnet held Brighton 0-0 before losing 3-1 in a replay at the Goldstone impressed the watching Albion boss Mike Bailey sufficiently to sign him up for the Seagulls.

Although he was itching to join, he had to serve a week’s notice with the Putney printer where he had a full-time job because they weren’t in a position to release him sooner.

Just over a year later, when injuries depleted Jimmy Melia’s cup hopefuls the closer they got to a dream Wembley date, Pearce seized his chance to put his own name in print. Circumstances fell just right for him, but it might not have happened if the experienced left-back Sammy Nelson hadn’t been sidelined.

A packed East Terrace at the Goldstone the backdrop as Pearce faces Newcastle in the FA Cup

Pearce played in the third round 1-1 Goldstone draw with Newcastle – one of six games he played in January 1983 – but he missed the 4-0 demolition of Manchester City in the fourth round and didn’t feature again until 22 March when he was sub for the 2-2 home draw with Liverpool.

Because versatile Gary Stevens was more than capable of playing alongside Steve Foster, normal centre back partner Steve Gatting was preferred at left-back for 14 matches from the end of January.

But when right-back Chris Ramsey was suspended for the semi-final against Sheffield Wednesday, Stevens took his spot, Gatting returned to the middle and Pearce slotted in at left-back.

Because Foster was suspended for the final against Man Utd, Stevens paired up with Gatting in the middle and Pearce retained his place.

Even when Foster returned for the replay, Pearce kept his place because Ramsey had been crocked in the first match and wasn’t fit to play (Melia making the mistake of putting left-footed Gatting at right-back instead of Stevens).

In a pre-match interview with the Daily Mail, Pearce said: “There’s money to be made from appearing at Wembley but the thrill for me is just being there – a player from non-League who thought his chance of playing league football had gone.”

Pearce retained the no.3 shirt at the start of the 1983-84 season back in the second tier but, when Chris Cattlin took over from Melia, he made it clear he wanted someone with more experience in that position.

In his matchday programme notes he wrote: “With Kieran (O’Regan), Eric Young and Graham Pearce all playing together, we have three players who haven’t been long out of non-League football.

“Normally these players would have been blooded slowly into the side, instead of being plunged in the deep end. They have done well and shown the right attitude, but when we play against aggressive sides away from home, some of their inexperience has been exposed.”

Until a suitable replacement could be found, Pearce remained in the side and even poked home his first Albion goal in a 4-3 win away to Cambridge United on 29 October 1983.

But four weeks later, after a 2-2 draw at home to Shrewsbury Town, Cattlin was typically forthright in his next programme notes, declaring: “I was unhappy with our defence and our failings in this department cost us the game.”

Pearce and fellow full-back Ramsey were promptly dropped; the left-back berth going to new signing Chris Hutchings from Chelsea.

Cattlin had high praise for his new recruit as he said: “Chris Hutchings is an enthusiastic, strong and determined defender and has a lot to offer, he’s also a fine footballer.”

After 18 consecutive games, Pearce found himself out of the side for the rest of the season.

It’s interesting to note that the reserve side for the 1 May 1984 fixture at home to Southampton featured five players (Pearce, Ramsey, Gary Howlett, Gerry Ryan and Neil Smillie) who’d been in the FA Cup Final squad a year earlier.

The new season was almost three months’ old before Pearce was seen in the first team again, and, ironically, the opponent was once again Shrewsbury.

The game at the Goldstone finished a goalless draw and, with Hutchings having been switched to right-back, Pearce got a run in the side extending to 19 matches.

Unluckily for him, he was then left out of the side in favour of Martin Keown, who Cattlin managed to bring in on loan from Arsenal, and the future England international quickly proved his calibre.

Pearce made one further appearance, in a 2-1 defeat at Middlesbrough, before the end of the season but in the 1985-86 season he finally cemented his place in the side and played a total of 41 matches.

Three days after Christmas 1985, he scored a rare goal as the Seagulls beat Leeds 3-2 at Elland Road. Ian Baird – later to play for the Albion in the old Fourth Division – missed a penalty but scored one of Leeds’ goals and Pearce clinched the winner on a pitch rutted by a rugby league game played on it only two days earlier.

The matchday programme described the goal thus: “Pearce played a one-two with (Steve) Jacobs and found himself with only Mervyn Day to beat and Leeds screaming for offside. The trusty left foot of the Londoner lobbed goalwards, Day was stranded, and Pearce had scored his first goal in 26 months to give Albion another three valuable points.”

Not such a memorable game came in a 3-0 defeat away to Norwich City on 5 April 1986. The full-back went into the referee’s notebook for a foul on future Albion winger Mark Barham, who was substituted shortly afterwards. Albion had a great chance to pull a goal back when Pearce was through one-on-one with Chris Woods, but the England ‘keeper saved his effort comfortably. Then, eight minutes from time, Pearce fouled Wayne Biggins in the penalty area and Welsh international David Williams buried City’s third from the penalty spot.

Pearce played in Albion’s final game of the season, a 2-0 defeat at Hull City under George Petchey, following Cattlin’s sacking, and it turned out to be his last match in a Brighton shirt.

The returning Alan Mullery explained in his programme notes for the opening game of the new season that he released Jacobs and Pearce because “I felt we had too many defenders”.

Pearce switched to Third Division Gillingham under Keith Peacock and played a total of 48 matches as the Gills narrowly missed out on promotion when losing a play-off final replay against Lou Macari’s Swindon Town in 1987.

Following a disappointing second season with the Gills, when they finished mid-table, Pearce returned to hometown club Brentford where he played 14 times (+ 8 as sub) in Steve Perryman’s 1988-89 side. One of his teammates was fellow former Albion cup star Smillie.

Pearce joined up with Peacock again for Maidstone United’s debut season (1989-90) in the Fourth Division, which culminated in a play-off semi-final defeat at the hands of a Cambridge United side featuring Dion Dublin up front.

The following season, under Phil Holder, Pearce was back at Brentford as first team and reserve coach. He subsequently had spells as player-manager with Isthmian League clubs Enfield and Molesey. He later became a PE teacher at Homefield Preparatory School in Sutton.

Born in Hammersmith on 8 July 1959, Pearce was one of seven children (five boys, two girls) and attended Grove Park Primary School, where he was captain of their under-9 football side. He went on to play for the Middlesex County side and Middlesex Wanderers before his stop-start professional career began.

• Pictures from my scrapbook and matchday programmes.