THE KIWI who Brighton & Hove Albion nurtured as a teenager went on to find his goalscoring feet in the Premier League although a big money move to Newcastle United didn’t quite pan out as he wanted.
Chris Wood found his chances limited on Tyneside after the Toon took him from Burnley for £25m in January 2022.
More than a decade earlier, while on loan from parent club West Bromwich Albion, Wood proved a handful for League One defences playing alongside Glenn Murray and Ashley Barnes as Brighton topped the division.
Wood uses his height to Albion’s advantage
The young New Zealander played 31 matches (24 starts + seven as a sub) and scored nine goals as the Seagulls, under Gus Poyet, won promotion from the third tier.
The contribution he made then was covered in my August 2021 blog post and over several years since he has gone on to play for various clubs and often managed to score against the Seagulls.
Young Wood netting penalties for Brighton against Rochdale (left) and Tranmere
He netted twice against the Seagulls in December 2012, when on loan at Millwall, and Poyet sang his praises to the media, declaring: “He is the kind of player we would like to bring in. He’s only 21 and I feel he will be a top, top player.
“When he was with us on loan, he was a baby but now he is maturing. He’s a man now. He’s clinical and brave and we have played a part in helping him on his way.”
Wood celebrates another Brighton goal
Born in Auckland on 7 December 1991, Wood played for New Zealand youth team Onehunga Sports then Cambridge (2003-06), Hamilton Wanderers (2007) and Waikato (2007-08) before moving to the UK at 17, starting out at West Bromwich Albion when Tony Mowbray was boss.
The Birmingham Mail discovered it was Wood’s English mother, Julie, who made sure it was football and not rugby that Wood took up.
“Football was always my passion,” he told the newspaper. “People tried to get me to play rugby because of my size but my mum wouldn’t let me. She was worried I would get hurt.
“I was about 13 or 14 when I decided I wanted to make football my career. I thought ‘this is what I want to do for the rest of my life’. “
Roger Wilkinson, who had become a coach at West Brom, coached him for two years in New Zealand and set up a trial for him.
“I came over and they liked what they saw and offered me the scholarship,” said Wood.
Brighton were the second of six clubs he joined on loan while under contract to the Baggies. He’d been at Barnsley in 2010 and after leaving the Seagulls he had spells at Birmingham City, Bristol City, Millwall and Leicester City, who signed him on a permanent basis in 2013.
Apart from a handful of Premier League outings for Leicester, Wood had seven seasons playing Championship football, including a loan spell at Ipswich and two seasons at Leeds.
It was only when he switched to Burnley for a then record fee said to be £15m that he became a Premier League regular, scoring an impressive 53 goals in 165 appearances for the Clarets.
With top scorer Callum Wilson ruled out for eight weeks with a calf injury in January 2022, Newcastle triggered a release clause in 30-year-old Wood’s contract and paid out £25m to take him to the north east.
It was considered a masterstroke by Eddie Howe because the move helped to blunt relegation rival Burnley’s striking options and, sure enough, Newcastle finished 11th and the Clarets were relegated.
Wood made 15 starts for Toon plus two as a sub in that period but the following season only started four games and had to be content with involvement from the bench on 14 occasions with the fit-again Wilson and Alexander Isak ahead of him in the pecking order.
Wood takes instructions from Eddie Howe before going on as a sub for Newcastle
Even so, the player told chroniclelive.co.uk: “I’m at a club with a great squad and a great team. You are always going to have competition at a big club and that’s exactly what we’ve got.
“We have some great strikers here. I’ve just got to keep trying to push and work hard and see if I can break my way into the team. I know I also have to take my chance when it comes my way.”
Interviewed in December 2022 by Lee Ryder, Wood told chroniclelive.co.uk: “I still believe I have a big part to play here. I have not shown my best football here yet but hopefully I can do that given the chance.
“If not, I am here to support the club and push them in the right direction. I am committed here and want to be here. Whatever capacity it is, I want to be here and help the manager.
“If it’s five minutes and seeing a game out, I am here to do it, work hard and press. If it’s starting the game, scoring goals and working hard, I’m here to do that. My future is definitely here.”
But before January was out, with the promise of more game time, he switched to Nottingham Forest, on loan initially and then permanently. In a February 2025 article in FourFourTwo magazine, he said: “It all came around very quickly.
“Forest needed a striker and I wasn’t playing at Newcastle; Alexander Isak is a brilliant player and he was coming into his own, showing his quality. You could see it when he arrived. I spoke to Eddie and he said, ‘At the moment, it seems you’re going to be third choice.’
“I thanked him for being honest and open. I said ‘I’ve received this opportunity – would it be possible?’ He said, ‘If that’s what you want to do, we can work it out.’ I really appreciated his honesty.”
Wood also told Sky Sports: “I could see the project that Newcastle were trying to build. It was an opportunity to elevate my game and potentially take me to the next step if I went in there and scored goals and done well.
“It didn’t work out perfectly, but it worked out well. We stayed up, done extremely well and then we got Champions League the next year. I’m happy to be a part of that and the rebuild of Newcastle, and where they have gone on to is fantastic.”
Rather like he’d done against Brighton, Wood returned to haunt Newcastle on Boxing Day 2023 when he scored a hat-trick for Forest at St James’ Park in a 3-1 win.
Wood was Forest’s main goal threat in the 2023-24 and 2024-25 seasons but that firepower has been missed in 2025-26 with him spending six months of the season out of action with a knee injury that required surgery.
Ashley Barnes and Chris Wood celebrate Brighton’s promotion from League One
LEVI COLWILL had a turbulent beginning to his season-long loan at Brighton but emerged grateful for the experience which developed his undoubted talent as a ball-playing defender.
After only one training session with his Albion teammates, the Chelsea loanee was sent on as a sub in the dying minutes of the 2022-23 season opening day 2-1 win against Manchester United at Old Trafford.
“It was a surreal experience,” he said. “I wasn’t expecting to come on because I had just arrived, I wouldn’t have put me on if I was the manager!”
That manager was Graham Potter of who Colwill said: “Graham has watched me play, so he knows what I am about. I have watched Brighton quite a few times so I know how they like to approach games. I understand the football.
“It suits me and compliments how I play. The gaffer said to me ‘Come in and play your own game and you’ll be fine’. I trust him and that’s a big reason why I came here.”
Colwill picks up his Albion shirt
However, within a few short weeks, there was a new man calling the shots and the young defender initially found it difficult to work with him.
Colwill admitted in one interview: “We didn’t get on at first. He broke me, broke my character. But then he built me up again and he’s like a father figure to me now. He’s amazing.”
In an interview with Andy Naylor of The Athletic, he explained: “It’s been tough because he (De Zerbi) plays a lot different to what I’ve been used to. But he’s a great manager, the way he plays will help everyone in the team look so good. I’m happy to play under him.
“As a centre-half, he expects a lot more from you, taking time on the ball, finding the right pass, being in control of the game. It’s a lot different, for example, to when Graham was here. It’s more pass, pass. But you’ve got to learn. It’s only going to help me when I’m older.”
After making his first Premier League start in a home defeat to Aston Villa, Colwill confessed:
“It’s been tough so far, but I’ve enjoyed every minute. The tough aspect has been learning new playing styles, a new manager coming in, things like that. But it’s going to help me in the future so I can’t complain.
“Once you get your head around how the new manager wants to play, it helps you understand why he does it and how it works. You’ve got to respect it.”
Colwill was also grateful to skipper Lewis Dunk, saying in a matchday programme interview: “Dunky guides me every day and he’s always giving me advice, both on and off the pitch. His presence alone helps me so much, playing alongside him.”
He added: “In games you get to see just how good he is and all the attributes he has. He should have definitely played for England a few more times because he’s a great player.”
After making 17 starts and five sub appearances as Albion finished in their highest-ever sixth spot in the Premier League, Colwill reflected in a BBC Sport interview: “It was an amazing year. I learnt so much as a player, a man.
“It was tough for me every single day but I I’m so happy for everything I went through. Ups and downs, I’ve learnt so much as a person and a player and I’m just grateful for that opportunity.”
He said playing under De Zerbi was different to most other managers he’d played under.
“It was perfect for me because you’re on the ball,” he explained. “As a defender, you start the attack and that’s what I want to be seen as and I really enjoyed it.
“He definitely gives you confidence all the time. He’s always telling you how good a player you are, but when you step on that pitch you’re just like everyone else, no matter how good you are.
“He’s there to make you work, for that hour or two hours you are on the pitch. You’re there to work and learn. He wants the best. He’s a perfectionist and I think that’s why Brighton did so well last season.”
De Zerbi was a great admirer of the England under 21 international, explaining: “Levi is a left-footer and it is an important quality for us because with Levi we can find different line passes, different solutions in the build-up, in the last 40 metres.”
Sadly, Albion’s qualification for European football wasn’t enough to tempt Colwill to stay and he returned to Chelsea and signed a new six-year contract. Before long, he followed up his Euro Under 21 Championship success with young England that summer with a full England cap, making his debut in a friendly against Australia that October.
Two months later, Colwill scored his first Chelsea goal …against Brighton! Although Conor Gallagher saw red that day, the 10-man home side held out to win 3-2 at Stamford Bridge. Albion’s two goals came from players who also went on to wear Chelsea blue: Facundo Buonanotte and Joao Pedro!
Born in Southampton on 26 February 2003, by his own admission in a July 2025 interview with The Athletic, he said: “Football is all I know. I grew up as an underprivileged kid.”
It has prompted him to put money into Southern League Premier South side Sholing FC, who he used to watch as a youngster. “I came to Sholing FC games and enjoyed them,” he told Simon Johnson. “It made me happy and made me want to become a footballer.
Interviewed at a pre-season game between Sholing and a team of Chelsea youngsters, he said: “It’s not just about Sholing FC. I want to help as many underprivileged kids as possible.
“If I can help bring a load of kids to come down to an event like this, to enjoy being here, to fall in love with the game, that can change their lives. They can perhaps do something else rather than being on the streets. That’s the main reason.”
He continued: “I also did something when I was on holiday in Trinidad. I organised a training session out there with some kids who were all from my grandma’s local area.
“My nan flew out with me. A few hundred people turned up. We bought the goals and so on out of my back pocket, just to give them something else to enjoy. Doing this drives me. I want to leave a legacy and have people be proud of me.”
The eight-year-old Colwill was playing for Sunday team City Central FC alongside Jamal Musiala (now at Bayern Munich) when the pair were picked up by Chelsea. “He was definitely one of my best friends,” Colwill told goal.com. “We went up together for our Chelsea trial. We have just done everything together.
“We keep in touch still now and he is a good mate. It is amazing to see what he has achieved so far.”
Colwill worked his way through the different age groups at Chelsea and signed his first professional contract aged 17. He spent the 2021-22 season on loan to Huddersfield Town in the Championship and was unlucky enough to score an own goal – the only goal of the game – as the Terriers lost to Nottingham Forest in the play-off final at Wembley.
Having played 75 Premier League games for Chelsea and helped them qualify for the 2025-26 Champions League, he played in the FIFA Club World Cup in America in the summer of 2025 when Chelsea beat PSG 3-0 in the final.
But the following month, his knee gave way towards the end of Chelsea’s first pre-season training session at Cobham and a scan confirmed he had torn his anterior cruciate ligament, which ruled him out for seven months of the 2025-26 season. At the time of writing, although he had resumed training, no date had been set for him to return to first team action.
Writing about the setback for The Athletic, Liam Twomey said: “Colwill’s unflappable assurance was critical to the team’s success in playing out from the back through intense pressure.
“Put together, it is a rare, coveted skill set for a centre-back, which is why Liverpool and Brighton & Hove Albion tried hard to prise Colwill away from Stamford Bridge in the weeks before he signed a new long-term contract in the summer of 2023.
“It is also why Chelsea rebuffed all advances and always insisted they considered him untouchable, as he has been ever since.”
GERRY ARMSTRONG was a raw youngster not long over from Ireland when he was part of a Spurs team relegated from the top division.
“We were playing poorly. People kept telling us we were too good to go down but what a load of rubbish that was. You don’t want to believe that sort of nonsense,” Armstrong told Neale Harvey in a tottenhamhotspur.com interview.
“We started thinking they were right but you had to earn the right to stay up and we lost too many games, simple as that.”
It was 49 years ago when Armstrong suffered that fate, and Spurs bounced straight back courtesy of a mightily convenient last day 0-0 draw at second-placed Southampton (Brighton finished on the same number of points but were edged into fourth spot on goal difference).
Eight years later, Armstrong, fresh from playing for Northern Ireland at the 1986 World Cup in Mexico, joined Brighton during Alan Mullery’s unhappy second spell in charge, and endured a turbulent season.
He went 17 games before scoring, joined Millwall on loan when Mullery was unceremoniously shown the door in January 1987, and was then recalled by new manager Barry Lloyd for the final eight games of the season. He only managed one goal (in a home 1-1 draw with Plymouth) to add to the three he scored earlier in the season, and he experienced relegation again, this time from second to third tier, as Albion finished bottom of the league.
Like Spurs, Albion bounced straight back up but by then Armstrong’s involvement was as a perennial substitute (in the days of two subs). In 1987-88, with Kevin Bremner and Garry Nelson on fire up front, he started one League Cup game early in the season and was a sub on no fewer than 25 occasions, only getting off the bench 11 times.
Albion’s Armstrong gets stuck in at Chesterfield, one of his former clubs
He scored twice, once on the last day of August, when he scored away at Northampton after going on as a sub for John Crumplin and, six months later, he went on for the injured Kevan Brown and netted the only goal of the game in extra time as Albion beat Hereford United in an away Sherpa Van Trophy tie.
Chances of a starting berth in the 1988-89 season were limited because Bremner, Nelson and Paul Wood were regulars, but Armstrong managed four starts and went on three of the seven times he was a sub.
He was eventually appointed reserve team player-coach but his time with the club ended ignominiously. Playing for the reserves in a Sussex Senior Cup tie at Southwick in January 1989, he was shown a red card and, as he walked off, he took exception to a comment from a supporter, jumped into the crowd and headbutted the person concerned.
Armstrong left the club a fortnight after the altercation but the matter ended up in court and the footballer received a conditional discharge.
It wasn’t the first time the red mist had descended, though, as Armstrong explained in an interview with Lionel Birnie for watfordlegends.com. He originally played Gaelic football for St John’s GAC and the Antrim senior team.
“I only started playing soccer at 17. I’d played Gaelic football and hurling. I got suspended for an altercation in Gaelic,” he said. “It’s an amazing game but fights used to break out all over the pitch. It was fun, I loved it but it was a very confrontational game.
“There was an incident where I broke a guy’s jaw in several places and got suspended. I didn’t mean to break it but I caught him one.”
It was while he was suspended from playing Gaelic football that he was picked up by Bangor and in no time at all he found trouble in football too.
“I made my debut for Bangor, came on as a sub with 20 minutes to go, got sent off with 10 minutes to go for whacking the centre- half,” Armstrong told Birnie. “I went past him and put the ball in the net to make it 2-1 and he said, ‘Next time you do that I’m going to do you.’
“When he said he was going to do me, I decided to do him first and I whacked him. The manager, Bertie Neill, gave me a bollocking. He chewed a couple of strips off me and I learned that soccer wasn’t a fighting game.”
It was another three years before he signed for Spurs and, by his own admission, “a load of clubs came to watch me but no one took me on because I was very inconsistent, still learning about the game, really didn’t get to grips with the offside”.
The Gaelic game helped him build stamina and strength and soccer made him sharper. After Bangor won some trophies, Spurs invited him for a week’s trial and he told Harvey: “I thought I did okay but I heard nothing for weeks.
“Arsenal were trying to sign me but, out of the blue, Terry (Neill) came over (in November 1975) and signed me on a one-year contract, with a one-year option. It was an opportunity I couldn’t turn down.
“I was overawed. I’d never been to London before, so it was like ‘Paddy’ coming to the big city and being lost. But all the lads were great and there were a lot of Irish boys, like Chris McGrath, Noel Brotherston and, of course, the legendary Pat Jennings.”
Armstrong was a late starter at 21 but he lapped it all up, enjoying training and working on his ball skills in the gym in the afternoons with Peter Shreeves. After six months, he broke into the first team.
Armstrong in Spurs action against Nottingham Forest’s John McGovern
He made his debut on the opening day of the 1976-77 season, in a 3-1 defeat at Ipswich and lost his place after only three matches. He was restored to the first team in February for the final 18 games but Spurs slid all the way to relegation.
Armstrong reckoned with hindsight that it was a five-week pre-season tour that took its toll on the squad. They travelled to Canada, USA, Hawaii, Fiji, New Zealand, Australia and India and, he said: “When I got back, I was absolutely knackered. But we only had 10-12 days to recuperate before pre-season began.”
After Neill left for Arsenal, his replacement, Keith Burkinshaw, often played Armstrong as a central defender having liked what he saw in a pre-season game.
Armstrong told Birnie: “He wanted me to play there because I was quick, strong, good in the air. It was nice in one sense but I didn’t want to play at centre half, I wanted to be up front where the action is.” Even so, he also played at right-back, in midfield and wide on the right.
Brighton fans of a certain vintage remember all too painfully how Spurs managed to gain promotion on the last day of the season.
Armstrong recalled: “We nearly lost it three games from the end when we lost 3-2 at home to Sunderland after I made a mistake playing at centre-half. But then we beat Hull and went to Southampton needing a point.
“It was tense, obviously, but they needed a point as well and it was one of those games where nobody really tried to push on because of the fear factor. We got our point and went off to Cornwall for four days to celebrate!”
For a while, Armstrong and Chris Jones were a forward pairing for Spurs but he admitted that neither of them scored enough goals and the beginning of the end for both of them came when Tottenham bought Steve Archibald for a million and Garth Crooks for £650,000.
Armstrong dropped down a division to join Watford in November 1980 for a £250,000 fee – at the time, a record sale for Spurs, and a record buy for the Hornets. He signed in the same week that Graham Taylor also signed Armstrong’s fellow countryman Pat Rice from Arsenal.
He was part of their promotion-winning squad of 1981-82 and said: “Graham Taylor taught me so much about movement and he took my level of fitness up another notch.
“I was fit and strong but I hadn’t tapped into all my resources. The two years at Watford prior are one of the reasons I had such a good World Cup [in 1982].”
Indeed, it was his winning goal for Northern Ireland against Spain at the 1982 World Cup that he is most remembered for and Armstrong later told The Argus: “If I had to pick one moment in football to relive again it would be that. It would be the highpoint of any player’s career to perform in the World Cup finals. But to score the winning goal against the home nation would be a dream. It was for me.”
In an interview with Andrew French of the Watford Observer, he recalled: “The goal came early in the second half. I was playing as a right-sided midfield player, and I won the ball off the Spanish left-back Gordillo.
“I went on a run for about 60 yards, went past a couple of players – I remember Xavi Alonso’s father, Joaquin, tried to clip my heels – but I then played the ball out wide to Billy Hamilton and kept my run going.
“Billy put in a great cross which the keeper, Luis Arconada, came for and palmed straight out to me. I was about 12 yards out and I just got my head and my knee over the ball and hammered it as hard as I could, and it hit the back of the net.
“It was actually a funny one as the ground went silent because the Spaniards weren’t going to celebrate, and the South American referee had been so poor and given us nothing. I was worried and I remember thinking ‘why isn’t anybody cheering?’
“But then I saw Norman Whiteside and Sammy McIlroy throwing their hands in the air, and then I looked at the ref and he was pointing to the centre. Once I knew he’d given the goal, that’s when the celebrations started.”
Armstrong had already netted in a 1-1 draw with Honduras and in the next round he scored in Ireland’s 4-1 defeat against France (pictured above); those goals were enough to earn him a golden boot (right) for best British Player of the Tournament.
On his return to the UK, he was back in the top flight but was sidelined for several weeks with a broken ankle sustained when he fell awkwardly in a reserves match. Towards the end of the season, Real Mallorca bid £200,000 for him and he spent two seasons playing in the Spanish league.
Armstrong told Birnie: “I didn’t want to leave. It was a case of Mallorca coming in. It was 200 grand so the club would get almost all their money back on me after three years, which was not a bad deal at all.
“When you go to talk to them and see the money they are going to offer and you realise the tax situation is very different there suddenly it is very attractive. You realise you can make in two years at Mallorca what you could make in six or seven years at Watford or any other English club.
“There was a challenge in Spain, playing in a different country, learning a different language and it did appeal to me in ways other than the money. I was 30, 31, so I thought I’d give it a go because I knew the opportunity would probably not come up again.”
The experience served him well because after his playing days were over he was a TV co-commentator on Spanish football.
In that respect, Armstrong’s typically Irish gift of the gab long made him an ideal pundit for broadcasters and a journalist’s dream interviewee: tales from his playing days have filled plenty of columns and air time over a good many years, and in 2021 Curtis Sport published his autobiography, Gerry Armstrong: My Story, My Journey.
Born in the County Tyrone village of Fintona on 23 May 1954, Armstrong was a teenager in Belfast at the height of Northern Ireland’s sectarian and political conflict. “There were bombs going off, paramilitaries burning buses and it was a horrific time,” he said.
“At times it felt as if you were living in a movie set, but it was real life. The book isn’t just about the highs, it also paints a picture of what it was like growing up back then.”
Armstrong won 63 caps for Northern Ireland and scored 12 goals, making his debut in 1977 at the age of 22 alongside George Best and Pat Jennings in a 5-0 friendly defeat to West Germany in Cologne.
His first two international goals were scored in a 3-0 World Cup qualifying win over Belgium at Windsor Park seven months later.
Without a doubt, though, 1982 was when he was at the pinnacle of his career. While he’ll forever be remembered for the winner against Spain, he also fondly remembered scoring against Portugal and Israel in qualifying.
“We had to beat Portugal at Windsor Park and we only got one chance that night. Terry Cochrane crossed and I managed to head it into the roof of the night,” he said.
“That win set us up and it then came down to the last game at home to Israel which we had to win to reach Spain. I managed to score the winner and the noise was unbelievable.
“There were 43,500 people inside Windsor. It was only supposed to hold 40,000, so I don’t know how everyone got in. But that’s one of a lot of very special memories.”
By the time of the 1986 World Cup, Armstrong had been in a bit of limbo. He’d returned to the UK the previous August and signed for West Brom on a free transfer but he struggled with travelling to and from London to train and play, didn’t see eye to eye with manager Ron Saunders, and picked up some injuries.
It was former Spurs teammate John Duncan who rode to his rescue. Duncan was in charge of Division Three Chesterfield and he took Armstrong on loan and then signed him permanently, giving him a dozen games, which were enough to put him in contention to be selected by Northern Ireland for the upcoming World Cup in Mexico.
Billy Bingham’s side didn’t make it past the group stage (drawing 1-1 with Algeria; losing 2-1 to Spain and 3-0 to Brazil) and Armstrong only saw action as a 71st minute sub in the Brazil game. Albion winger Steve Penney started the first two matches and was subbed off in each.
It was while Armstrong was away with the Irish squad that Mullery made contact with an offer for the following season.
Although Brighton was the last professional English club Armstrong played for, he lived in the area for several years afterwards. His second wife, Caron, came from Brighton and although his final games as a player were at Glenavon, back in Ireland, he spent some time as a player-coach at Crawley Town, who were in the Beazer Homes League at the time.
In November 1991, he became manager of Worthing and led them to a promotion before being appointed assistant manager of Northern Ireland by his former teammate Bryan Hamilton. He reprised that role for two years under Lawrie Sanchez between 2004 and 2006.
PINT-SIZED Scouser Eric Potts went from a flying owl to a soaring seagull back in the 1970s.
Ginger-headed Potts caught the eye in more ways than one and, after he’d put in a man-of-the-match performance for Sheffield Wednesday against Brighton, he earned a £14,000 move to the Goldstone Ground.
He joined Alan Mullery’s newly-promoted Seagulls in the summer of 1977 but after three months lost his starting berth to Tony Towner and went on to earn the reputation of a goalscoring supersub during his one season with the Albion.
Potts (12) wheels away after his late goal v Sunderland
In one game at home to Sunderland, he went on for left-back Gary Williams with Albion trailing 1-0 and hit two goals in the last two minutes to turn the match in Brighton’s favour.
Potts moved back to his native north west, initially to Preston, before becoming a Third Division promotion winner with Burnley.
In 1977, though, football magazine Shoot! hailed Potts’ “astute” signing for the Albion in glowing terms, saying: “Potts’ will-of-the-wisp skill has electrified many crowds and will quickly win over Brighton supporters.
“An exciting individualist, his darting runs and ninety-minute wholeheartedness will undoubtedly set the terraces buzzing at his new club just as he did many times in the seven years he was with Wednesday.”
Potts had impressed when Wednesday visited the Goldstone for the last game of the season on 3 May 1977 when a crowd of 30,756 saw Albion edge a cracking match 3-2 to clinch promotion from Division 3. The next month, he was making the journey for a longer stay.
“When I met Alan Mullery and the chairman and vice-chairman of the club in June their attitude to the game was impressive enough for me to want to sign for them…they didn’t have to ‘sell; the potential of the club to me,” Potts told the magazine.
“I have played against Brighton twice and they seem to have the right blend of players. The motivation from Mullery makes their chances of success that much greater and I know I can do a good job for them.”
Somewhat ironically in view of how the season panned out, Potts declared: “I want to go places…not sit on the substitutes’ bench like I did eight times in the Third Division last season. The First is my aim and that’s the reason I’m delighted to be joining Brighton.”
Potts’ popularity at Hillsborough saw him become the first Wednesday player to be named Player of the Year twice (1974-75 and 1975-76) and the move to Brighton took him back to the second tier, a level at which he’d played under two different Owls managers, Derek Dooley and former Albion player Steve Burtenshaw.
The season began well enough for him as he lined up in the no. 7 shirt for the first 21 matches of the season. But home-grown winger Towner came back into contention in November and took over the shirt, meaning Potts had to resort to that familiar place on the bench.
He had only five more starts in the rest of the season, but, in the days of only one sub, went on 15 times between December and April and scored goals in three of them (including that double against the Black Cats).
As the history books have recorded, Albion narrowly missed out on a second successive promotion in 1978 and Potts’ short stay in the south was over. Brighton returned a decent return on their investment by selling the winger to Preston North End for £37,000.
Potts spent two seasons at Deepdale under former England World Cup winner Nobby Stiles but he switched to Lancashire rivals Burnley, then in Division Three, for £20,000.
He was a regular in Brian Miller’s side throughout the 1980-81 season, featuring in 37 games plus one as a sub, and chipping in with five goals, as the Clarets finished in eighth spot.
The team improved markedly the following campaign to earn promotion as champions but Potts had lost his place as a starter to an emerging future England international, Trevor Steven.
Nevertheless, his 21 appearances plus eight as a sub were enough to earn him a championship medal which he was presented with ahead of a pre-season friendly the next season after he’d already moved on again, this time to Bury, where he ended his career.
Born in Liverpool on 16 March 1950, part of Potts’ schooldays were spent at Anfield Comprehensive School, a stone’s throw from the home of Liverpool FC.
But it was at Blackpool FC where he began his football journey, starting out as an amateur.
When he wasn’t offered pro terms, he went into non-league football with New Brighton and Oswestry Town. His form at Oswestry attracted Wednesday who bought him for £5,000.
He made his debut for Wednesday in October 1970 but didn’t establish himself in the first team until towards the end of the 1972-73 season.
By the time he left for Brighton, he had scored 21 goals in 159 appearances for the Owls.
Potts returned to the non-league scene after he left Bury, turning out for Witton Albion and Clitheroe, and, after he’d hung up his boots, earned a living as a taxi driver.
Both his sons followed in his footballing footsteps: eldest Colin was initially with Preston but played all his first team football in non-league.
The youngest, Michael, started as a schoolboy with Manchester United, before moving on to become a member of the Blackburn Rovers team that reached the semi-final of the FA Youth Cup in 2008-09.
Released in 2011, he signed for York City in the summer of that year at the age of 19 and on the opening day of the 2012-13 season, as a substitute, he made his Football League debut for York in a 3-1 home defeat against Wycombe. He subsequently played for various non-league sides.
Potts looks on as Peter Ward challengesPotts wins a tussle with Kenny Sansom at Crystal Palace
In parallel lines 