Gary Williams knew where the goal was – even from left back

A CARTILAGE operation when he was just 17 changed Gary Williams’ career, but, after success at Brighton, it eventually brought his playing days to a premature end at Crystal Palace.

Originally a winger, the operation, when he was an emerging player at Preston North End, took the edge of his pace and led to him converting into an overlapping left back.

Thankfully, as Brighton fans would witness, his ability to score important goals never left him.

Born in Litherland, Liverpool, on 8 March 1954, Gary Peter Williams had unsuccesful trials with Liverpool and Coventry City before starting his career with non-league Marine. He caught the eye of a scout who’d gone to watch a different player and ended up signing for Preston in April 1972.

Williams made his Preston debut in the final game of the 1971-72 season as Preston drew 2-2 at home to Swindon.

He then played in the opening match of the following season, against Aston Villa, but had to wait until the end of March at Brighton for his next appearance.

After his cartilage op, and just when he thought he was set to be released aged 18, Preston’s reserve team left-back got injured, Williams filled in, did a good job, and it was the platform he needed to launch his career.

“Because I used to be a winger, I knew which way to shepherd them to make it difficult to cut inside,” he told the journalist and author Spencer Vignes in his 2005 book, A Few Good Men.

It was the legendary Bobby Charlton, briefly trying out management at North End, who gave Williams his big break into first team football, selecting him at left back for the final eight games of the 1974-75 season.

Young Gary Williams with former England World Cup winner, Nobby Stiles, at Preston, and scoring the winner at Sunderland.

Former Everton boss Harry Catterick took over from Charlton and made Williams the first choice left back in 1975-76. The following season his outstanding performances earned him the Player of the Season award and on 22 March 1977, he made his 100^th league appearance in a 1-0 defeat at Selhurst Park.

By then, Williams was catching the eye of clubs higher up the league and his final game for Preston was the season-ending fixture at Shrewsbury on 14 May, which North End won 2-1.

In July 1977, Preston accepted a £45,000 fee from Brighton to sign Williams shortly after his teammate Mark Lawrenson joined for £100,000. Albion’s Graham Cross and Harry Wilson moved in the opposite direction to fill the positions they’d vacated.

Williams told Vignes how he’d always enjoyed playing against Brighton because of the size of the crowds they got.

“To run out in Division 3 at the Goldstone in front of a full house was amazing. You knew you were in for a hard time but the atmosphere was just infectious,” he said.

Manager Alan Mullery had called him and asked him to get himself down to Brighton and the club booked a room in the Metropole Hotel, the sea view helping to make up his mind about the move.

“I wanted to better myself and get into the First Division but football is such an up and down game that it’s not too wise to look too far ahead,” Williams told Football Weekly News magazine in 1980.

The start to his Albion career was somewhat inauspicious. Although he came on as a substitute in the opening game, a league cup tie away to Cambridge United which finished 0-0, injury then prevented him making his league debut for two months.

It finally came in a 2-0 win away to Sunderland on 1 October 1977 and he then missed only one game through to the end of the season, appearing a total of 34 times as the Seagulls finished fourth, missing promotion on goal difference to Tottenham.

The following season saw Williams play every game, scoring twice, as Brighton were runners-up to Palace gaining promotion to Division One for the first time.

In Albion’s first season amongst the elite, Williams was again ever present – indeed, he remarkably played 146 consecutive games during his time at the club.

The Everton-supporting full-back got the chance to play against his boyhood side in December 1979 and three months later he scored the first of two cracking, memorable Brighton goals in the top division as the Seagulls finished in 16th position.

On 29 March 1980, at the Goldstone, he lashed a shot from 30 yards that flew past England goalkeeper Peter Shilton to earn Albion the double over European Cup holders Nottingham Forest.

Williams beats Nottingham Forest full back Viv Anderson at the Goldstone and, together with Gary Stevens, tries to thwart Liverpool’s Kenny Dalglish.

Williams admits he was about to pass it until skipper Brian Horton urged him to ‘hit the ****ing thing!’

“When you hit the ball that sweetly, you don’t even really feel a thing,” he recounted to Vignes, in that 2005 interview. “By the time I looked up, it was heading for the top corner.”

Although Forest boss Brian Clough declared it a fluke in a post-match interview, because the game took place in front of the TV cameras, it was selected as one of the goals of the season.

Thirteen months after that goal, Williams struck another beauty, this time to silence the Sunderland faithful at Roker Park.

It clinched Albion a 2-1 win and was part of a late flurry of good results which saw the Seagulls escape the clutches of relegation.

Describing it to Vignes, he said: “It was our last attack of the game. Gordon Smith knocks a good ball into the penalty area and I’ve just taken a gamble and gone up from the halfway line. I say so myself but it was a really good volley.

“It fell to me around 10 yards out and you hear the net ripple because the crowd went silent.”

While it contributed to Albion staying up, that summer saw the departure of Mullery, Lawrenson and Horton and the arrival of Mike Bailey into the manager’s chair. It was to signal the end of Williams’ Brighton career.

Bailey favoured a far more defensive approach to his predecessor and brought in the experienced Northern Ireland international Sammy Nelson, who had been displaced at Arsenal by the arrival of Kenny Sansom.

Williams only learned about the signing through The Argus and, when he confronted the manager about it, was told Nelson was only going to be a squad player.

“I’m thinking ‘bollocks’ but he didn’t play him straightaway,” Williams recounted. “He couldn’t drop me because I wasn’t doing anything wrong.”

Ironically, however, he lost his place after bombing forward and scoring in a 4-1 win over Manchester City. Astonishingly, Bailey was annoyed that he had been too adventurous!

With Nelson keen to carry on playing and earn a place in Northern Ireland’s 1982 World Cup squad, it meant Williams was left to languish in the reserves.

By the end of the season, though, Mullery, by now manager of Crystal Palace, came to Willams’ rescue and gave him a chance to resume first team football.

In a swap deal that saw winger Neil Smillie arrive at the Goldstone, Williams moved to Selhurst.

But after only 10 games he was forced to have an operation on his troublesome knee. Expert advice steered him towards a painful decision but he took it and retired from the game aged just 29.

Williams told the Argus: “The trouble with my knee is really wear and tear. I had a cartilage out at 17, and I was told after the operation last October a lot of harm might be caused if I went on playing.”

In A Few Good Men, Vignes gained a great insight into a northern lad who fell in love with the Albion and remains a fan to this day.

“I was very lucky in that I played right at the beginning of the era of overlapping full-backs,” Williams told him. “It was beginning to creep in when I first came onto the scene, and I had an advantage as I’d started my career as a left-winger. I knew all about coming forward.”

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Mis-firing Mick Ferguson couldn’t repeat goalscoring prowess for Everton or Brighton

MICK FERGUSON was a prolific goalscorer for Coventry City but the goals dried up in spells with Everton and Brighton & Hove Albion.

Ferguson’s arrival at the Goldstone in the early autumn of 1984 was certainly not amid a great fanfare. The Albion, under new chairman Bryan Bedson, were wrestling with debt and, to bring in some much-needed funds, sold striker Alan Young to Notts County for £50,000 and full-back Mark Jones to Birmingham for £30,000.

Needing a cut-price replacement for Young, and with Ferguson unwanted at Birmingham having been responsible for getting them relegated (see below), he came to the Goldstone as part of the deal that took Jones to St Andrews.

In modern-day football, loan players don’t generally play against their parent clubs but, amazingly, at the end of the previous season, Ferguson was allowed to play against Birmingham while on loan at his old club Coventry, and ended up scoring a goal that kept the Sky Blues in the top division but sent Birmingham down.

It was such an unusual saga that as recently as May 2017, the Guardian revisited the tale, catching up with Ferguson to explain the circumstances.

As the article explains, shortly before the player’s 30th birthday, manager Ron Saunders offloaded him to Brighton, where the manager was Ferguson’s former Coventry teammate, Chris Cattlin. Just to prolong Saunders’ agony, Ferguson made his Seagulls debut in a 2-0 home win… over Birmingham! This time he didn’t score. And, for Brighton, that state of affairs existed for several months.

I remember his second game quite vividly. It was a midweek league cup tie away to Fourth Division Aldershot and I went to the game with my pal Colin Snowball, who at that time was living in nearby Bagshot. There wasn’t anything subtle about Albion’s tactics that night. Goalkeeper Graham Moseley would kick the ball long for Ferguson to get on the end of it.

But, as the striker tried to lay it off, all he succeeded in doing was heading it into touch – repeatedly. The new signing did not impress! Despite their superior status in the league, Albion succumbed 3-0 in what was a pretty humiliating exit. Ferguson was remarkably selected for the following Saturday’s game, an away defeat to Oxford, after which he was omitted for four games. Cattlin gave him another chance with a four-game spell but still the dismal form continued and he didn’t get another look-in for four months.

Freelance journalist Spencer Vignes did a retrospective article about Ferguson for the Albion matchday programme and discovered the striker didn’t have a high opinion of his former playing colleague. “Several of the players just didn’t get along with him, and I was one of them,” he said. “His man-management skills left a lot to be desired. As a manager you need to have the players on-side. Chris certainly didn’t have us on-side.”

Ferguson admitted to being frustrated by Cattlin chopping and changing the side and said there were times he turned out when only 80 per cent fit, which didn’t do justice to himself, the team or the supporters. “My ankles weren’t great and towards the end I did struggle with my back, but I felt when I was fit I could certainly do a good job.”

The striker felt with the ability in the squad at the time they should have achieved more but pointed the finger at Cattlin for it not happening. “Some people aren’t cut out for management and I don’t think Chris was. It doesn’t surprise me that he never worked as a manager again.”

The history books (many thanks to Tim Carder and Roger Harris) recall him as the goalscorer in a 1-1 draw away to Portsmouth on 6 April 1986 but, having been to that game too, I seem to recall it was a rather desperate claim for what looked more like an own goal by Noel Blake.

The start of the following season saw the arrival of former £1m striker Justin Fashanu from Notts County and Dean Saunders, a free transfer from Swansea City, so Ferguson’s prospects of a starting place looked bleak.

However, the 1985-86 season was not very old before Cattlin had a striker crisis on his hands. Gerry Ryan was out long-term with the horrific leg break from which he never recovered, Terry Connor and summer signing Fashanu were also sidelined with injury and a big man was needed to play alongside Alan Biley.

Cattlin had little choice but to bring back the previously mis-firing Ferguson, and to everyone’s surprise and delight his goal touch returned, albeit briefly.

“I was virtually forced into the team through injury,” Ferguson admitted in a matchday programme interview. “But, fortunately, things turned out quite well. It was nice to get a goal against Blackburn in my first match back. That seemed to pave the way.”

The programme article had tried to give some perspective to the dismal form when he had first arrived. It said: “Mick’s confidence was affected by his loss of form, but he never lost an inner belief that he would pull himself out of the bad patch. And what a difference the goals make. He has shown great character this season and did a marvellous job for the team while Justin Fashanu was out with injury.”

Ferguson himself said: “It took us quite a while to settle down. We were in a flat at first and I was having a lot of problems, one way and the other, so it wasn’t an easy time.”

Eventually Ferguson, his wife and two daughters settled into a house in Hove, and the striker admitted: “When you’re having a bad time there is a tendency to bring your problems home. It’s unfair on your family. I didn’t notice at the time, but, looking back, I think I probably was a little snappy with my wife and children.

“I think you can reach the stage where you really start to wonder, but I always knew I could score goals for Brighton. I’ve scored goals everywhere else I’ve played. It was just a question of time and waiting for the right break.”

Indeed, Ferguson scored in three successive matches in September 1985, prompting Cattlin to give him a special mention in his programme notes for the league cup game at home to Bradford City. “The form of Mick Ferguson is bound to improve even more with the confidence he is gaining through his three goals in three games,” wrote the manager. “His header against Wimbledon was a true indication of his ability; it was of the highest class.”

The renewed confidence saw him add another consecutive pair the following month – before on-loan Martin Keown took over the no.9 shirt and demonstrated he could score goals as well as defend!

Sadly, the revival in Ferguson’s fortunes were not to last. When Fashanu was fit again, Ferguson was dropped and only stepped in a couple more times. His goal in a 4-3 home win over Huddersfield on 16 November was the last he scored for the club.

Apart from a lone outing in January, in a 3-0 defeat at Sheffield United, Ferguson was on the outside looking in until, to everyone’s astonishment, after a five-week absence from first team action, he was selected by Cattlin to lead the line in a FA Cup Sixth Round tie against First Division Southampton on 8 March 1986.

Ferg action Shilts Bond Case Ferguson, sandwiched between Kevin Bond and Jimmy Case, is foiled by Southampton goalkeeper Peter Shilton in what turned out to be the striker’s final Brighton game.

A crowd of 25,069 packed into the Goldstone – when the average attendance at the time often dipped below 10,000 – but it ended in a disappointing 2-0 defeat and the manager admitted he had made a mistake with his selection. It turned out to be Ferguson’s last game for the club.

Just over three weeks later, he moved to fourth-tier Colchester United – whose manager Cyril Lea was promptly sacked!

United’s reserve team manager, Mike Walker (who would later manage Everton) took over the first team as caretaker and, as the team went on an unbeaten run of eight games, Ferguson scored seven times, the first of which came in a 4-0 win over Leyton Orient on 8 April.

The following season he played 19 games and scored four times before leaving on 7 November 1986 to join non-league Wealdstone.

It was quite a fall from the heady days of the early Seventies.

Born in Newcastle on 3 October 1954, Ferguson was picked up by Coventry City’s youth scheme in 1970 and, although he made his debut in 1975, shortly after the sale of Scotland international Colin Stein, it wasn’t until the start of the 1976-77 season that he became a Highfield Road regular.

In tandem with Ian Wallace (who was later a strike partner of Peter Ward’s at Nottingham Forest), he really started to attract attention, as the Coventry Telegraph recounted when describing him as a “truly great goalscorer”.

The article reckoned he was strongly tipped for international honours at one point but injury and loss of form affected him over the next two seasons. Forest, Villa and Ipswich were all supposedly keen to sign him, with Brian Clough agreeing a £500,000 deal, then pulling out.

However, in the summer of 1981, he finally left City having scored 57 goals in 141 games (plus eight sub appearances) all in the top flight when Everton paid £280,000 for him. Ferguson scored six times in his first eight games – but the goals dried up after that and he was gone within less than a year having made only made 10 appearances (plus two as a sub).

In 2007, David Prentice, in the Liverpool Echo, sought out Ferguson for an explanation of his less than happy time on Merseyside.

Manager Howard Kendall initially loaned him to Birmingham City, before making the deal permanent, but injury disrupted his chances at St Andrews, hence the loan move back to Coventry.

After retiring from playing in 1987, Ferguson stayed in the game working in community development roles for Sunderland – for 10 years, until he fell out with manager Peter Reid – Newcastle United and Leeds United, where he was head of Football in the Community.

Pictures from Albion matchday programes and, via YouTube, from Coventry City’s Sky Blues TV.

The cheek of Parris in the autumn briefly lightened Brighton gloom

LIGHTER moments were few and far between as an Albion follower in 1995. A despised regime seemingly intent on taking the club into oblivion had spread such disillusionment among fans that gates were badly hit.

It meant only 5,659 were at the Goldstone Ground on 28 October 1995 to see an amusing incident that can still be seen on YouTube.

Step forward George Parris, a star at West Ham United a decade previously, who had joined the Seagulls to help out his old Hammers teammate Liam Brady, by then trying to manage a club in turmoil.

Bristol Rovers humiliated Brighton & Hove Albion 8-2 at the Goldstone Ground in 1973, shortly after ‘Old Big ‘ead’ Clough had taken charge, but, 22 years later, it was the Rovers goalkeeper who was left with the red face.

That was all down to quick-thinking Parris. The experienced defender-midfielder found himself on the blind side of the Rovers goalkeeper and, as the ‘keeper rolled the ball forward to clear it, Parris nipped in, got a toe in to win the ball, swivelled and buried it into the empty net.

These days he would almost certainly have been penalised for a foul as he appeared to use his shoulder to nudge the no.1 off balance, but, back in 1995, the goal stood.

He talked about the incident, and his career, in an interview with the Argus in November 2001.

George Michael Ronald Parris was born in Ilford on 11 September 1964. His talent for football saw him chosen to play for England Schoolboys and he joined West Ham United from school.

He signed professional for the Hammers in 1982 and made his league debut at Upton Park in a 3-0 defeat to Liverpool in May 1985.

Also making their debut that day, for what would be their one and only first team appearance for the Hammers, was central defender Keith McPherson, who played 35 games for the Albion between 1999 and 2000.

Parris meanwhile became the regular left-back in the 1985-86 season when West Ham finished third in the top flight. He was comfortable in either full-back position, but could also fill in as a defensive midfielder.

He was part of the West Ham side who were Littlewoods Cup semi-finalists in consecutive seasons and FA Cup semi-finalists in 1990-91.

In 12 years at Upton Park, ‘Smokey’, as he was known, made 290 league and cup appearances, chipping in with 17 goals too.

But it was an era when he had to endure some dreadful racism, which he talked about in a 2014 interview with Sam Wallace in the Independent.

Former Hammers skipper, Alvin Martin, said of Parris: “What we remember most about George was his friendly disposition and true honesty which was reflected best when he was on the field. George is one of the most reliable professionals anyone could wish to play alongside.”

Sadly, when West Ham decided to honour Parris’ 11 years’ service at the Boleyn Ground with a testimonial match at the end of the 1994-95 season, there was a dismally low turn-out as reported on website theyflysohigh.co.uk.

Parris had left the Hammers in March 1993, a £100,000 fee taking him to Birmingham City, and his infectious enthusiasm soon made him a fans’ favourite at St Andrews. Unfortunately, when Barry Fry took over as manager, he made it plain Parris didn’t fit into his plans.

Brady brought him to the Seagulls on a three-month loan and he also had loan spells with Brentford and Bristol City before spending a summer in Sweden with IFK Norrköping.

Brady invited him back to the Goldstone in September 1995 to play on a month-by-month contract basis, and he stayed until 1997, taking on the captaincy when Paul McCarthy was injured.

“Being captain of Brighton was a great honour for me, and I’d like to think that my characteristics rubbed off on the other players,” he told the matchday programme in 2019. “At that stage in my career I was able to deal with the responsibilities that the captaincy brings.

“You have to know that what works for some players will not work for others and you have to be the manager’s voice on the pitch. There was no added pressure that I felt and I’d like to think I shouldered it all quite well.”

*Matchday programme portrait of the former West Ham player*

Parris scored five times in 88 games for the Seagulls before briefly joining Southend United in August 1997.

Sadly, there was a hidden side to Parris’s life: he was a compulsive gambler and he later told the whole harrowing story in a four-hour long DVD.

He also spoke to the dailymail.co.uk about how he considered suicide after his addiction and mounting debts spiralled out of control in the late 90s.

It came after another large bet on the horses lost, he walked out of a bookies and seriously considered ending it all. He revealed: “I drove up to Newhaven. I can remember looking out over the bridge there and thinking ‘What do I do?’

“I couldn’t see how I was going to get myself out of the big hole I was in. I’d begged and borrowed from everyone I knew and, yes, I did give serious thought to killing myself.

“I owed money to my closest friends and family and had nowhere else to go. But, thankfully, I pulled myself together and went home and confessed to my then wife that I’d lost every penny I had gambling.”

Gradually Parris pieced his life back together and obtained coaching qualifications, such as the UEFA A licence, and became a Football Association-approved level-two coach educator.

Parris stayed on the south coast, living in Rottingdean, and had spells as player-manager of non-league Shoreham and St Leonards, but also ran youth football and cricket schools.

In 2016, Parris took interim charge of Albion’s women’s team and guided them to promotion to Women’s Super League Two. When Hope Powell took over the women’s team in August 2017, Parris reverted to the role of regional talent club technical director, a post he left in September 2019.

In November 2017, Parris was honoured alongside Albion manager Chris Hughton (another former playing colleague) at the Football Black List Awards in London for their contributions to coaching and management.

Coventry’s legendary skipper Ernie Machin also led Brighton

3 Machin Shoot! A MIDFIELD dynamo who captained Coventry City during their glory years at the top of English football’s pyramid was instantly installed as captain when he signed for third tier Brighton.

Ernie Machin was the first signing Peter Taylor made on taking sole charge of the Albion following Brian Clough’s decision to quit and join Leeds United.

Taylor, a former Coventry goalkeeper, had a well-earned reputation for his detailed knowledge of Midlands footballers.

Although Machin had moved to Plymouth Argyle in 1972, after 10 years at Highfield Road, he fitted the bill perfectly to add a bit of bite, experience and leadership to Taylor’s side.

A £30,000 fee took him to the Goldstone in the summer of 1974 but he was still nursing an injury sustained in training at Plymouth and when rushed into action too soon he broke down and missed quite a chunk of matches in the first part of the season.

Eventually he took up a regular spot in the centre of midfield and Argus reporter John Vinicombe observed in his end of season summary: “It wasn’t until the latter part of the season that Machin started to display known form.”

Machin action The midfielder eventually completed 31 games (plus three as sub) but manager Taylor took the captaincy from him and appointed his new centre back signing, Graham Winstanley.

Nevertheless, Machin began the following season and got what would be his one and only Albion goal in the opening fixture, a 3-0 home win over Rotherham United.

He remained ever-present until the arrival in March 1976 of the on-pitch leader who would guide Albion to the promised land – Brian Horton.

Machin shoots Machin played 41 games that season and only shared the midfield with Horton once – in what turned out to be his final game in the stripes, a 4-2 home win over Grimsby Town.

I hadn’t been aware until reading the excellent thegoldstonewrap.com that Machin didn’t move to Sussex during his time with the Albion. “He never settled on the south coast, and still lived in Coventry and trained in the Midlands,” they reported.

So perhaps it was no surprise that when Jimmy Hill, the manager who signed him for City and went on to be Coventry chairman, offered Machin a job back at his old club, he was only too happy to accept.

He took on the role of youth team coach, but it didn’t work out and he left football and went to work for Car Bodies and Massey Ferguson.

Machin was a member of the Coventry City Former Players Association after his career ended and they paid due respect to his part in the club’s history when he died aged 68 on 22 July 2012.

In an extended obituary on their website, they related how he had been born in Walkden, Manchester, on 26 April 1944, and had trials alongside future World Cup winner Alan Ball at Bolton Wanderers, but was not considered good enough.

Instead Machin joined non-league Nelson FC and, in 1962, was spotted by Coventry’s North West scout Alf Walton, who suggested Hill sign him up.

Hill wasn’t entirely convinced but admired the fact he rarely wasted a pass when in possession, and paid the princely sum of £50 to take him to Highfield Road, adding a further £200 when he made it into the first team.

That breakthrough came in April 1963, aged 18, in a 2-0 win over Millwall, and by the start of the following season he was first choice in the number 10 shirt as the Sky Blues headed for promotion.

However, they did it without Machin who sustained a bad knee injury in a home game with Watford in November, and missed the rest of the season, and beyond. Indeed, it was 18 months before he played again, having endured several operations.

Eventually he returned to play a pivotal role in the club’s Second Division title win in 1967, scoring 11 goals along the way.

When regular captain George Curtis broke his leg in the club’s second game in Division One, Machin took over as skipper and missed only three games in the club’s first two years amongst the elite.

ccfpa.co.uk recalled: “Older fans will remember his stunning goal in the 2-0 victory over European champions elect Manchester United in March 1968.

“His never-say-die attitude won him the respect of all his playing colleagues and the fans. He continued to be a regular, when fit, right up to the time of his departure in 1972 but a bad car accident put him out for three months in 1970 and his ‘dodgy’ knee continued to trouble him.”

The history books record that in 1972 he was the first English footballer to go through the courts to challenge a FA fine and suspension using TV evidence. He was sent off in a game at Newcastle for allegedly kicking an opponent, but the footage proved his innocence.

Even so, the FA spotted something else he’d done and upheld the disciplinary action on the basis of that without allowing him to present a defence. The courts ruled against the FA, and the PFA subsequently established the rights of players to legal representation in disciplinary cases.

By the time Coventry’s new managers Joe Mercer and Gordon Milne sold him to Plymouth for £35,000, he had played 289 games and scored 39 goals.

The website greensonscreen.co.uk says: “When Machin moved to Home Park in December 1972 he soon showed his class and intelligence, controlling games from midfield. He was named the Player of the Year in his only full season with the club but, much to the dismay of the fans, requested a transfer and moved to Brighton and Hove Albion.”

Despite his relatively short stay at Home Park, he made such an impression that in 2004 he was named in Plymouth’s Team of the Century.

Although suffering from poor health, Machin attended a reunion of Coventry’s 1967 promotion-winning team in 2007 and in 2008 he was one of 30 former players inducted into the club’s Legends Group for services to the football club.

1 main ernie + cant 2 machin signs

Pictures include one from my scrapbook of Machin in a Coventry team line-up alongside manager Noel Cantwell who kindly gave me his autograph when the Sky Blues played Brighton in a friendly. Also pictured, the Evening Argus coverage of his signing. And a Shoot! magazine portrait. Plus a montage of other images.

Flying winger Tony ‘Tiger’ Towner immortalised in children’s TV programme

2-towner-takes-on-argus IF ART is the sincerest form of flattery, Tony Towner can count himself amongst the privileged few to be forever remembered on film.

That it was done by two of Rotherham United’s most ardent celebrity fans is neither here nor there – it’s not everyone who can say their prowess has been portrayed in an episode of Chucklevision.

Towner and fellow Millers hero Ronnie Moore were at the centre of a classic knockabout episode of the children’s TV series in which Rotherham supporters Paul and Barry Chuckle constantly get involved in slapstick scrapes.

In Football Heroes, made in 1996, the Chuckle Brothers meet Towner and Moore (actors playing them rather than the footballers themselves!) on their way to a game and accidentally end up with their invitation cards to play in a veterans match, leading to them ending up on the pitch.

*Towner earned plaudits for his Rotherham performances in this Shoot magazine feature – pipping one Danny Wilson!*

It was Towner and Moore’s starring performances in the Rotherham side that won promotion from the old Division 3 as champions in 1980-81 that earned them cult status.

Over three seasons, Towner appeared over 100 times for the Millers and even all these years later is still remembered with affection.

Take, for example, comments made on the Millers Mad website a couple of years ago. Ivor Hardy said: “Tony (Tiger) Towner was one of the best and most talented footballers ever to play for us.

“He was instrumental in us winning the league in 80/81, along with doing the double over our near neighbours Sheffield United in the same season.

“We were lucky to get the services of Towner and Seasman from Millwall, and only did so because the Lions were in financial turmoil that season and had to get some money in fast. He will always be a legend with the older fans, along with team mates Seasman, Moore, Fern, Breckin, Mountford etc.

“Tiger gave us some great memories.”

Meanwhile, kevthemaltbymiller said: “Great player for us, very tricky winger with lightning pace. Happy memories.” And sawmiller added: “Tiger was a super player – good winger who created a real buzz in the crowd when he got the ball and ran at players.”

Towner himself considered his time at Rotherham to have been his best playing days. In an Albion matchday programme article, he told Roy Chuter: “They were probably my best years, my most consistent, anyway. I was 26, 27 years old – at my peak. I had three tremendous years.”

Initially playing under Sunderland’s 1973 FA Cup Final hero Ian Porterfield, he also enjoyed working with the former Liverpool legend Emlyn Hughes, when he took over as manager.

Brighton fans also have good memories of the local boy made good. Sussex youngsters making the grade with the Albion have been pretty few and far between over the years, but Towner and defender/midfielder Steve Piper were two who did it in the 1970s.

In Albion’s 1972-73 season in the second tier, Piper had already been blooded in the first team in the November. Towner signed professional on 29 December 1972 and, with Albion having been knocked out of the FA Cup by Chelsea in the third round, manager Pat Saward arranged a friendly against Stoke City on fourth round day, 3 February 1973 (Stoke had been beaten 3-2 by Man City) and gave Towner his first team debut in a 2-0 defeat at the Goldstone.

The following Saturday he made his league debut aged just 17 at home to Luton Town. Albion went into the game having suffered 14 defeats on the trot (12 in the league plus the games against Chelsea and Stoke) and, rooted to the bottom of the table, relegation was inevitable.

Saward gave the side a shake-up, dropping three established players – goalkeeper Brian Powney in favour of loan signing Tommy Hughes from Aston Villa, right back Graham Howell (to the bench), and experienced striker Barry Bridges.

Piper made only his sixth first team appearance and he was joined by winger Towner and forward Pat Hilton. It was Towner’s brilliant display on the wing that really caught the eye as Albion finally mustered a win, beating the Hatters 2-0.

Towner kept the shirt until the end of the season and it was the launchpad for a 15-year professional career in which he made over 400 appearances. After that Luton debut, he scored his first goal in a 2-1 home win against Huddersfield on 10 March.

“I was an Albion fan as a kid, in Bevendean, and I joined them straight from school at 15, as an apprentice,” he said. “I already had the ‘Tiger’ nickname when I got into the team in 1973 – I think it was one of Alan Duffy‘s. I must have tackled him a bit too hard in training, or something. Tiger was a great nickname, and I loved it.”

One of the few survivors of the great Brian Clough cull of the playing staff in 1974, Towner was a speedy, skilful winger who could put in terrific crosses for his teammates. The fact he was a local lad endeared him greatly to the crowd.

In five years, he had plenty of challengers for his place. In the early days, Gerry Fell competed for the wide berth and later Eric Potts, but Towner still managed 171 games (+ 12 as sub) for the Albion and scored 25 goals.

“Gerry was the opposite of me, though still a winger – he had loads of pace, though not too much skill,” Towner recalled. “He’d knock the ball ahead of him and run past the defender to get it, a bit like Stuart Storer. I’d try to trick my way past.”

In John Vinicombe’s end of season assessment of Peter Taylor’s first season in sole charge (1974-75), he said: “It is with no disrespect to Taylor that I suggest that the three most consistent players were those he inherited – O’Sullivan, Towner and Piper.

“Towards the end, Towner tailed off a little but he struck up an intuitive partnership with Fred Binney.”

In fact Towner was third highest in the squad for appearances that season, playing 47 games in total plus four as sub and with 10 goals was second highest goalscorer behind Binney.

It was the arrival of Gerry Ryan from Derby in September 1978, which finally prompted his departure. George Petchey, who later joined Chris Cattlin’s backroom team at the Goldstone, took him to Millwall for £65,000.

Unfortunately, while Brighton won promotion to Division 1 in 1979, Millwall went the opposite way out of Division 2, and Towner found himself back in the third tier.

After 68 appearances for the Lions, in 1980 he was sold to Rotherham along with teammate John Seasman for a combined fee of £165,000.

Towner scored once for Rotherham’s near neighbours Sheffield United in a 10-game loan spell in 1983 and although he had missed out on Brighton’s eventual elevation to the top tier, he managed it with Wolves in 1983-84 having been signed by the Black Country side for £80,000.

He then joined Charlton Athletic but in the 1985-86 season was loaned to Rochdale where he once again linked up with his former Rotherham teammates, Moore and Seasman. He made five appearances for Rochdale and MikeMCSG on clarkechroniclersfootballers.blogspot.co.uk recalls: “He came on as sub in a home game and made an instantly good impression by beating the full back with his first touch.

“He went on to play a blinder in the draw at Halifax on Boxing Day. Unfortunately Tony didn’t want to uproot to the North and couldn’t be persuaded to make his stay permanent. When Cambridge came in with an offer he signed for them instead although he only made eight appearances for them in total.”

Towner’s final Albion appearance had been in a 4-1 defeat away to Leicester in September 1978 but his final appearance at the Goldstone came in a memorable FA Cup 3^rd round tie on 4 January 1992.

Albion beat then Southern League Crawley 5-0 and Towner earned a rousing reception from the 18,031 packed into the Goldstone when, at the age of 36, he came on as a substitute for the visitors.

Crawley were one of several non-league clubs he played for: he also turned out for Gravesend, Fisher Athletic, Lewes, Newhaven and Saltdean.

Interestingly, Towner reflected: “I could definitely have played for a few more years at league level, and perhaps I should’ve done. I’d got a bit disillusioned with it though.”

After his playing days ended, Towner ran his own Brighton-based removals business and watched the Albion as a fan. In October 2015, Brian Owen interviewed him for an Argus piece ahead of a game against Cardiff when former Albion winger Craig Noone was in opposition.

Towner reckoned Albion made a mistake letting him go but added: “It’s good to see Brighton making good use of wingers.

“That’s the way I was brought up, using the wide men.

“It’s all right having midfield men or attack-minded full-backs. But what gets the crowd on its feet is a winger going past the full-back and crossing.

“You can have all the formations you like but, if you see a winger getting past his full-back, it excites people.”

Tony Towner certainly came into that category.

Pictures mainly shot by Evening Argus photographers and then reproduced in the Albion matchday programmes show a happy Towner congratulated by manager Pat Saward after his league debut, in familiar pose taking on a full back, getting in a trademark cross, in full flight on the wing, and finally on a Wolves album sticker.

All-time Albion hero Peter Ward scored inside a minute of debut

ward v bpool

ARMS aloft in familiar salute to yet another goal, the smiling footballer in a black and white picture on a Florida football club’s website dates back 40 years!

All around the world, it seems, Peter Ward’s goalscoring exploits for Brighton & Hove Albion are still the stuff of legend.

Four decades may have come and gone but the memories of this mercurial talent have never dimmed.

FC Tampa Rangers say of their youth coach: “During the 1976–77 season at Brighton, he scored 36 goals, beating the club record and winning him the golden boot.

“He is still revered by Brighton fans who sing a song dreaming of a team in which every player is Peter Ward: ‘We all live in a Wardy Wonderland’.”

If the word legend gets bandied about a little too frequently, where Peter Ward is concerned it is perfectly apt.

1-ward-scores Few Brighton players have managed to approach the esteem in which this extraordinary talent is held by supporters who saw him score the goals which took the Seagulls from perennial third tier also-rans to a place among the elite.

It takes genuine talent, bravery and skill to score goals at all three levels but Ward delivered. In 220 games for the Albion (plus seven as sub) he scored 95 goals.

In his splendid 2007 book, A Few Good Men (The Breedon Books Publishing Company Limited), Spencer Vignes refers back to 1980 and says of Ward: “No centre forward since has managed to steal his crown. Some have come close – Garry Nelson and Bobby Zamora spring to mind – but Wardy remains special, the golden boy of what proved to be a golden time for the club.”

I was sorry to have missed Ward’s latest return to Brighton when in 2016 he joined some of the Goldstone heroes of the past at the Theatre Royal.

Impishly donning a curly wig on top of his now bald pate to make his grand entrance, Ward showed he’d still got something of the showman about him.

There was never a shortage of superlatives to describe his skills on the pitch. While his dad Colin was a compositor on the Tamworth Herald, his son’s talents with a football filled dozens of column inches in a variety of football publications.

PW green BW Alan Mullery, the manager who benefited most from his audacious skill and compared him to the great Jimmy Greaves, said: “He was just the skinny little kid who could do fantastic things with a football.”

Mullery told Shoot: “Peter has the ability to kill a ball no matter how it comes at him. His pace over short bursts is incredible and he shoots powerfully and accurately with either foot.”

He continued: “Above all else, Peter’s strength on the ball, for a player of his stature, is remarkable. He fools defenders who believe they can easily knock him flying.”

Two of Ward’s former teammates told Vignes what made him so special. “He had this long stride that just seemed to take him away from people,” said Peter O’Sullivan. “One step and he’d be gone. Once he got goal-side of a player, that was it really – bang! Nobody ever seemed to be able to catch him, even in training.”

Brian Horton joined the club around the same time as Ward and said of his younger teammate: “He was this thin, scrawny little player that needed to learn the game, but his finishing was unbelievable, absolutely unbelievable.”

Nottingham Forest fans will have less happy memories of a player the managerial duo of Clough and Taylor took to the City Ground as they strived to replace Garry Birtles and Trevor Francis with any pairing from Ward, Ian Wallace and Justin Fashanu.

It just didn’t work out for Wardy at Forest although he tells Vignes in A Few Good Men: “I had a great time at Forest. I got on well with the lads and had a laugh.”

While he always got on well with Taylor, his relationship with the erratic Clough was a lot stormier which meant he was in and out of the side.

When Lichfield-born Ward left school he was only 4’8” and because he was told he was too small to make a career playing football he got a job as an apprentice fitter at Rolls Royce and played local football in the Derby area.

The detail of those early years can be discovered in Matthew Horner’s excellent biography of Ward (He Shot, He Scored, Sea View Media).

Scout Jim Phelps recommended Ward to the then non-league Burton Albion manager Ken Gutteridge having worked with the freescoring player at a Sunday afternoon side, Borrowash United.

After joining the newly-promoted Brewers initially in the Reserves, the 1974-75 season was only a month old when he made his first team bow alongside former England internationals Frank Wignall and Ian Storey-Moore – and promptly scored a hat-trick in a 4-1 win over Tamworth, his hometown team.

By the middle of November that season, with 10 goals to his name, Ward’s scoring exploits had attracted the attention of league clubs and Brighton boss Peter Taylor, with plenty of contacts in the area, put in a bid.

The Burton chairman, Jim Bradbury, went public on the approach – which Gutteridge found completely unacceptable. He promptly resigned… and before long was appointed to Taylor’s backroom staff!

In the meantime, Burton resisted Brighton’s money and it later emerged that Gutteridge had told Taylor he would only take up the post on condition that Ward would eventually be brought to the Goldstone.

Taylor stuck to his word and eventually signed Ward for £4,000 in the close season of 1975.

The rest, as they say, is history and in researching for this piece it was difficult to sift through the multitude of material from my scrapbooks, programmes, books and other places to condense it all into something manageable.

Because of his popularity, most of the story is familiar to fans of a certain generation anyway and anyone who has not yet read Horner’s book should get themselves a copy because it is rich with material from Ward himself and others who played alongside him or observed him.

Scoring within 50 seconds of his Albion debut away to Hereford United in front of the Match of the Day cameras couldn’t have been a better start and the partnership he struck up with beanpole Ian Mellor was key to promotion from the old Division 3.

For what at times seemed like a fantasy coming to life, it’s intriguing to learn that Ward’s watching of the Bond film The Spy Who Loved Me on the eve of two games was followed the next day by him scoring hat-tricks.

In the 1977-78 season, he saw it before making his England under 21 debut at the Goldstone against Norway in a 6-0 win, and, later the same season, he saw it again before an away game at Mansfield and scored three once again!

It seemed a natural progression that Ward would make it to the full England team and he did eventually – winning one cap for a six-minute substitute appearance against Australia in May 1980.

In fact he made the full England squad three years earlier for a game against Luxembourg but wasn’t involved in the match itself and, by his own admission, reckons he blotted his copybook with manager Ron Greenwood by being ill in the room he shared with Trevor Brooking after going out drinking with Brian Greenhoff.

ward cover In the way that all good things must come to an end, the beginning of the end of the fairytale came as Albion struggled to come to terms with their first season at the top level.

Ward was certainly not as prolific as he had been lower down the football pyramid although, as reported in my previous blog post, the arrival of Ray Clarke helped him rediscover his form to finish that season as top goalscorer with 17.

However, a return to his Midlands home territory looked increasingly likely. He nearly went to Derby in November 1979 but a swap deal with Gerry Daly fell through, and Forest also wanted him but Clough walked away from the deal.

Eleven months later, though, Clough and Taylor were back in for him when Birtles was sold to Man Utd, paying the Albion £450,000 for his services. Andy Ritchie, being displaced by Birtles’ move to United, promptly replaced Ward at the Albion.

Ward made just 33 appearances for Forest, scoring seven goals, and in 1981-82 went on loan to Seattle Sounders.

In the autumn of 1982, Brighton brought him back to the Goldstone on loan and it was in the fourth game of a 16-game spell that he scored (above) what he considered his favourite goal, the winner against his boyhood idols Manchester United at the Goldstone on 6 November 1982.

Ward was part of the Albion line-up that won that memorable FA Cup fifth round tie at Anfield en route to the 1983 FA Cup Final but it was to prove his penultimate game as the eccentric Clough quashed Ward’s desire to stay with the Seagulls and that potential trip to Wembley.

At that time, Clough’s Forest hadn’t been to a FA Cup Final and he told Ward: “Son, I’ve never been to a Cup Final and neither will you.”

That spelled the end of Ward’s time at the City Ground and by the end of 1983 he was sold to Vancouver Whitecaps for £20,000; the beginning of what became a 13-year career playing mainly indoor football in America, where he still lives.

• Pictures from various sources: the matchday programme, Evening Argus and Shoot! / Goal.

Cross the colossus majestic in promotion-winning season

1-cross-clincher GRAHAM Cross won promotion from the third tier in successive seasons – one with Brighton & Hove Albion, the next with Preston North End.

They came after a record-breaking 15-year spell with his hometown club Leicester City.

Cross was a tower of strength and ever-present in Alan Mullery’s 1976-77 promotion-winning team. He was so consistent that his fellow professionals named him and fellow Seagulls Brian Horton and Peter Ward in the division’s PFA team of the year.

One standout performance I recall was in a cracking League Cup replay at the Goldstone against Division 1 side Ipswich Town on 7 September 1976 (see picture above).

Despite the Albion being down to 10 men, having had Phil Beal carried off injured after sub Ian Mellor had already come on, Cross scored the winning goal two minutes from time to give Albion their first competitive victory against a first division team for 43 years!

“Graham had an absolutely tremendous 1976-77 season for us and I can’t speak too highly of him,” Mullery told Shoot! “When I first started planning for the new term I reckoned on having him in the side for our step up into the Second Division.”

G Cross BW HS However, when he realised he could land the highly promising 20-year-old Mark Lawrenson from Preston for £112,000, those plans changed.

Lawrenson had played brilliantly against the Albion during the promotion season and was eager to take the step up so he headed south together with full back Gary Williams and Cross and left back Harry Wilson went in the opposite direction.

“I wish him well at Preston and can assure their supporters they are getting one of the most honest lads in the game in Graham,” said Mullery.

Cross certainly played his part as Preston earned promotion from the third tier – one of his teammates was centre forward Michael Robinson, who joined Albion in 1980 – but in the following season the magic touch eluded him when he played 19 times for Lincoln City but didn’t manage to stop them being relegated to the Fourth Division.

3-gc-leicester Cross had been part of the furniture at Leicester and the meashamfox blog recalls how he scored on his debut on 29 April 1961 against Birmingham City in a 3-2 win at Filbert Street.

He was a real ‘Mr Versatility’ who played in eight different positions, although mostly in midfield – the history books describe him as an inside forward or wing half – and at centre back.

During all the hullabaloo surrounding Leicester’s remarkable Premiership title win in 2016, there were flashbacks to the last time a Leicester side went that close to clinching the league title – in 1962-63 – with Cross a member of that side.

In an interview with the Leicester Mercury, his former Scottish international teammate Frank McLintock spoke about a so-called signature move called ‘the switch’ Leicester employed whereby Cross dropped back and McLintock bombed past him.

“It was a load of rubbish, really,” McLintock told the paper. “It was just that I was really fit and Graham, who was a great player, would be a bit puffed out when he got back. We just swapped positions for a bit.

“The opposition would get confused with who was picking up who. Even Bill Shankly copied it later on at Liverpool.”

Unlike the 2016 vintage, the 1963 side blew their title chances by losing their last four league games. However, they did reach the FA Cup Final that year. Cross was in the side that lost 3-1 to Manchester United. He was also in the Leicester side that lost the 1969 final 1-0 to Manchester City.

His performances in 1963 were good enough to earn him a call up to the England under 23 team, making his debut in a 0-0 draw with Yugoslavia at Old Trafford. In the return fixture two months later, he scored a penalty to supplement an Alan Hinton hat-trick as England won 4-2.

He was a permanent fixture in the side for 10 matches (including a 4-1 win over West Germany, when future Albion colleague Peter Grummitt was in goal). But in November 1964, Leeds’ Norman Hunter took over the no.6 shirt.

Cross was recalled for one more game, in April 1966, when the under 23s beat Turkey 2-0 at Ewood Park. Two of the side that day – Martin Peters and Roger Hunt – would go on to be part of the England World Cup winning team three months later, but Cross never progressed to the senior England team.

Nevertheless he did pick up a League Cup winner’s medal when Leicester beat Stoke City in 1964 but was a loser the following year when they were beaten narrowly by a Chelsea side containing Barry Bridges and Bert Murray.

Three years before joining Brighton, Cross received a long service clock to mark 500 first class appearances.

Throughout this period, he was also one of that rare breed who played county cricket too.

A right-arm medium-fast bowler, he played 83 first class matches for Leicestershire between 1962 and 1976 and took 92 wickets at an average of 29.95. His top batting performance was a knock of 78.

I am indebted once more to the meashamfox blog to learn that it was Cross’ dual sporting prowess that eventually brought his Leicester career to an end.

In the summer of 1975, he was part of the Leicestershire side captained by Ray Illingworth that won the county championship and the Benson and Hedges Cup, making him the only man to have played in cup finals at Wembley and Lord’s.

But the Leicester board took a dim view of him carrying on playing cricket instead of reporting back for pre-season training and he was suspended.

He was sent out on loan to Chesterfield and played 12 times for them in the 1975-76 season, before being released.

He arrived at the Goldstone on May 25 1976 at the same time as full back (and future manager) Chris Cattlin.

Manager Peter Taylor had impeccable contacts in the Midlands and in Cattlin, from Coventry, and Cross, from Leicester, he acquired two experienced campaigners who had played at the top level in the game for many years.

Taylor’s intention was that Cross would have the sort of impact at Brighton that the ageing Dave Mackay had on Derby when Taylor and Brian Clough signed him from Spurs. G Cross LEic

Taylor had tried to sign Cross before, in the pair’s early days at Derby. Leicester even accepted an £80,000 bid but Cross prevaricated over the move and they turned their attentions elsewhere. He admitted his regret at missing out on the £4,000 cut of the deal but told Goal magazine: “I’m happy in Leicester and I’m pleased that I decided to stay.”

That decision would ultimately lead him to become the all-time appearance record holder for Leicester, having played 599 games; a feat still not surpassed.

Clough and Taylor were renowned for building their sides on solid defences and, having already captured Grummitt, Graham Winstanley, Andy Rollings and Wilson, Taylor added Ken Tiler, Dennis Burnett, Cattlin and Cross.

Taylor, of course, didn’t hang around to see how Cattlin and Cross would contribute. With only four weeks to go to the start of the season, he decided to quit and renew his partnership with Clough, this time at Nottingham Forest.

One of the first images fans saw of his replacement, Alan Mullery, showed him embracing Cross and Cattlin at the pre-season press photocall.

Cross mostly played alongside Rollings, with Burnett and Winstanley filling in when Rollings was sidelined.

Interestingly, Cross never actually moved to Brighton during his spell with the Seagulls: the deal he agreed allowed him to continue to train with Leicester because he and his wife had business interests in the Leicester area.

The meashamfox blog declared “Graham Cross was Leicester City’s finest ever player” although the author was also sad to report how in February 1993 “he had been jailed for using post office funds to pay off his gambling debts”.

The blog concluded: “Despite this blip in his life, for me ‘The Tank’ Graham Cross is a true Leicester legend.”

Pictures from my scrapbook show:

A cracking Argus picture and headline record the winner Graham Cross scored against Ipswich in the League Cup.
A full page colour photo in Goal magazine when at Leicester.
Celebrating his inclusion in the PFA division 3 team of the year with Brian Horton and Peter Ward at the annual awards dinner.
Another Goal article, from 1973, marking a clock presentation to Cross in recognition of 500 senior appearances for Leicester.
Cross in the Preston team line-up alongside Michael Robinson, who would eventually join the Seagulls via Manchester City.

*Cross aged 77 was interviewed and photographed by* The Times ahead of Leicester’s 2021 FA Cup Final win over Chelsea

Chelsea starlet Barry Bridges a Brighton record signing

5-bridges-in-stripes ENGLAND international Barry Bridges was once Brighton & Hove Albion’s record signing for the princely sum of £28,000.

Much of his career ran in parallel with Bert Murray. Both young stars at Chelsea in the early to mid-60s, they were transferred to Birmingham City in 1966 and joined the Albion in the early 1970s.

Norfolk-born Bridges had come to the attention of Chelsea while playing for local side Norwich & Norfolk Boys and had a dream debut in 1959 at just 17, scoring in a local derby against West Ham. It was in the 1961-62 season that he established himself in the Chelsea first team, Jimmy Greaves having been transferred to AC Milan.

In what turned out to be superb 1964-65 season for him and the club, he scored 27 goals in 42 appearances for Chelsea and collected a League Cup winners’ medal when they beat Leicester City 3-2 over two legs.

It was in May 1966 when Tommy Docherty started breaking up his squad and Bridges left Chelsea for Birmingham having scored 93 goals in 205 league appearances for the London club.

Bridges went one better than Murray and earned full England international honours. Four caps in fact. He was just a few days short of his 24^th birthday when he made his debut in a 2-2 draw with Scotland at Wembley in April 1965.

bb-england-w-sir-a

Bridges pictured with Sir Alf Ramsey, Jack Charlton and Nobby Stiles while on England international duty.

He kept the no.9 shirt in the next two games, played in May, a 1-0 win over Hungary at Wembley and was the scorer of England’s goal in a 1-1 draw away to Yugoslavia. His fourth and final game was in a 3-2 friendly defeat against Austria in October 1965. Injury prevented him staking a claim for a place in the 1966 World Cup squad.

In 1971, Bridges went on an end-of-season tour to Australia with an English FA squad that also included Peter Grummitt (then of Sheffield Wednesday) and Dennis Mortimer (of Coventry at the time). The squad went to Dublin first to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the FA of Ireland, drawing 1-1 with the Republic, before heading Down Under where they won all nine of the matches they played in various locations across a month.

BridgesChels

Birmingham paid a then club record fee of £55,000 to acquire Bridges and in two seasons in the West Midlands he scored 46 goals in 104 outings.

Interviewed by bcfc.com in 2014, Bridges said: “What persuaded me to join Birmingham more than anything was the chairman, Clifford Coombs. He was a great guy and wanted to put the club back on its feet. He told me that I was going to be his first signing and he really wanted me to join.”

In his first season he helped Blues to a League Cup semi-final – ironically against Queens Park Rangers – the club he would move to next.

In August 1968, a £50,000 deal saw him move to Loftus Road, where he was part of a strong forward line playing alongside Frank Clarke and the flamboyant Rodney Marsh with his old Chelsea teammate Terry Venables pulling the strings in midfield.

Unfortunately the campaign ended in relegation from the old First Division but in 1969-70 he linked up well alongside Marsh and Clarke and scored 24 goals in all competitions.

Bridges QPR

QPR decided to cash in on him and sold him to Millwall in 1970 and in 1972 he was part of a Millwall side who only narrowly missed promotion to the top division. The Lions were already celebrating promotion on the pitch at The Den when news came through that in fact promotion rivals Birmingham had beaten Sheffield Wednesday to go up, contrary to a rumour that had been circulating in the ground that they’d been losing.

“The four supporters who had been chairing me on their shoulders dropped me. Everyone was stunned, and we had to troop off the pitch all bitterly disappointed and choked,” said Bridges. “I desperately wanted to play First Division football again and so did the rest of the lads. We were all sick.”

When Pat Saward signed him for Brighton in September 1972, it was evident from the start that this was a player who had played at the highest level.

Unfortunately, although Bridges could easily cope at that level, others either didn’t step up or the new players didn’t gel – arguably Saward made too many changes – but, whatever the reason, Brighton couldn’t stop losing and were left floundering at the foot of the table.

Bridges made his debut in a 1-1 draw away to Aston Villa but it was another four matches before he got his first goal, ironically against his old club Millwall, in a 3-1 defeat at home.

Bridges seldom had the same partner up front, early on playing with Willie Irvine, on other occasions with Ken Beamish and later with Lammie Robertson after Saward brought him in from Halifax in exchange for Irvine.

My abiding impression of him was that he appeared to be too good for the rest of the team. His speed of thought was often way ahead of the rest so he would put passes into areas where he would expect a teammate to be, only to be disappointed that they hadn’t read it, so he was made to look wasteful.

One of the few moments of pleasure for Bridges in what was otherwise a season of doom and gloom was the prospect of a FA Cup third round tie against Chelsea at the Goldstone in January 1973. Bridges was in great demand for pre-match interviews in view of his past association with the London club.

“It’s a tremendous draw for the club and a dream draw for Bert Murray and myself who both started our careers at Chelsea,” Bridges told Goal magazine. “Personally it will be nice to see most of the Chelsea lads again. I grew up with Peter Bonetti, Ron Harris and Ossie (Peter Osgood).”

Bridges hoped a good performance in the Cup would help to reinvigorate the lacklustre league form and said: “It’s a crying shame that we’re struggling because the facilities here are second to none. Obviously we need to start getting results now before it’s too late. A win against Chelsea could be just the boost we need to get out of trouble in the league.”

As it turned out, not only did the game end in defeat (2-0) for the Albion but it drew national headlines for all the wrong reasons – ‘day of shame’ for example – as Harris and Brighton left back George Ley were sent off, five were booked and the mood on the pitch led to fighting on the terraces with 25 people arrested.

However, Albion’s fortunes did eventually improve – although it was without Bridges, who in the final few games of the season was restricted to appearances off the bench.

Back in the third division, Bridges was restored to the starting line-up and scored in the opening game in a 1-1 draw at Rochdale.

He was part of the team Brian Clough and Peter Taylor inherited in October and, after they secured their first win courtesy of Pat Hilton’s goal in a 1-0 win away to Walsall, Bridges told the press: “I did more running about in this game than I had in the previous 10 matches.

“I’m 32 now, but with this chap geeing me up I reckon I can go on playing for several more years. We were a bit on edge before the game and the first thing he told us was to relax. Afterwards he told us he was pleased with the effort we showed and we can work from here and go places.

“Though I was sorry to see Pat Saward go – he was a great coach – I think Brian’s got what it takes to make us a good side. He’s just what the club have been waiting for.”

But three games later, as one of the team humiliated in a 4-0 home FA Cup defeat to Walton & Hersham at the end of November, Bridges was unceremoniously dropped and didn’t play again for the first team until February.

Although he then had a run in the team, scoring six times in a 17-game spell, he was among twelve players Clough and Taylor offloaded at the end of the season.

That brought down the curtain on his league career but he continued playing – initially in South Africa with Johannesburg side Highlands Park and then in Ireland – where when player-manager of St Patrick’s Athletic he also gave game time to another former Brighton striker, Neil Martin. He also managed Sligo Rovers before returning to his native Norfolk to manage non league sides Kings Lynn and Dereham Town.

In 2013, the QPR programme caught up with him to discover he was living in Norwich close to where he was brought up, and still getting along to watch matches.

1-england-bridges 2-chelsea-bridges 4-bridges-in-hoops Barry Bridges (Lions) Barry Bridges (Millwall yellow)

Pictures from my scrapbook show Barry in his England and Chelsea days, in Millwall’s white and change yellow shirts, in QPR’s familiar hoops, and in the Albion stripes.

Ken Beamish dumped by Clough without a word

SWASHBUCKLING Ken Beamish was a good old fashioned centre forward who crowds appreciated for his never-say-die attitude in pursuit of goals.

He mostly played in the third tier but had three seasons at the next level up (one was Brighton’s disastrous 1972-73 season and he had two with Blackburn).

He twice won promotion from the old Third Division – with Brighton in 1972 and Blackburn in 1975 – and scored 198 goals in 642 league and cup games between 1965 and 1982.

Born in Bebington on 25 August 1947, Beamish started his career with nearby Fourth Division Tranmere Rovers in the 1965-66 season and was top scorer in two of his six seasons with the club, helping them to promotion to the Third Division in 1966-67. KB Tran

He joined Brighton on transfer deadline day on 9 March 1972; manager Pat Saward having set off for the north west from Sussex at 5am to ensure he captured his man before the 5pm deadline that existed at the time.

When Beamish signed for £23,000 (plus the surplus-to-requirements Alan Duffy), Albion had just scored 13 goals in three games so supporters were baffled as to why he was needed.

After two substitute appearances, Beamish made his full debut in the oft-talked about televised game v Aston Villa and then got off the mark in the 3-1 Good Friday win over Torquay United (see picture).

He contributed six goals in 14 games, including last minute winners in two games in the same week, against Rotherham and Rochdale.

In an interview in Goal magazine after promotion was clinched, Saward explained why he had signed him when the team was already riding high and looking a good bet for promotion.

Aiming a bit of a sideswipe at the incumbents Willie Irvine and Kit Napier, Saward said: “We had plenty of skilful players up front but none had the devil in him. We wanted more thrust. Beamish gave us it.”

Reporter David Wright wrote: “He added the final spark to an ever-improving Brighton side that, after promising a great deal for two-thirds of the season, finally showed their true force in the last two months of the season when they enjoyed a marvellous run of 12 games without defeat.”

Saward was delighted with his signing and said: “Ken shows great courage and has an insatiable appetite for scoring goals. He would die in the box for you. He goes in where angels fear to tread. The whole side never know when they’re beaten – something they proved over and over again – and Beamish epitomises this. He battles away from the first whistle to the last.”

There was clearly mutual admiration because Beamish reflected in an Albion matchday programme how Saward had helped him to become a better player. “He really put in the work with me on the training pitch,” he said. “My ball control was never the best but he worked hard with me to make sure it improved. He was a good man.”

In Brighton & Hove Albion Supporters’ Club’s official souvenir handbook, produced to celebrate the promotion, coach Ray Crawford, the former England international striker who was part of Saward’s backroom team, said: “I don’t like to single out players because football is a team game, but I must on this occasion. Ken Beamish added the final bite up front, and those vital goals that he scored helped us into Division II. What a player this boy is – he never gives up!”

Unfortunately for Beamish, the goals were harder to come by in the division above, particularly in a struggling side and with a new strike partner in the shape of experienced Barry Bridges. Beamish’s scoring ratio dropped to one in four during 1972-73 and, back in the third tier the following season, it didn’t get much better.

He kept his place in the side after Brian Clough’s arrival in October 1973 but 12 goals in 45 games didn’t impress a manager used to better things and he found himself part of the former Derby manager’s huge clear-out of players – and he was none too happy at the manner of it.

A contributor to Jonathan Wilson’s biography about Clough, Nobody Ever Says Thank You, Beamish spoke about how most of the players failed to get any rapport going with the manager because he was seldom around. “I played most of the games but we never saw much of Clough,” he said. “We saw him on matchday and Friday.”

Clough didn’t help matters when he missed a game altogether so he could go to America to watch a Muhammad Ali-Joe Frazier fight. That left him open to criticism but Clough was not remotely bothered. Instead he went on the front foot and openly criticised the players for lacking moral courage and declared: “There is a gale blowing through this club and the players concerned are about to feel the draught.”

That one of them was Beamish appeared harsh at the time and the manner of his departure clearly left a nasty taste in the mouth.

Beamish told Simon Levenson in his interview for Match of My Life (Know The Score Books Ltd): “I knew my time was up when I wasn’t included in the end of season tour to Torremolinos. We’re all grown men and there are ways of telling people that you’re not part of their future plans. He could have told me face to face, but instead I discovered I’d been transfer listed when my neighbour told me he’d heard it on the radio.”

A subsequent Albion matchday programme interview revealed his dismay at the circumstances, which understandably made it easy for him to leave.

“I never spoke to anyone at Brighton between the end of the season and signing for Blackburn,” he said. “That was the disappointing thing because I’d enjoyed my time at Brighton and made some good friends there.

“It was a sad ending to a happy period in my life.”

Clough’s loss was Gordon Lee’s gain. Lee, who would go on to manage Everton, paid £26,000 to take Beamish to Blackburn Rovers – the start of an association which continues to this day.

After scoring 19 goals for Blackburn in 86 appearances between 1974 and 1976, including promotion in 1975, he then had two years at Port Vale – where he was the player of the year in 1977-78 – a year at Bury and a second spell at Tranmere. He ended his playing days at Swindon Town, where he originally went to become assistant manager to long-serving John Trollope – father of former Albion assistant manager, Paul.

When Trollope senior left Swindon, Beamish ended up taking over as boss for 15 months (as pictured below), from March 1983 to June 1984, but 1983-84 proved to be a nightmare season in Swindon’s history with them finishing 17^th in the old Fourth Division, the lowest finishing position in their history. Beam Swin mgr

Beamish subsequently became commercial manager at Blackburn from 1986 until his retirement in 2012. He then became vice chairman of the Blackburn Rovers Former Players Association.

Pictures from my scrapbook show a great action shot of Beamish scoring against Torquay, as featured in a Brighton & Hove Gazette end of season publication, a portrait of him in Goal magazine. Dig the hairstyle, pear drop collar shirt and tank top in this Goal picture of him with his son. The Argus captured Ken’s elation as he celebrated Willie Irvine’s goal against Aston Villa. And the man himself signed the photo of him being interviewed. Below, interviewed in 1992 by Sky Sports.

Terry Connor had an eye for goal for Leeds and Brighton

Connor action 1 TERRY CONNOR is a familiar face to today’s football fans as a loyal assistant manager to Mick McCarthy.

But Leeds United and Brighton fans of a certain vintage remember him as a pacy striker with an eye for goal.

His time with the Albion saw him at his most prolific with a record of almost a goal every three games (51 in 156 appearances) – form which earned him a solitary England under 21 cap as an over-age player.

Relegation-bound Brighton took the Leeds-born forward south in exchange for Andy Ritchie shortly after they had made it through to the semi-final of the 1983 FA Cup, but the new signing could take no part because he’d already played in the competition for Leeds.

If Brian Clough had allowed Peter Ward to have remained on loan to the Seagulls that spring, who knows whether Connor would have joined, but, when the former golden boy sought an extension of his loan from Nottingham Forest, which would have enabled him to continue to be part of the progress to Wembley, according to Ward in He Shot, He Scored, the eccentric Forest boss told him: ‘Son, I’ve never been to a Cup Final and neither will you’.

So the Connor-Ritchie swap went ahead and, with the rest of the team’s focus on the glory of the cup, the new arrival scored just the once in five appearances, plus two as sub, as the Seagulls forfeited the elite status they’d held for four seasons.

lpool goal Connor would have his moment of cup glory (celebration above) in the following season, though, as the TV watching nation saw him and Gerry Ryan score in a 2-0 win over Liverpool at the Goldstone; the second successive season Albion had dumped the mighty Reds out of the FA Cup.

*Connor was best man when teammate Hans Kraay got married. Frank Worthington (right) was there too.*

Born in Leeds on 9 November 1962, Connor went to Foxwood School on the Seacroft estate in Leeds. He burst onto the football scene at just 17, scoring the only goal of the game after going on as a sub for Paul Madeley to make his hometown club debut in November 1979 against West Brom.

“I got such an early break at Leeds because the club were rebuilding their side after those days when they were riding high,” Connor told Shoot! magazine. “Eddie Gray was still in the team when I came in. He was the model professional. It was terrific to have someone with his experience alongside you.”

Connor went on to make a total of 108 appearances for Leeds over four seasons, scoring 22 goals, before the by-then manager Gray did the swap deal with Ritchie.

In February 2016, voice-online.co.uk carried an interview in which Connor recalled racial abuse he received as a player.

“It was difficult for black players to thrive. I can remember going to many away games and there were bananas thrown on the pitch and `monkey’ chants from the stands,” he said.

“I remember receiving mail from Leeds fans telling me not to wear the white shirt, even though I was born and bred in Leeds. I had bullets sent to me and the police were called on a couple of occasions.”

Even so, the move to Brighton still came as a bit of a shock to him.

“‘I’d never imagined myself playing for anyone else but Leeds,” he told Shoot! at the time. “I was born and bred in the city. My parents and friends live there, and really Elland Road was a second home to me.”

Unfortunately for Connor, manager Jimmy Melia gave him the impression he was going to be forming a double spearhead with Michael Robinson. But after relegation, Robinson and several others from the halcyon days were sold, in Robinson’s case to Liverpool.

TC phoenix The man who bought him didn’t last long either; Melia making way for Chris Cattlin in the autumn of 1983. It didn’t stop Connor making his mark in the second tier and despite having several different striking partners of varying quality, his goalscoring record was good at a time when the side itself was struggling to return to the top with the Cup Final squad being dismantled and under investment in replacements.

In his first full season, he missed only two first team games all season and was top scorer with 17 goals as Albion finished ninth in the league. His main strike partner Alan Young scored 12.

Connor got only one fewer in the 1984-85 season when the side finished sixth; the veteran Frank Worthington chipping in with eight goals in his only season with the Seagulls.

In 1985-86 Connor had two different strike partners in Justin Fashanu and the misfiring Mick Ferguson but still managed another 16 goals, including four braces.

The disastrous relegation season of 1986-87 contained a personal high for Connor when, in November 1986, he was selected as an over-age player (at 24) for England under 21s and scored in a 1-1 draw with Yugoslavia.

He had formed a useful partnership with Dean Saunders but, as money issues loomed, Saunders was sold to Oxford and soon, after being voted player of the season, Connor also left as the Albion were relegated; Barry Lloyd being unable to halt the slide back to the third tier.

Reflecting on his time at Brighton in a matchday programme interview, Connor said: “I really enjoyed my football, playing on the south coast. We also loved the lifestyle and my eldest daughter was born there, I loved playing in the atmosphere created at the Goldstone. There was a bond with the players and their partners, with Jimmy Melia and Mike Bamber, and it was like one big happy family.”

As Lloyd was forced to sell players, Connor returned to the top flight via a £200,000 move along the coast to newly-promoted Portsmouth. A terrible run of injuries plagued his Pompey career meaning he only managed 58 appearances and scored 14 goals over the course of three seasons.

A £150,000 transfer fee saw him join then Third Division Swansea City for the 1990-91 season and although he managed 39 appearances, he scored only six times.

Next stop was Bristol City in September 1991 for £190,000 but he scored only once in 16 games for the Robins. By the summer of 1993 he dropped out of the league to play for Conference side Yeovil Town and when he retired from playing he became a coach at Swindon Town.

John Ward took Connor as a coach to three clubs he managed, Bristol Rovers and City and then Wolverhampton Wanderers, where, across the reigns of several managers, he remained for the next 13 years. He worked at youth, reserve and first team level before becoming McCarthy’s assistant in 2008. He briefly took the reigns himself after McCarthy was sacked in early 2012 but, unable to halt the team’s relegation from the Premiership, reverted to assistant under the newly-appointed Ståle Solbakken for just four games of the new season before leaving Molineux.

Within three months, he resumed his role as McCarthy’s assistant when the pair were appointed at Portman Road. When McCarthy took over as the Republic of Ireland boss in November 2018, Connor once again was his assistant and in 2020 the pair found themselves at the top Cypriot side APOEL. In early 2021, McCarthy and Connor were back in tandem at Championship side Cardiff City.