GOALKEEPER Mikkel Andersen was one of five loan signings in Albion’s line-up for newly-appointed manager Russell Slade’s first match.
Alas the young Dane was unable to help the Seagulls to a much-needed win as they succumbed 2-1 at Leyton Orient on 7 March 2009.
The Danish giant, who came from Reading with a glowing endorsement from ex-Albion boss Steve Coppell, played five matches during Michel Kuipers’ absence through injury – and conceded 10 goals in four defeats.
The one victory he was part of was a convincing one: he was between the sticks when Albion trounced Slade’s previous employer Yeovil Town 5-0 at Withdean (two each for Dean Cox and Nicky Forster, the other a Glenn Murray penalty).
Andersen was still only 20 when he joined the Seagulls and at 6’5” he towered over most of his teammates.
The youngster had spent two years at Reading by then but had already been out on loan three times: to Torquay United and Rushden & Diamonds, where he played three times for each. Ironically, his debut for Rushden came against the club he’d just left, Torquay.
At Brentford, his one appearance for the then League Two Bees was to cover for the suspended Ben Hamer, who was also on loan from Reading.
It might have been brief but Andersen’s performance in Brentford’s 2-1 home win over Bradford City in December 2008 earned him the Man of the Match honour.
In a late flurry of goals, Marcus Bean put Brentford 1-0 up in the 88th minute only for Michael Boulding to equalise in the 89th minute. Bees won the match courtesy of a 90th minute winner from former Albion striker Nathan Elder.
At Brighton, Andersen was reunited with Tony Godden, who had only just succeeded Paul Crichton as Albion’s goalkeeper coach. Godden had previously worked with the Dane at Rushden & Diamonds.
Andersen told the matchday programme: “I was on an emergency loan and he was the coach. I really enjoyed it there and it was Tony who told Brighton about me.
“I’ve been at Reading for two years now and I’ve just signed another new deal for them so hopefully I’ll be there for another two years.
“But you need to play some league games to build up your experience and that is why I am here. I want to develop both as a player and a person – that is why I came to England in the first place, something I always wanted to do when I was growing up in Denmark.”
The month before he joined Brighton, Andersen had made his debut for Denmark’s under 21 international side having already been capped at under 19 and under 20 levels. The Danes beat Malta 1-0.
Albion made their move on Godden’s recommendation shortly before Slade took over from the departed Micky Adams. Caretaker boss Dean White, who completed the deal with chairman Dick Knight, told the Argus: “Mikkel is an up and coming young goalkeeper. He is a big presence and comes highly recommended by Steve Coppell.
“With the current situation as it is we need cover in this position. It’s an important position, Mikkel has played against us in the reserves this season and we know what he’s about.”
Born in the Copenhagen suburb of Herlev on 17 December 1988, Andersen started out with AB Copenhagen and became Denmark’s youngest ever goalkeeper to play senior football when he turned out for them at the age of 17.
It was while on a pre-season tour with AB Copenhagen, playing against a Reading XI at Palmer Park, a municipal multi-sports venue in Reading, he earned his break in the English game.
“AB is ten minutes from home,” he said. “I wanted to come to England to develop as a player and a person.
“I was on a training camp with AB and we played against Reading and after that they gave me a couple of trials. They signed me when I turned 18.”
Although Andersen had been on a pre-season tour with the Royals and been selected as goalkeeper back-up on the bench, there were several other loan spells away from Berkshire before he finally made his first team debut.
For much of his time at the club, he was behind Marcus Hahnemann and Adam Federici in the goalkeeping pecking order.
He spent almost the whole of the 2009-10 season at Bristol Rovers (playing 39 matches) and returned the following season when he featured a further 19 times, before returning to Reading. He was awarded the League One side’s Young Player of the Year trophy and was named in the BBC Team of The Year.
In August 2012, he began a three-month loan spell at League One Portsmouth and he returned to Denmark for the whole of the 2013-14 season, playing for Danish Superliga team Randers Freja.
When he finally rejoined parent club Reading, by now under Nigel Adkins, for the 2014-15 season, his long-awaited first team debut came in September away to Sheffield Wednesday. Andersen made another four appearances for the Royals before the season’s close, after Steve Clarke succeeded Adkins.
Although he played in a memorable 1-0 FA Cup third round win at Huddersfield Town in January 2015, he was on the bench (Federici was no.1) as the Royals went right through to the semi-finals where they lost to Arsenal.
In June 2015, Andersen signed a two-year contract with Danish Superliga side FC Midtjylland.
He played 11 UEFA games with the Danish side, when he was up against the likes of Rubin Kazan, Napoli, Club Brugge and Manchester United.
Following 42 appearances in two years with FC Midtjylland, Andersen made the switch to Lyngby, of Copenhagen.
After a season there, he rejoined Midtjylland and in the 2020-21 campaign he was limited to just four games, although two were in the Champions League against Liverpool and Ajax.
In 2021 he stayed in Jutland and joined newly-promoted Viborg FC where he made only six appearances in two years. He then switched to Copenhagen-based Danish Second Division side Fremad Amager where he made 52 appearances over two seasons as goalkeeper and coach.
THE MAN whose all-time appearance record was overtaken by James Milner in February 2026 spent six years from the age of nine training once a week at Albion’s school of excellence in Seaford.
Hastings-born Gareth Barry made one substitute appearance for the youth team but, with off-field issues clouding Albion’s horizon at the time, decided to continue his football education at Premier League Aston Villa.
“It wasn’t nice being at Brighton then,” Barry told Spencer Vignes in a matchday programme interview. “There was talk about the club folding and, if that had happened, I could have been left in the middle of nowhere.
Gareth Barry was a young Seagull in the 1995-96 season
“They were in Division Three and looking like they were going out of the league, so there were a lot of things favouring a move away.”
His move to the Birmingham suburb of Sutton Coldfield was the springboard to a stellar career that saw him go on to make an all-time record 653 Premier League appearances for Villa, Manchester City, Everton and West Brom as well as earn 53 caps for England.
He spent 12 years at Villa, became the club captain, was their Player of the Season in 2006-07 and made 440 league and cup appearances.
He made his Premier League debut at 17 on 2 May 1998, going on as a 49th minute substitute for Ian Taylor in a 3-1 win away to Sheffield Wednesday (Lee Hendrie was one of Villa’s scorers and future England manager Gareth Southgate was in defence).
His first start came in the last game of that season against champions Arsenal: it was eventful. He started in midfield up against Patrick Vieira and Emmanuel Petit and ended at centre-half covering for Ugo Ehiogu who’d been sent off. Before long he was a regular first team pick.
Barry on his full Villa debut against Arsenal
Noting the progress of their former player, the then hard-up Seagulls (as they were back in the 1990s) sought compensation for their early nurturing of Barry and his friend Michael Standing, who’d also switched from Albion to Villa at the same time.
Villa disputed the claim and, at a Football League Appeals Tribunal in London, Villa’s manager, the ex-Albion player John Gregory, declared Brighton chairman Dick Knight wouldn’t recognise Barry if he stood on Brighton Pier with a ball under his arm and a seagull on his head.
If he thought that was funny, the smile was soon wiped from his face when the powers-that-be sided with little old Brighton and ordered the Villains to cough up.
During the hearing, Les Rogers, the Albion youth coach spoke with knowledge and passion about the work he had done with Barry and Standing from under 10s to under 16s.
Les Rogers
Although he had only played one youth team game as a sub, Barry had featured in various age group teams as a left-sided defender, left-back and in midfield (Standing had actually been the better prospect in the younger age groups but he never made it to the Villa first team).
“We made the case that Albion had seen Gareth as a player of real potential from the early days and had given him and Michael top-quality coaching,” Knight recalled in his autobiography, Mad Man: From The Gutter To The Stars. “Whatever this boy had become – he was already being talked about as a future England international – was 95 per cent down to the football education he’d received from Brighton.”
Screenshot
The tribunal worked out a club and international appearances payment instalments package Villa should pay to Albion that, over time, would have totalled £1,025,000, plus a sell-on percentage. (There was a technical hitch over the compensation for Standing. It was eventually set at £200,000).
In spite of the ruling over Barry, aggrieved Villa started to stall on the payments due and, because Knight was desperate for cash to keep ailing Albion alive, he eventually did a once-and-for-all deal with Villa chairman ‘Deadly’ Doug Ellis.
It meant the total Villa paid Albion for Barry was £850,000. As Knight would later rue, it meant when Barry was sold to Manchester City for £12.5million, Brighton missed out on £1.8million they would have received if the original tribunal settlement had remained valid.
Born on 23 February 1981, Barry’s footballing prowess first showed at William Parker Grammar School and as well as training with Brighton’s East Sussex school of excellence at Seaford, he earned recognition at school, district and county levels.
“My upbringing wasn’t overly comfortable,” Barry told reporter Joe Bernstein in a 2016 interview for the Daily Mail. “I’ve got three brothers and two sisters. Dad was a plumber who worked really hard to support six children, and mum was busy at home. The four brothers shared a room, a bunk bed on each side. It wasn’t luxurious.”
It was only in his final year at William Parker that national scouts took notice and he had a number of suitors prepared to take him on. He shunned offers from Brighton, Arsenal, Chelsea and Crystal Palace, and took his mum and dad’s advice to move 200 miles from home.
“My mum and dad were keen for me to skip London and go to the Midlands. They felt a proper move would serve me better than coming home every weekend. So, I did my GCSEs and left,” he recalled.
“I lived in digs, the minibus would arrive at seven in the morning and I wouldn’t get back until five in the afternoon. I missed my family but drilled it into my mind that I was there for the football. It was a very good decision from my parents.”
Managers came and went at Villa – Graham Taylor and David O’Leary before Martin O’Neill – and Barry remained a stalwart of the side, appointed captain under O’Neill in August 2006.
Bigger clubs started sniffing around him and in 2008 it looked like he would move to Liverpool with Steve Finnan as a makeweight, but Liverpool weren’t prepared to meet Villa’s asking price.
Barry took an unwise move to go public with his desire to leave and ended up having the captaincy withdrawn, being fined and ordered to train on his own, before patching things up.
O’Neill told the Birmingham Mail: “We obviously don’t want him to go, so the price we are asking is a fair and realistic one for a player who is so good. In fact, I think it is really cheap.
“My own view is that he should hang around for another year and see if we can make further progress as he would want.
“Gareth is still only 28 next year – if we don’t get where he wants to go, everybody would wish him well.” The following year fees were agreed with Manchester City and Liverpool.
Barry chose City because he was annoyed that Liverpool hadn’t found the cash the year before and he also didn’t pick up the right mood music from Reds’ boss Rafa Benitez about where he would fit into their set-up.
“I met the City manager Mark Hughes in a hotel. He emphasised the ambition of the owners. He described it as a speeding train and his advice was to jump on,” said Barry. “’It appealed to me that City hadn’t won a trophy for so long and I’d be part of the team to end it.”
It was the right choice because he went on to win the FA Cup in 2011 and the Premier League in 2012.
Barry’s development into a full England international began with selection at under-16 level, he went on to captain the under-18s and earned 27 caps for the under-21s between 1998 and 2003, equalling Jamie Carragher’s record, until it was beaten by James Milner.
When still only 19, Barry made two substitute appearances for Kevin Keegan’s senior team, picking up his first full cap against Ukraine in a Wembley friendly on 31 May 2000, shortly after he’d played in Villa’s 1-0 FA Cup Final defeat to Chelsea.
His first start for England was four months later in a 1–1 draw against France and he was a halftime sub against Germany in the 1-0 defeat that was Keegan’s last in charge and the last game played at the old Wembley.
Caretaker manager Howard Wilkinson selected him at left-back for a World Cup qualifier in Helsinki with Martin Keown captain for the one and only time. Antti Niemi and Sami Hyypia were playing for Finland. The game finished 0-0 but was full of controversy in that some felt Niemi should have been sent off for wiping out Teddy Sheringham outside his area in only the fifth minute and a late ‘goal’ by Ray Parlour was deemed not to have crossed the line.
During Sven Goran Eriksson’s time in charge Barry lost his England place to Ashley Cole and Wayne Bridge although he did make late sub appearances in May 2003 against South Africa and Serbia and Montenegro.
It was then another four years before he was recalled and became a regular, firstly under Steve McClaren and then Fabio Capello. Barry captained England against Ghana in a 1-1 draw in March 2011 and won his 50th cap for England against Spain later that year.
He scored in games against Trinidad and Kazakhstan and his headed goal (some said it was a Daniel Majstorović own goal) against Sweden in November 2011 was a landmark one – the 2,000th for England since their first international in 1872.
Bobby Zamora was up front for England that day, replaced in the 70th minute by Darren Bent, and Milner went on for Jack Rodwell. David Stockdale was an unused sub.
Barry’s last cap came when Roy Hodgson sent him on as a half-time sub for Steven Gerrard in a 1-0 win away to Norway in May 2012 and was then subbed off injured in the 73rd minute.
Barry initially left City for Everton on a season-long loan for the 2013-14 campaign during which he joined an elite club in going past 500 Premier League appearances and helped the Toffees seal a return to European competition for the first time since 2010 when they finished fifth.
He moved to Goodison Park on a permanent three-year deal in 2014 and played in all but one of their 10 UEFA Europa League games in 2014-15. The following season, when he turned 35, Barry claimed an awards double by being named both Everton’s Player and Players’ Player of the Season.
He told evertonfc.com: “It’s fantastic. It was great for me to be nominated and win these awards. If you look at the talent in our dressing room, for me to be chosen as the Player of the Season, it means a lot to me.
“Both awards mean so much and when you are getting voted by the players you are training with each day and then playing with, any professional will tell you that it means a lot.”
After a total of 154 appearances for Everton, he joined West Brom in August 2017 to fill the void left by the departure of Darren Fletcher.
Albion head coach Tony Pulis said: “He’s a fantastic player and I think his attitude towards playing is really gauged by the fact that Everton had offered him a two-year contract to stay there. He really wants to play and I’m really looking forward to working with him.”
Barry had one season in the Premier League with Albion, and another in the Championship after their relegation in 2018. Injury brought his 2018-19 season to an early end and he was initially released before re-signing in November 2019 until the end of the season.
Although 38 by then, he said: “I came to West Brom as a Premier League club and I want to help take it back there. I believe it is where this club really deserves to be.”
Baggies boss Slaven Bilic told BBC WM: “It will be brilliant to have him with us.
“You need that kind of quality in the middle of the park, and you need that kind of character around you in good times and hard times because he has been through it all.”
He finally called time on his career in August 2020, however, Barry didn’t stop pulling on his boots and turned out for Kidderminster-based Comberton Dynamoes Vets (who also included another ex-Villa player in Darren Byfield in their ranks).
He was once again in the headlines in July 2024 when, aged 43, he signed for 12th-tier Hurstpierpoint, in the second tier of the Mid Sussex Football League, to play alongside his lifelong friend and agent Michael Standing.
• As Milner closed in on Barry’s all-time Premier League appearances record, Barry told OLBG.com editor-in-chief Steve Madgwick: “Having played with James at Villa, Man City and England, and he’s a good friend, I know how hard he’s worked and he’s left no stone unturned.
“He is the ultimate professional, so if James is to pass it, it’s going to someone that fully deserves it because he’s getting every ounce out of the career that he deserves because he’s putting the maximum effort in. Now with that, he’s got quality as well. That’s not to be underrated.”
CORK-BORN George O’Callaghan had something of a yo-yo footballing career after bursting onto the professional scene as a talented teenager.
Eyed by Arsenal and Spurs when he was in his formative years at Port Vale (then in the Championship), he turned to drink when ex-Albion captain and manager Brian Horton dropped him from the Vale first team.
Although the tall midfielder worked his way back into contention, he returned home to Ireland to rebuild his career before making several other attempts to succeed in the English game.
Over the course of five years, he was an influential cog in Cork’s League of Ireland side, the highlight coming with a championship win in 2005 when he scored eleven goals from midfield and was voted League Player of the Season.
He survived meningitis in 2006 just a handful of months before another Championship side, Ipswich Town, gave him another opportunity to make it in England but he struggled to hold down a place at Portman Road.
After only 13 appearances, the Tractor Boys were prepared to offload him to third tier Brighton. A deal was agreed in August 2007 but he made the move on loan rather than permanently because he still thought he could make it in Suffolk.
By then 28, the player brought experience and creativity to Dean Wilkins’ largely young side, slotting in effectively in the centre of Albion’s midfield alongside Dean Hammond, making 16 starts and one appearance off the bench.
But his Irish gift of the gab brought it all to a messy end. He publicly criticised chairman Dick Knight’s handling of contract negotiations in an explosive article in TheArgus and didn’t play for the Seagulls again.
The Irishman told reporter Andy Naylor he thought the team was in danger of falling apart because chairman Knight had been too slow to sort out contracts and loans.
Knight countered: “We have given him the chance to shine and show his talents. It’s not George O’Callaghan’s business to tell the club what we should be doing.”
The midfielder spoke out after Albion capitulated 3-0 at Millwall on Boxing Day. He told Naylor: “There are a lot of lads who are very important to this team that don’t know if they are coming or going and I think it’s about time the club got a grip on it and sorted it out, because it has dragged on for too long and I feel it is starting to affect the players.
“I just don’t think it is right and it’s something the club needs to look at. It used to happen at Cork City when I was there and we lost a lot of good players. We lost Kevin Doyle and Shane Long for peanuts over contracts not being sorted out early and quickly.
“It makes you angry as a player. I can cope with it, because I am a lot older than the other lads, but the young lads are really upset and it’s not right.”
O’Callaghan’s version of events the club would have wanted to keep to themselves plainly differed from Knight’s while Wilkins was stuck in the middle.
“I know the manager tries his best behind the scenes,” said O’Callaghan. “He is fantastic. I think he works with a very small budget. It must be more frustrating for him, because he has built a team and it could easily fall apart now.
No holding back where O’Callaghan was concerned
“Things should have been sorted out a lot quicker. It has been a big thing in the squad in the last few weeks. I’ve mentioned it and the club need to sort it out now.”
The Irishman said he had encountered something similar at Ipswich the previous season, pointing out players just needed to know where they stood.
“I don’t want to stay and then see our best lads go, like Hammo,” he reasoned. “If we want to make that push for the play-offs and get back into the Championship it needs to be sorted.”
Knight was in no mood to take that sort of broadside from a loan player and told the reporter: “The team’s performance was absolutely woeful. I think certain players should be looking at themselves before trying to deflect criticism elsewhere. I thought it was a disgrace.
“George O’Callaghan is totally out of order. I would suggest he is trying to deflect attention away from his own performance, which was frankly poor, and he wasn’t the only one.
“Young players within the club are dealt with contract wise as and when the time is right.”
Knight maintained that he’d already agreed with Ipswich that both O’Callaghan and fellow Town loanee Matt Richards could extend their loans until the end of the season but neither player wanted to commit to it until they’d explored other options.
Unsurprisingly, O’Callaghan’s stay with the Seagulls came to an abrupt end and he returned to Portman Road.
Sidestepping the spat with Knight, O’Callaghan reckoned his return to Ipswich was his decision, telling The Argus: “I enjoyed playing regularly at Brighton but I spoke with the gaffer and decided it is right to try again at Ipswich and try to get first team action.
“They are a good bunch of lads at Brighton and I enjoyed playing with them so I hope things work out for them.”
When a month later there was no look-in happening with the Tractor Boys, he returned to Ireland once again to play for his old club, Cork City. It was part of a familiar pattern.
Deadline day signings David Martot and George O’Callaghan
O’Callaghan had joined the Albion on loan (the same day David Martot signed a similar arrangement from Le Havre) on August transfer deadline day having rejected a permanent move earlier that month (the clubs had agreed a £60,000 deal plus £15,000 based on appearances).
The player said at the time: “It would be a shame to leave Ipswich because the supporters have been brilliant to me, even though they never saw enough of me, and all the lads are fantastic, but I need to be playing regular football.”
Town manager Jim Magilton praised O’Callaghan’s ability and attitude and empathised with his frustration at not getting a run in the side. He said: “I don’t want to lose George but I wouldn’t stand in his way. He has been great since he has been here. He is very popular in the dressing room and he has done very well.
Tractor Boy O’Callaghan
“But he is 28 years of age and needs to be playing games. I have been there, so totally understand how frustrating it can be. We will do anything we can to help him.
“I have absolutely no problems with George. He has been top class since he came here. His attitude is first-class in training and in games.”
O’Callaghan had impressed Knight in a reserves match when Ipswich beat the Seagulls’ second string.
When O’Callaghan finally agreed the temporary move, Albion also wanted his Town teammate Richards on loan, but he too prevaricated, only to change his mind the following month. It was the first of three loan spells with the Albion. Brighton also wanted a third Ipswich player, injury-prone Dean Bowditch, who had briefly been on loan the previous season, and he eventually returned for a month in 2008.
Born in Cork on 5 September 1979, O’Callaghan left Ireland as a teenager to pursue his football dream and in a March 2020 podcast with the Irish Examiner, he talked about his early days at Port Vale when he was regarded as one of the hottest properties in football.
“Arsenal came in for me when I was 18,” he said. “I was waiting outside the manager John Rudge’s office and Pat Rice, who was Arsene Wenge’s assistant at the time, came out and said: ‘George, we can’t get you this time, we’ll get you next time,’.”
When the youngster protested to Rudge, he was told Arsenal had only offered £1m for him and Vale wanted £2m. O’Callaghan continued to progress in Vale’s Championship team but when Rudge was replaced by Horton, he was demoted back to the youth team.
In another podcast, A Footballer’s Life, O’Callaghan admitted to Graham Cummins that he turned to drink as his promising career stalled. “You’re responsible for your own actions so it’s ultimately your own fault. But nobody looked out for me or had my back at the club. Nobody caught me and said, ‘George, what’s going on, you’re not yourself’.
“Those days, the clubs didn’t care, it was old school, you were put out to do the job and if you didn’t you were replaced.
“You never asked anyone for help in those days. I kind of went into meltdown. Everything unravelled, I didn’t know what I was doing.”
When he eventually got back in the first team picture, he said Arsenal’s north London rivals Spurs then showed an interest in him. “David Pleat tried to sign me for Tottenham. But Brian Horton said: ‘You’re doing really well,’ and offered me a two-year deal and doubled my money.”
He asked Rudge’s opinion about the situation and when told he should stay at Vale because he’d struggle to get games for Spurs, he stayed put. “I took his advice and signed the contract. Within about 14 months I was finished, sent home.
“It was a massive mistake, a big, big mistake. I was too comfortable in the situation I was in. I probably didn’t have the guts to go ahead with it. I loved playing for Port Vale but I should have pushed for Arsenal and Tottenham. And then you can always go out on loan if it doesn’t work out.”
One of O’Callaghan’s early matches for Albion was against his old club and unsurprisingly he was a natural interviewee before the game. “It is a very special club to me because I started off my career there when I was only 15,” he told TheArgus.
The Irishman scored four goals in 22 league starts plus 12 sub appearances for Vale and felt he probably had a point to prove coming up against them (Albion won 1-0 with a goal from Alex Revell).
“I never showed Port Vale fans what I can do,” he said. “I took a few wrong roads when I was a kid and it has taken me a while to get back to where I am now.
“It will be nice to put on a good performance and show them what they have missed; the player I have turned into. I never fulfilled my potential there.
“I started off doing well there as a kid but I didn’t really have the right guidance and it all went pear-shaped. As soon as John Rudge left as manager and Brian Horton came in, my chances were limited. I think that is where it all went wrong.
“Obviously, I wasn’t his type of footballer. People said he was a good footballer, but he wanted physical lads.
“Maybe at the time I wasn’t physical enough and he didn’t fancy me. I don’t blame him in any way because at the end of the day it is all down to yourself and how you look after yourself.”
He added: “I had so many knocks there that it took the fire out of me. I had to go back to Cork to get that fire back into me and build my career again.
“It was a big learning curve in my life. I lost my career in English football for a while and had to battle hard to get back.”
The player’s topsy-turvy career continued back at Cork City before he had another go in England, spending eight months at Tranmere Rovers. Once again he returned to Ireland, this time to play for Dundalk, but the lure of the English game beckoned again.
O’Callaghan linked up with Yeovil Town in the summer of 2009 and played in three pre-season friendlies. In the opening months of the season, he made 15 appearances (including six from the bench) but found it difficult to break into the team past the partnership of Jean-Paul Kalala and Shaun MacDonald.
Next stop, in December that year, was Waterford but before long he was back at Cork City once again. Brentford took him on a two-week trial but nothing came of it and instead he went to then Conference side Cambridge United but didn’t feature.
The wandering Irishman at one point tied his luck with Brunei side Duli Pengiran Muda Mahkota but he got into trouble for failing to bow to the Crown Prince.
His old Brighton and Ipswich teammate Nicky Forster took him on at Dover Athletic but he only played once for the Conference South team, and he announced his retirement on Christmas Eve 2012.
He briefly managed Sabah in the Malaysia Premier League in 2014 but he struggled to deal with El Hadji Diouf and was sacked in January 2015 when he started missing training sessions.
Four years after playing what he thought was his last game, he turned out for junior Cork club Rockmount.
After packing up playing, O’Callaghan became an agent and spent a year as a business development manager for William Hill. He was a general manager for gym chain Anytime Fitness for two years and later co-founded agency TEN Sports Management.
ONE-TIME Norwich City hero Ian Culverhouse flew high in the Premier League and Europe with the Canaries and ended his playing days at basement Brighton where he began a lengthy coaching and managing career.
It was only at the end of November 2024 that Culverhouse began a new managerial post, taking charge of sixth tier (National League South) side St Albans City.
A few weeks previously he had parted company from Boston United because they were struggling to come to terms with life in the tier above.
Culverhouse was brought to Brighton by Brian Horton in 1998, shortly after he’d been picked up by non-league Kingstonian having been given a free transfer earlier in the year by Swindon Town. He’d spent three and a half years at the County Ground, including being a key player in their Second Division Championship-winning squad of 1995-96, but left the Robins after falling-out with manager Steve McMahon.
He’d only played twice for Kingstonian before he joined Brighton, who were playing in exile at Gillingham at the time.
Signed on a monthly contract initially, his presence as a sweeper helped plug holes at the back and saw Torquay United, Scarborough and Swansea City all beaten. But after two months, Horton decided to dispense with a sweeper and play a flat back four, so Culverhouse was let go.
But when Albion promptly lost 3-1 to Mansfield Town without him, Horton had a change of heart. He re-signed Culverhouse before a week was up, gave him a contract until the end of the season and even made him captain (in the absence of injured Gary Hobson). Quite some turnaround.
“He was one of the best readers of the game the Albion have had,” reckoned wearebrighton.com. “Culverhouse would always be in the right place at the right time, on the scene to stop danger before anybody realised that there was danger coming.”
The musically-minded wags amongst the Albion die-hards also found the perfect terrace song for him – sung to the tune of Our House by Madness, ‘Culverhouse, in the middle of defence’ became a popular ditty.
He completed 38 appearances for the Seagulls that season and took his first steps towards a coaching and managing career under Horton’s successor, Jeff Wood, when he began coaching the reserve side. Wood said: “Ian has shown on the field that he is a player of immense ability. In his new coaching role, he will now have the opportunity to pass his knowledge on to the younger players at the club.”
A grateful Culverhouse added: “This is a good opportunity for me and I am looking forward to it.
“It’s the first chance I’ve had to coach and it’s something I wanted to do anyway when my career finished. It has just come at a nice time.”
Albion’s then chairman, Dick Knight, told the Argus: “Ian has impressed me greatly with not only his experience but his attitude.
“He has been a real leader in the dressing room as well as on the field and we are giving him a chance to bring that know-how to bear on the coaching side.”
Culverhouse was retained as reserve team coach after Micky Adams took over from Wood towards the end of the season, and the new boss told the Argus: “Ian reminds me a bit of myself. You have got to get on the ladder somewhere. He is enthusiastic, has had a good career and sets himself high standards.
“He has a lot to learn in terms of coaching, but I hope he will become fully qualified along with the rest of my staff.
“He will still be registered as a player as well in case we need him in emergencies, but I don’t envisage him playing too many games.”
In fact, there was just the one final first team appearance for him, when Adams tried to bring a halt to a six-game winless run at the start of 2000. But it didn’t go well and he was subbed off in a 2-0 defeat at Hull.
“It is fair to say we have possibly seen the last of Culvs in a first team shirt,” Adams admitted later. “He is still registered as a player, but his career is probably over. It was me that persuaded him to play at Hull. He wasn’t sure he would be up to it in terms of fitness.”
Born in Bishops Stortford, Hertfordshire, on 22 September 1964, Culverhouse was in the England Youth squad for an international junior tournament in Norway in the summer of 1982, starting in a 4-1 defeat to the home nation and gaining a second cap as a sub in a 3-2 win over Poland.
In the same year, he began as an apprentice at Tottenham. He impressed in Spurs’ youth and reserve sides and spent three years at the Lane. “I was playing alongside players like Ricky Villa, Ossie Ardiles and Glenn Hoddle, which was tremendous experience,” he said.
He even collected a UEFA Cup winners’ medal in 1984 as an unused substitute in the first leg of Spurs’ win (on penalties) over Anderlecht; future Albion boss Chris Hughton was left-back and recent signing from Albion, Gary Stevens, was in midfield, and scored one of the decisive penalties.
But Culverhouse only made one full appearance for the first team, plus one as a substitute, and in October 1985 moved to Norwich under Ken Brown for a £50,000 fee. He was part of the Norfolk club’s Second Division title-winning side of 1985-86 in his first season and became an established defender, usually as a right-back but also as a sweeper.
Culverhouse for the Canaries
He was part of the successful Canaries side that finished third in the inaugural Premier League season of 1992-93 after enjoying three top five finishes in the old First Division, reaching two FA Cup semi-finals (1989 and 1992) and playing in Europe (1993-94). He won the club’s player-of the-year award in 1990-91.
The excellent Norwich fans website Flown From The Nest blamed the Robert Chase regime for Culverhouse’s eventual departure from Carrow Road after nine years.
“From being an integral part of the City team that finished third in the Premiership and enjoyed UEFA Cup success, Ian Culverhouse found himself at the start of the 1994-95 season out of contract and out of favour with Robert Chase and manager John Deehan,” it said. “Similar problems had occurred the previous season with Dave Phillips.”
Culverhouse with the Robins
Together with the contract issues, Culverhouse went public to criticise Deehan’s decision to drop him, which ended any chance he had of regaining his place. Eventually, he was transferred to Swindon for the bargain sum of £150,000 in December 1994, the fee being fixed by a tribunal.
After he left Brighton in 2000, Culverhouse became youth coach at Barnet and two years later joined Leyton Orient in a similar role before being elevated to assistant manager. He left the Os in August 2005 – replaced by future Villa boss Dean Smith – but was then appointed coach at Wycombe Wanderers by former Swindon boss John Gorman.
When Paul Lambert succeeded Gorman, he and Culverhouse developed a strong bond. He followed Lambert to Colchester United to become assistant manager, then returned to Norwich in the same role, where he didn’t forget Wood’s role in setting him on the coaching ladder, being instrumental in the former Albion manager’s appointment as Norwich’s goalkeeping coach.
At the end of their first season, Lambert and Culverhouse steered Norwich to the League One title. The following season, they won promotion to the Premier League and finished 12th in their inaugural season back at the elite level. When Lambert quit Norwich to take charge at Aston Villa in July 2012, Culverhouse and fellow ‘lieutenant’ Gary Karsa followed him.
Coach at Villa under Paul Lambert
In June 2013, Lambert told the Birmingham Mail how much trust he placed in his right-hand man. “My assistant boss Ian Culverhouse has a real eye for a player,” he said. “If he reckons we should go for someone I will back his judgement 100 per cent.”
But in April 2014 Culverhouse and Karsa were suspended by the club after being accused of bullying and aggressiveness by players and other staff members, and they were sacked the following month.
Between January 2016 and February 2017, Culverhouse was assistant manager to veteran boss John Still at Dagenham & Redbridge. He left the Daggers to become manager of Southern League Premier Division side King’s Lynn Town. In May 2018, he moved on to Grantham Town but left after only five months and returned to King’s Lynn.
He led them to a second place finish in the Southern League, and. in the subsequent play-offs against Northern Premier League Warrington, saw the Linnets win 3-2 in extra time to earn a place in the National League (North) for 2019-20.
This was the Covid-affected season in which the fixtures weren’t completed. Lynn finished the games played two points behind York City with two games in hand. The National League board ultimately decided, using an “unweighted points per game” formula that Lynn would have won the title and they therefore gained promotion to the National League.
However, on 29 November 2021 he was sacked by Lynn on the back of a run of eight league defeats in a row which left the club second from bottom of the National League and struggling for survival.
Two months later, he was back in management at National League North Kettering Town, together with assistant Paul Bastock, although that tenure only lasted four months.
Next stop was Boston United in September of the same year, a club all too familiar to Bastock, who played 679 games for the Pilgrims (and broke Peter Shilton’s record in competitive club football when he made his 1,250th appearance in the game in 2017).
The pair helped to preserve Boston’s league status in their first season and then guided them to promotion via the play-offs in May 2024. United’s struggle in higher company – only two wins in 16 matches – led to Culverhouse and Bastock leaving the Jakemans Community Stadium in October 2024.
REGARDLESS of the often overblown ‘bitter rivalry’ between Brighton and Crystal Palace, many people have served both clubs with equal distinction, none more so than Martin Hinshelwood.
A player at Palace until injury curtailed his career when only 27, he went on to have a long career in the game, much of it with Brighton; more often in youth development as a coach and briefly as the no.1.
In the summer of 2002, his appointment as Albion boss 11 weeks after his former Palace teammate Peter Taylor had quit came as something of a surprise considering chairman Dick Knight declared he had interviewed seven candidates for the post.
In more recent times, Albion have had a Uruguayan, a Spaniard, a Finn and an Italian as head coach, back in 2002 it looked a strong possibility Knight might appoint wild-haired German coach Winfried Schafer, who had just managed Cameroon at the World Cup, but the chairman suspected his lack of command of English might be too big a hurdle to get over.
A terrific start
A clear favourite had been Steve Coppell but when the ex-Palace manager fell asleep during his conversation with Knight, apparently fatigued after a long-haul flight, the chairman was suitably unimpressed and, with time running out before the 2002-03 season got under way, Hinshelwood was appointed instead.
A 3-1 win away to Burnley looked like a terrific start but after a 0-0 home draw with Coventry, the side went on a disastrous 10-game losing spell (a 2-1 League Cup win over Exeter City the only bright spot amid the gloom).
Knight had already publicly signalled he would take decisive action after the sixth defeat in a row – a 4-2 home reverse to nine-man Gillingham!
He told the Argus: “If the team went ten matches losing every one, then you have got to do something about it.
“It’s very easy to criticise him (Hinshelwood). Obviously, he is a manager under pressure because we have just lost six games.
Getting his message across
“To suggest we should instantly sack him puts out the wrong message. Most people right now will think it was the wrong decision to appoint him, but I am not going to panic. I am going to monitor the situation.”
Of course, that monitoring didn’t take long to reach an inevitable conclusion – four more defeats and Hinshelwood was relieved of first team duties. He was made ‘director of football’ and Knight went back to Coppell to try to keep the Albion in the division. He very nearly managed it, too, but such a bad run of defeats had taken their toll on the points total.
As it happened, it wasn’t the first time Hinshelwood had found himself in the Albion hotseat: he was caretaker manager on three occasions: in 1993 (before Liam Brady’s appointment), in 2001 (after Micky Adams left for Leicester) and again in 2009, when he was in charge for a 4-4 FA Cup first round tie at Wycombe Wanderers after Russell Slade had been sacked and before Gus Poyet’s arrival.
When researching backgrounds of any number of players for this blog, Hinshelwood’s name is often cited as the one who either made the approach to bring them to Brighton or who was a major influence in their development.
For example, when Hinshelwood first joined the Albion in 1987, from Chelsea, he was instrumental in bringing from Stamford Bridge to the Goldstone Doug Rougvie and Keith Dublin, who both played their part in getting Albion promoted straight back to the second tier in 1988.
Hinshelwood had been reserve team manager at Chelsea for two years during the managerial reign of John Hollins, after first team coach Ernie Walley, his former Palace youth team coach, put in a good word for him.
His long association with Brighton began with a ‘phone call to Barry Lloyd to congratulate him on landing the Albion manager’s job. The former Fulham captain asked Hinshelwood to join him at the Goldstone – and he stayed for the next six and a half years.
He returned to the club in the summer of 1998, when Brian Horton had taken over, and was appointed Director of Youth, with Dean Wilkins as youth team coach.
Pensive Hinsh
An interview with the matchday programme pointed out that across the following 14 years, he oversaw a youth system that produced 31 players who made it through to the first team, although he said such success had very much been a team effort, name-checking Wilkins, centre of excellence managers Vic Bragg and John Lambert, scouting chief Mark Hendon and physio Kim Eaton.
Dean Hammond, Adam Hinshelwood, Adam Virgo, Adam El-Abd, Dean Cox, Jake Robinson, Dan Harding and later Lewis Dunk, Jake Forster-Caskey and Solly March all graduated from that period. “To have been a part of their journeys makes me immensely proud,” he said.
Hinshelwood left the Albion for a second time in 2012 and worked variously for Crawley, Portsmouth, Stoke City and Lewes. He returned to the Seagulls once again when the former head of academy recruitment at Stoke, Dave Wright, who had joined Brighton in 2019, invited him to take on a role of scouting 13 to 16-year-olds.
When Hinshelwood himself was that age, he had visions of following in his dad Wally’s footsteps. He had been a professional for Fulham, Chelsea, Reading, Bristol City and Newport County, and, although born in Reading (on 16 June 1953), young Martin had become accustomed to an unsettled childhood, moving around the country to wherever dad’s next club took him.
The family finally settled in New Addington, near Croydon, with Wally playing non-league football in Kent and Martin played representative football for Dover Under 15s, Croydon Boys and Surrey Under 16s.
He was on schoolboy terms at Fulham when Bobby Robson was manager but they didn’t think he would make it. It was while he was playing for Surrey Schools that former Spurs and Palace manager Arthur Rowe scouted him for Palace and he was taken on as an apprentice in 1969.
Hinshelwood playing for Palace, up against Stoke’s George Eastham
Hinshelwood was given his first team debut by Bert Head in 1972. He played in midfield in the old First Division for a dozen matches but the side were relegated in his first season. The flamboyant fedora-wearing Malcolm Allison took over as manager and he was later replaced by Terry Venables.
Martin’s younger brother Paul (Jack Hinshelwood’s granddad) played in the same side at full-back and the brothers were alongside the likes of Kenny Samson and Peter Taylor. In 1975-76, when still a Third Division side, they shook the football world by making it to the semi-finals of the FA Cup, where they lost to eventual winners Southampton, although Martin missed the game through a right knee injury. It eventually forced him to quit playing in 1978, after he’d made 85 appearances for Palace in five years.
Venables appointed him as youth team coach at Selhurst Park and although he spent 18 months as player-manager of non-league Leatherhead, he then resumed his Palace role under Steve Kember.
Alan Mullery dispensed with Hinshelwood’s services during his brief managerial reign at Palace but he kept his hand in at coaching with non-league clubs Kingstonian, Barking and Dorking.
Selsey-based Hinshelwood then had a spell as manager of Littlehampton before the Chelsea job came up.
DEAN WILKINS might have lived in the shadow of his more famous elder England international brother Ray but he certainly carved out his own footballing history, much of it with Brighton.
Albion fans of a certain vintage will never forget the sumptuous left-footed free-kick bouffant-haired captain Wilkins scored past Phil Parkes at the Goldstone Ground which edged the Seagulls into the second-tier play-offs in 1991.
Supporters from the mid-noughties era would only recall the balding boss of a mid-table League One outfit at Withdean comprising mainly home-grown players who Wilkins had brought through from his days coaching the youth team.
After Dick Knight somewhat unceremoniously brought back Micky Adams over Wilkins’ head in 2008, he quit the club rather than stay on playing second fiddle and subsequently went west to Southampton where he worked under Alan Pardew and his successor Nigel Adkins as well as taking caretaker charge of the Saints in between the two reigns.
Wilkins’ initial association with the Seagulls went back to 1983, when Jimmy Melia brought him to the south coast from Queens Park Rangers shortly after Albion’s FA Cup final appearances at Wembley.
Melia’s successor Chris Cattlin only gave him two starts back then and although he pondered a move to Leyton Orient, where he’d had 10 matches on loan, he opted to accept to try his luck in Holland when his Dutch Albion teammate Hans Kraay set him up with a move to PEC Zwolle. Playing against the likes of Johann Cruyff, Marco Van Basten and Ruud Gullit proved to be quite the footballing education for Wilkins.
Wilkins in the thick of it in Dutch football for PEC Zwolle
After two years in the Netherlands, 25-year-old Wilkins rejoined the relegated Seagulls in the summer of 1987 as the club prepared for life back in the old Third Division under Barry Lloyd.
Relegation had led to the sale for more than £400,000 of star assets Danny Wilson, Terry Connor and Eric Young but more modest funds were allocated to manager Lloyd for replacements: £10,000 for Wilkins, £50,000 for Doug Rougvie, who signed from Chelsea and was appointed captain, Garry Nelson, a £72,500 buy from Plymouth and Kevin Bremner, who cost £65,000 from Reading. Midfield enforcer Mike Trusson was a free transfer.
The refreshed squad ended up earning a swift return to the second tier courtesy of a memorable last day 2-1 win over Bristol Rovers at the Goldstone.
At the higher level, Wilkins had the third highest appearances (40 + two as sub) as Albion finished just below halfway in the table. The following season Wilkins was appointed captain and was ever-present as Albion made it to the divisional play-off final against Notts County at Wembley, having made it to the semi-final v Millwall courtesy of the aforementioned spectacular free kick v Ipswich.
Wilkins scored again at Wembley but it turned out only to be a consolation as the Seagulls succumbed 3-1 to Neil Warnock’s side.
As the 1992-93 season got underway, Wilkins, having just turned 30, was the first matchday programme profile candidate for the opening home game against Bolton Wanderers (a 2-1 win) when he revealed the play-off final defeat had been “the biggest disappointment of my career”.
The 1993-94 season was a write-off from October onwards when he damaged the medial ligaments in both his knees after catching both sets of studs in the soft ground at home against Exeter City.
Although injury plagued much of the time during Liam Brady’s reign as manager, the Irishman acknowledged his ability saying: “He is a very fine footballer and a tremendous passer of the ball and he possesses a great shot.”
Ahead of the start of the 1995-96 season, Wilkins was granted a testimonial game against his former club QPR, managed at the time by big brother Ray. But at the end of the season, when the Seagulls were relegated to the basement division, he was one of six players given a free transfer.
Born in Hillingdon on 12 July 1962, Wilkins couldn’t have wished for a more football-oriented family. Dad George had played for Brentford, Leeds, Nottingham Forest and Hearts and appeared at Wembley in the first wartime FA Cup final. While Ray was the brother who stole the limelight, Graham and Steve also started out at Chelsea.
In spite of those older brothers who also made it as professionals, Wilkins attributed his development at QPR, who he joined straight from school as an apprentice in 1978, to youth coach John Collins (who older fans will remember was Brighton’s first team coach under Mike Bailey).
He made seven first team appearances for Rangers, his debut being as a substitute for Glenn Roeder in a 0-0 draw with Grimsby Town on 1 November 1980. After joining the Albion in August 1983, he had to wait until 10 December that year to make his debut, in a 0-0 draw at Middlesbrough, in place of the absent Tony Grealish. He started at home to Newcastle a week later (a 1-0 defeat), this time taking the midfield spot of injured Jimmy Case.
Perhaps the writing was on the wall when Cattlin secured the services of Wilson from Nottingham Forest, initially on loan, and although Wilkins had a third first team outing in a 2-0 FA Cup third round win at home to Swansea City, boss Cattlin didn’t pick him again. Instead, he joined Orient on loan in March 1984.
A long career in coaching began when Wilkins was brought back to the Albion in 1998 by another ex-skipper, Brian Horton, who had taken over as manager. With Martin Hinshelwood as director of a new youth set-up, Wilkins was appointed the youth coach – a position he held for the following eight years.
Return to the Albion as youth coach
His charges won 4-1 against Cambridge United in his first match, with goals from Duncan McArthur, Danny Marney and Scott Ramsay (two).
That backroom role continued as managers came and went over the following years during which a growing number of youth team products made it through to the first team: people like Dan Harding and Adam Virgo and later Adam Hinshelwood, Joel Lynch, Dean Hammond and Adam El-Abd.
At the start of the 2006-07 season, with Albion back in the third tier after punching above their weight in the Championship for two seasons, Wilkins was rewarded for his achievements with the youth team with promotion to first team coach under Mark McGhee.
By then, more of the youngsters he’d helped to develop were in or getting close to the first team, for example Dean Cox, Jake Robinson, Joe Gatting and Chris McPhee.
After an indifferent start to the season – three wins, three defeats and a draw – Knight decided to axe McGhee and loyal lieutenant Bob Booker and to hand the reins to Wilkins with Dean White as his deputy. Wilkins later brought in his old teammate Ian Chapman as first team coach.
Into the manager’s chair
Tommy Elphick, Tommy Fraser and Sam Rents were other former youth team players who stepped up to the first team. But, over time, it became apparent Knight and Wilkins were not on the same page: the young manager didn’t agree with the chairman that more experienced players were needed rather than relying too much on the youth graduates.
Indeed, in his autobiography Mad Man: From the Gutter to the Stars (Vision Sports Publishing, 2013), Knight said Wilkins hadn’t bothered to travel with him to watch Glenn Murray or Steve Thomson, who were added to the squad, and he was taking the side of certain players in contract negotiations with the chairman.
“In my opinion, his man-management skills were lacking, which was why I made the decision to remove him from the manager’s job,” he said. It didn’t help Wilkins’ cause when midfielder Paul Reid went public to criticise his man-management too.
Knight felt although Wilkins hadn’t sufficiently nailed the no.1 job, he could still be effective as a coach, working under Micky Adams. The pair had previously got on well, with Adams saying in his autobiography, My Life in Football (Biteback Publishing, 2017) how Wilkins had been “one of my best mates”.
But Adams said: “He thought I had stitched him up. I told him that I wanted him to stay. We talked it through and, at the end of the meeting, we seemed to have agreed on the way forward.
“I thought I’d reassured him enough for him to believe he should stay on. But he declined the invitation. He obviously wasn’t happy and attacked me verbally.
“I did have to remind him about the hypocrisy of a member of the Wilkins family having a dig at me, particularly when his older brother had taken my first job at Fulham.
“We don’t speak now which is a regret because he was a good mate and one of the few people I felt I could talk to and confide in.”
Youth coach
Knight knew his decision to sack the manager would not be popular with fans who only remembered the good times, but he pointed out they weren’t aware of the poor relationship he had with some first team players.
Knight described in his book how a torrent of “colourful language” poured out from Wilkins when he was called in and informed of the decision in a meeting with the chairman and director Martin Perry.
“He didn’t take it at all well, although I suppose he felt he was fully justified,” wrote Knight. “He was fuming after what was obviously a big blow to his pride.”
Reporter Andy Naylor perhaps summed up the situation best in The Argus. “The sadness of Wilkins’ departure was that Albion lost not a manager, but a gifted coach,” he said. “Wilkins was not cut out for management.”
Saints coach
One year on, shortly after Alan Pardew took over as manager at League One Southampton, he appointed Wilkins as his assistant. They were joined by Wally Downes (Steve Coppell’s former assistant at Reading) as first team coach and Stuart Murdoch as goalkeeping coach.
Saints were rebuilding having been relegated from the Championship the previous season and began the campaign with a 10-point penalty, having gone into administration. The club had been on the brink of going out of business until Swiss businessman Markus Liebherr took them over.
A seventh place finish (seven points off the play-offs because of the deduction) meant another season in League One and the following campaign had only just got under way when Pardew, Downes and Murdoch were sacked. Wilkins was put in caretaker charge for two matches and then retained when Nigel Adkins, assisted by ex-Seagull Andy Crosby, was appointed manager.
It was the beginning of an association that also saw the trio work together at Reading (2013-14) and Sheffield United (2015-16).
Adkins, Crosby and Wilkins were in tandem as the Saints gained back-to-back promotions, going from League One runners up to Gus Poyet’s Brighton in 2011, straight through the Championship to the Premier League. But they only had half a season at the elite level before the axe fell and Mauricio Pochettino took over.
When the trio were reunited at Reading, Wilkins, by then 50, gave an exclusive interview to the local Reading Chronicle, in which he said: “This pre-season has given me time to learn about the characters of the players we’ve got at Reading and find out what makes them tick.
At Reading with Crosby and Adkins
“It’s my job then to make sure every player maximises his potential. That’s what I see my role as, to bring out the very best of them from now on and make them strive to attain new levels of performance.
“I will always keep working toward that goal. If we can do that with every individual and get maximum performances out of them, I believe we will be in for a great season.
“We’re back together now and it’s going fantastically well. I have loved every minute of it. I’m used to working with Nigel and Andy and we are carrying out similar work to what we’ve done in the past.”
The Royals finished seventh, a point behind Brighton, who qualified for the play-offs, and the trio were dismissed five months into the following season immediately following a 6-1 thrashing away to Birmingham City.
Six months later the trio were back in work, this time at League One Sheffield United, but come the end of the 2015-16 season, after the Blades had finished in their lowest league position since 1983, they were shown the door.
Between January 2018 and July 2019, Wilkins worked for the Premier League assessing and reporting on the accuracy, consistency, management and decision-making of match officials.
In the summer 0f 2019, he was appointed Head of Coaching at Crystal Palace’s academy, a job he held for 15 months.
A return to involvement with first team football was presented by his former Albion player Alex Revell, who’d been appointed manager of League Two Stevenage Borough. Glad to support and mentor Revell in his first managerial post, Wilkins spent a year as assistant manager at the Lamex Stadium.
BOURNEMOUTH-BORN Steve Gritt is synonymous with Brighton & Hove Albion’s darkest hour because he was in the almost scalding managerial hotseat at the time the club nearly went out of the league.
The mastermind behind Albion’s ‘Great Escape’ in 1997 grew up in the Dorset coastal resort and began his footballing career with his local club in the 1970s. He later worked as the Cherries chief scout, although, apart from etching his part in Brighton’s footballing folklore, most of his more memorable days in the game came at Charlton Athletic.
Somehow, against all the odds, he managed to keep the Seagulls up when most doomsters could only see the club losing its status – and possibly going out of business as a result.
Gritt, who had been out of work for 18 months having been cast adrift by a new chairman at Charlton, took over from the beleaguered Jimmy Case in December 1996 with Albion 12 points adrift at the bottom of the fourth tier.
“I was delighted when Brighton offered me the chance to return,” he wrote in his matchday programme notes. “I know a lot of people were calling it the ‘worst job in football’ but when you love football as I do then you don’t always see things that way.”
Gritt was certainly an old hand when it came to football’s vicissitudes: rejected by AFC Bournemouth as a teenager, he went on to enjoy the elation of promotion as well as enduring the despair of relegation during his time with the Addicks.
Quite what would have become of Albion if they’d lost their place in the league is now only speculation – thankfully it wasn’t a bridge Gritt had to cross.
“I’d spent 18 years at Charlton as player and joint-manager, with just six months away from it, at Walsall. Then a new chairman, Richard Murray, came in and he didn’t like the joint-manager situation, so he put Alan Curbishley in sole charge, and I left,” Gritt explained.
Without a full-time job in the game, he stayed in touch by doing some scouting work for Tony Pulis at Gillingham, Brian Flynn at Wrexham and a couple of stints for West Brom. He even pulled his boots back on to play for Welling and Tooting & Mitcham.
Eager not to continue to have to queue at the benefit office for dole money, he applied for the vacant Albion manager’s job and got it after an interview in Crewe with the despised chairman Bill Archer and his ‘henchman’ chief executive David Bellotti.
“I knew very little about what was going on at the club,” Gritt told Roy Chuter in a retrospective programme piece. “I’d read bits in the papers, but my only interest was in the football. I wasn’t going to get involved.
“The place was very low. Some of the senior players filled me in on what was happening. In my first few days, there was graffiti on the walls saying I was a stooge, a whistle protest, a fan chained himself to the goal at half-time at my first match – that bothered me as we were winning at the time and went on to beat Hull 3-0.
“Then the next week I had to go onto the pitch with a megaphone at Leyton Orient to get the supporters to leave after the match – and they already hated me! I thought ‘What is going on?’ but my job was to get some sunshine back into the fans’ Saturday afternoons.”
After familiarising himself with the issues at a fans’ forum – “It helped me understand that the fans had to do what they had to do” – he devoted himself to improving the football and although the budget was tight, brought in the experienced defender John Humphrey and Robbie Reinelt, who would go on to score one of the most crucial goals in Albion’s history.
Puzzled by the plight of a side that contained good players in the likes of Craig Maskell, Ian Baird and Paul McDonald, Gritt maintained: “I never thought we’d go down.”
He recalled: “There was such a lot of experience. If I could organise them, we’d have a chance.”
Looking back years later
Ultimately, the club’s fate was decided in the final two games of the season – at home to Doncaster Rovers and away to Hereford United.
“We knew we could beat Doncaster,” he said. “There was a big crowd and a tremendous atmosphere – very tense. Maybe that got to the players – we didn’t play as well as we had done, but once we were 1-0 up, we weren’t going to get beat. We had a great defence.”
Gritt recalled: “I was beginning to think that there wasn’t going to be any goals in the game as there hadn’t been too many chances during the game that I can remember.
“Suddenly we had a corner from which Mark Morris eventually hit the bar, confirming my thoughts. But suddenly the ball fell to Stuart (Storer) who struck it into the net to spark off unbelievable celebrations on the pitch, off the pitch and in the dugout.
“Could we now keep our composure and see the game out to a memorable 1 nil win? We did! What a day and what a memory.”
And so to Hereford, who needed to win to avoid dropping out of the league. Albion only needed a draw to stay up. Everyone knows the story. A goal down at half-time when Kerry Mayo put through his own net, Gritt reminded the players at half-time that their jobs were on the line.
Relief at Hereford
He sent on Reinelt as a sub and in the 62nd minute he slotted a second half equaliser to send the Albion faithful into ecstasy and condemn the Bulls to their fate.
“I think if it had been Brighton, we could have faded into obscurity,” he said. “Most of the players would have left, and I don’t think we could have coped.”
As things subsequently transpired, it was Gritt who would soon be on his way.
It’s perhaps a bit of a cliché to say there is no sentiment in football but when Gritt’s side had managed only four league wins up to February in the 1997-98 season, and were second bottom of the table, chairman Dick Knight wielded the axe.
“No one who cares about the Albion will forget Steve’s tremendous contribution to our survival last season,” said Knight. “This season, given our difficult circumstances, feasibly we were only seeking to preserve our league status by a safe margin, but to date that comfort zone has eluded us.”
Thankfully you can’t keep a good man down for long, though, and within two weeks of getting the Brighton bullet, Gritt was back in the saddle as assistant manager to Billy Bonds at Millwall.
Although Bonds was sacked by the Lions only six weeks after Gritt’s arrival, successors Keith Stevens and Alan McLeary kept him on, working with the reserve team. Then Mark McGhee took charge and got Gritt back involved with the first team to take on organisational work such as set plays.
After McGhee took charge at Brighton, Gritt switched across south London back to Charlton, where he ran their academy for the next six years.
He returned to his hometown club in 2011 to become chief scout, initially under Lee Bradbury and then his successor, Paul Groves.
But he was disappointed to be let go in September 2012, telling theEcho: “They have changed the way they are doing their recruitment so there wasn’t really any need for me to be there.”
Bournemouth chairman Eddie Mitchell explained: “We have got analysts on board now and all games are available on DVD. We are trying to build a database from these clips.
“We felt it was impractical to send somebody all over the country to watch games every day when we can get DVDs of games and players.
“It was a role which diminished for us. Whether it is the right way to go remains to be seen but we have got to look at effectiveness and costs.”
Gritt said: “It was a big thing last year for me to come back to the club where I grew up. I am disappointed it has come to an end like this, but life goes on.
“I have lost jobs in the past and, hopefully, I will bounce back. I am looking forward to the next chapter in my career and will just have to wait and see what comes up.”
Born in Bournemouth on 31 October 1957, Gritt’s early footballing ability was first seen in the Kings Park First School football team of 1969, as the Echo discovered when readers were asked to send in their old sports photos.
A rare sight: young Gritt with hair!
Gritt, a forward, was taken on as an apprentice by the Cherries and played a handful of games for the first team under John Benson before being released at the age of 18.
Colin Masters remembered on the Where Are They Now? website (in an October 2020 post) how Gritt linked up with non-league Dorchester who paired him up front with Ron Davies, the former Welsh international centre-forward who’d played for Southampton, Man Utd and Portsmouth.
“They were an exciting pair to watch at that level,” said Masters. “After three matches I was so impressed with Steve that I went and found the Dorchester club secretary and asked if he had signed Steve Gritt on a contract.
“The reply was ‘No’. Within two weeks, Charlton Athletic came in and took him (presumably for nothing) and he went on to have a very successful career for many years. Dorchester’s loss was Charlton’s gain!”
Between 1977 and 1993, Gritt played a total of 435 matches for the Addicks, including a relegation to the old Third Division in 1980 and two promotions – to the Second Division in 1981 under Mike Bailey and the First Division under Lennie Lawrence in 1986. He had a six-month spell with Walsall in 1989 before returning and experiencing another relegation in 1990.
Gritt became joint player-manager with Curbishley in 1991 and, under their stewardship for the next four years, the likes of Lee Bowyer, John Robinson, Richard Rufus and Shaun Newton established themselves as mainstays of the side.
When Charlton decided in 2021 to re-name their East Stand in Curbishley’s honour, a generous Gritt told londonnewsonline.co.uk it was a fitting tribute to his former colleague.
“We had our trials and tribulations but I’ve always judged that we did what was required to keep the club going. We had to steady the ship.
Joint Charlton manager with Alan Curbishley
“We would have loved to have kept Rob Lee, for example, but we had to do things for the well-being of the club so we could keep it going and give the fans something to shout about.
“It was a great time when we got back to The Valley (they’d spent several years sharing Selhurst Park with Crystal Palace).
“Then the club made a decision which I was never going to agree with. But when I look back to see what Alan did – he went on to do a significant job – I cannot complain. Ultimately what he achieved he thoroughly deserved.”
Gritt said: “When I was there we had to make sure we weren’t seen to be having disagreements although I cannot recall us having too many anyway.
“When we were on the training ground, we each knew what the other one would be doing during the sessions. We both had jobs to do on the day.
“I was more of a player than he was at that time – so the management side was more in his hands. It was fairly straightforward, until the club decided that they wanted one man in charge. That was obviously disappointing for me at the time but I have thoroughly enjoyed my career.
“Alan gave the club a massive block to build on – but no one could have envisaged how the club went after he left. It was a massive disappointment.”
After he left Bournemouth in 2012, Gritt dropped out of league football and spent five years as assistant manager at Ebbsfleet United, working with his former Charlton teammate (and ex-Albion youth team manager) Steve Brown and then Daryl McMahon, who he subsequently followed to League Two Macclesfield Town, Conference side Dagenham & Redbridge and Isthmian League Hornchurch.
EVERY NOW AND AGAIN as a football supporter a truly special player stands out well above the rest you’ve watched. Bobby Zamora was most definitely in that category.
As the new year dawns on what will be my 55th year supporting Brighton & Hove Albion, it is perhaps fitting to spend a little time remembering just how good Zamora was for the Seagulls before his outstanding ability to score goals was taken to higher levels: Tottenham Hotspur, West Ham, Fulham and ultimately, and, quite deservedly, England.
That he came back to the Albion from QPR as his career began to ebb was nothing short of a bonus – and, while I’m not a big gambler, I was delighted to get a modest return from the bookies when my punt on him being the last goalscorer came good after he had gone on as a sub at Elland Road on 15 October 2015 and chipped the winner (below) to register his first goal since rejoining!
“That goal was definitely the highlight of my season,” Zamora told interviewer Adam Virgo in a Seagulls World interview. “It was my first goal since coming back and to score the winner so late in the game was unbelievable. It was a special moment for me, and it settled the nerves knowing that we’d got the three points.”
Just four days later, Zamora repeated the feat going on as a 76th-minute substitute for Tomer Hemed at home to Bristol City and beating goalkeeper Frank Fielding with a low shot from 15 yards out. Albion won 2-1; Sam Baldock having levelled things up against his former club after Derrick Williams opened the scoring for City.
Unfortunately, Zamora managed just five more in that second spell. He made 10 starts plus 16 as a sub in Chris Hughton’s side but he was struggling with a hip injury.
It eventually caught up with him and prevented him from contributing further to Albion’s aim of promotion back to the elite; his last game being as a sub in a 0-0 draw at home to Sheffield Wednesday on 8 March 2016. “If I was fit, I would have scored some goals and we’d have been promoted automatically,” he told the UndrThe Cosh podcast (pictured above).
Thankfully another returning striker in the shape of Glenn Murray completed that task the following season and went on to cement his own place in Albion’s history: his 111 goals in 287 appearances putting him second in the list of Brighton’s all-time top goalscorers.
Golden goalscorers: Zamora + Murray
Each of the different eras I’ve watched the Albion has thrown up truly memorable players who have generated their own air of excitement and anticipation because of the goals they scored.
The first one for me was Alex Dawson, who netted seven in the first five games I watched in 1969. Then along came Willie Irvine whose goalscoring in third tier Albion’s promotion-winning season of 1972 earned him an unexpected recall to the Northern Ireland side – and an appearance (that I went to watch) in a 1-0 win against England at Wembley.
Next, of course, was the truly outstanding Peter Ward, who jinked his way past defenders with apparent ease and scored goals for fun, his 36 goals in 1976-77 smashing a decades-old record. Like Zamora, he came back to the scene of past glories (albeit only on loan) and scored a magnificent winner against the team he supported as a boy, Manchester United.
Garry Nelson, with 32 goals, and Kevin Bremner were a superb front pair in another third tier promotion-winning line-up in 1988 while, in 1990-91, Mike Small and John Byrne combined brilliantly to take the Seagulls within a hair’s breadth of a return to the big time.
The arrival of a beanpole of a kid with an eye for goal in Zamora completely transformed Albion’s fortunes under Micky Adams and he was the talisman in back-to-back promotions following years in the doldrums.
Zamora’s Albion story is pretty well known but let’s remind ourselves of how it all began.
Depending on whose account you believe more, it was either Dick Knight or Adams who had the foresight to bring Zamora to the Withdean.
Adams said: “The first time I saw him he came onto the training ground; he looked like a kid. But he was tall and gangly with a useful left foot; there was potential there.”
In fact, Zamora might never have arrived in Sussex if Albion had been successful in securing a permanent deal for on-loan Lorenzo Pinamonte. When Brentford outbid Brighton for the services of the Bristol City loanee, Albion turned their attention to Zamora (left), a Bristol Rovers player who was only getting sub appearances under Ian Holloway but had scored eight goals in six games on loan at nearby non-league Bath City.
“He was six foot one and we knew he had a very good first touch and could hold the ball up well, the type of player we wanted,” Knight recounted in his autobiography Mad Man: From The Gutter to the Stars (Vision Sports Publishing, 2013).
Zamora duly arrived on loan and scored six in six matches (including a hat-trick in a 7-1 away win at Chester). He scored an equaliser and was named Man of the Match on his debut v Plymouth and by the end of February was Player of the Month.
Hat-trick ball at Chester
While Knight and Adams wanted him to stay, he insisted on returning to Rovers where he thought he might force his way into Holloway’s starting line-up. But it was back only to the bench as Nathan Ellington, Jason Roberts and Jamie Cureton were ahead of him in the pecking order.
As preparations began for the new season, Albion offered £60,000 for Zamora but Rovers chairman Geoff Dunford wanted £250,000. An incredulous Knight said he wouldn’t go higher than £100,000 and couldn’t believe they could demand such a figure for someone who hadn’t actually started a first team game.
Zamora had Rovers’ youth team coach Phil Bater to thank for forcing through the move. He accompanied the shy youngster into a meeting with Holloway, who tried to say he’d get some games if he stayed. Bater reckoned the youngster was being strung along and argued Zamora’s cause saying he stood more chance of playing if Rovers let him join the Albion.
After some brinkmanship from each club’s respective chairmen, with Knight threatening to walk away from the deal, it finally went through two days before the start of the season, although Albion’s chairman reluctantly agreed to a 30 per cent sell-on clause for the player.
Zamora instantly became one of the top earners on £2,000 a week with a goal bonus built in.
“It was an absolute coup that we had finally secured this player,” said Knight. “I could only see good things in him, could only see that he would be a huge asset to us.
“Football is all a matter of opinions. There is little science to it. For me, Zamora was the best signing I ever made.”
Zamora has eyes on the ball closely watched by a young Wayne Bridge for Southampton
Not only did Zamora manage to score 31 goals as Albion won promotion from the basement division, he went one better when they went straight to the top of the third tier the following season, netting 32 times in 46 matches.
A significant number of those goals came courtesy of Zamora’s excellent understanding with left-footed right-back Paul Watson, of whom he said: “He created a lot of goals for me with those quick free kicks. He didn’t put a foot wrong too often and was very underrated. He never got the credit his hard work deserved.”
Expanding on it in another interview, he said: “Whenever Watto got the ball I knew precisely where I needed to run to and he knew where to deliver it. It was such a great connection: Watto has an absolutely wonderful left foot and it made my job as a striker so much easier when you get deliveries like that.”
Declaring that even in the Premiership he hadn’t come across anybody with a better left foot, he added: “I was very lucky to have played in the same team as him; he created numerous goals for me; not only with his deliveries but with his intelligent play as well.”
Watson had arrived at the club with Charlie Oatway and was part of a cluster of players who had served under Adams at Brentford and Fulham. When Adams and assistant Bob Booker steered Albion to promotion as fourth tier champions, Zamora was player of the season and he and Danny Cullip were named in the PFA divisional XI.
Not long into the following season, the lure of taking over as manager at a Premier League club saw Adams quit Brighton, initially to become Dave Bassett’s no.2 at Leicester City, but with the promise of succeeding him.
“While I thought I had a shot at another promotion, it wasn’t a certainty,” Adams explained. “I knew I had put together a team of winners, and I knew I had a goalscorer in Bobby Zamora, but football’s fickle finger of fate could have disrupted that at any time.”
His successor, Peter Taylor, knew how fortunate he was to inherit an experienced squad, and said: “Of course the greatest asset we had was Bobby Zamora. Having him meant that we could play a front two at home and away from home we could play him on his own and he would still get us a goal out of nothing. He was an incredible player and miles too good for that level.”
And Zamora wasn’t only a star on the pitch, as Knight spoke about in his autobiography. “When he was at his zenith at Brighton, the requests we got for him to visit schools, hospitals and go to prize-givings far outweighed all the other players together, but he was always amenable. He was never starry, never refused. I couldn’t speak more highly of Bobby Zamora as a person.”
Knight recounted in his book how, after a 1-0 win at Peterborough, when Zamora missed a penalty but also scored the only goal of the game, Albion’s promotion to the second tier was confirmed and in his own inimitable way Posh boss Barry Fry said to Brighton’s star striker: “You’re a fucking great player and you’ll play for England one day, I’m fucking sure of it.”
Zamora was still only 21 when Tottenham signed him from relegated Brighton in July 2003. He left the south coast having scored a total of 83 goals in 136 appearances but in his last season in the stripes he netted just 14 as the Seagulls battled unsuccessfully to retain their tier two status.
Unfortunately, he missed eleven matches with a dislocated shoulder and, had former Premier League striker Paul Kitson been fit to play alongside him (he managed only seven starts plus three off the bench), the season may well have had a different outcome.
Everton’s Bill Kenwright had offered £3m for Zamora during the season but their manager Walter Smith seemed less convinced and, with Kevin Campbell and Wayne Rooney likely to be ahead of him, Zamora stayed in Sussex.
But chairman Dick Knight promised not to stand in his way if an opportunity was presented at the end of the season and that came from Tottenham. Manager Glenn Hoddle and assistant Chris Hughton had been to see Zamora in action at the Withdean on a number of occasions.
Spurs chairman Daniel Levy played hardball over the deal. Eventually, Knight settled on a £1.5m fee but, because of the original sell-on clause, £450,000 was due to Bristol Rovers.
Hoddle told The Guardian: “He has got good pace and great movement on and off the ball. No disrespect to Brighton, they have got a good team down there, but we have got players here who can make the most of his movement.”
The player’s agent Phil Smith told the newspaper: “The fee for Bobby is £1.5m which is a decent price in today’s market for a Second Division striker.
“It has been a long time coming for Bobby but he is delighted to be going into the Premiership. It has always been an ambition.”
Disappointed Albion manager Steve Coppell observed: “It is a big move for Bobby and nobody really expected we could hang onto him for much longer. But it has blown a big hole in any plans I had. I don’t have a better option than playing with Bobby Zamora up front.”
When he arrived at Spurs, one of the senior pros who took him under his wing was none other than Gus Poyet.
“As a young guy coming into the team, he was one of the senior pros who would always talk to me and encourage me,” Zamora told the matchday programme. “He didn’t have to do that, but he went out of his way to do so and you could see he had coaching qualities. He would often point things out on the pitch that you’d pick up on, and when he spoke, you’d listen.
“He wasn’t starting every game either, so in training I did more things with him than maybe the rest. I really got on well with him.”
As it turned out, Zamora made only 18 appearances for Spurs (11 as a substitute) and only scored once – ironically a single goal that knocked West Ham out of the Carling Cup in October 2003.
In January 2004, Spurs chose to use him as a makeweight in taking Jermain Defoe from the Boleyn Ground to White Hart Lane.
Phlegmatic Zamora didn’t look on it as a failure but embraced the “learning curve” of training alongside the likes of Poyet, Robbie Keane, Darren Anderton and Jamie Redknapp.
“I came away a better player and with more experience,” he said. “Glenn Hoddle had signed me and then he got sacked not long afterwards. David Pleat took charge and we didn’t really see eye-to-eye, but the lads and the club were brilliant and I learned so much from my time there.
“I took a chance by stepping back down to the Championship with West Ham – but it was the opportunity of playing regular football again that was the pull for me.”
PETER TAYLOR steered Albion to promotion from the third tier in 2002 – a feat his namesake as Brighton boss fell short of achieving back in 1976.
The younger Taylor, who played for and managed arch rivals Crystal Palace, had quite an extraordinary managerial career – from taking charge of the England international side, when he appointed David Beckham as captain, to taking the reins at Isthmian League side Maldon & Tiptree at the age of 69.
He took the helm at third-placed third-tier Brighton in October 2001 after being sacked by Premier League Leicester City – who had created the Albion vacancy by recruiting manager Micky Adams to work as no.2 to newly-appointed Dave Bassett.
Starting at the Albion
Taylor revealed that it was on Adams’ advice that he accepted Albion’s offer. “Micky said they were a close bunch, a confident group and happy with each other,” Taylor told The Guardian. “My job now is to carry on the good work he has started.”
In dropping down two divisions Taylor returned to the level of a previous success, when he guided Gillingham to the First Division via (via a play-off final win over Wigan Athletic). In less than two years he went from the Second Division to the Premiership – managed England for one game along the way – and back again.
“I’ve not lost any self-belief after what happened at Leicester,” said Taylor. “I don’t feel I have anything to prove. Leicester is in the past now as far as I am concerned. I am not worried about the level I am managing at. Brighton has fantastic potential, particularly in size of support, and it is my job now to fulfil it.”
Albion press officer Paul Camillin wrote in the matchday programme: “Micky’s replacement is a man whose coaching ability is unquestionable. Here is a man who not so long ago was taking England training sessions under the gaze of Sven Goran Eriksson,”
Taylor’s knowledge of the game spanned all four divisions and beyond and Camillin pointed out: “He was the overwhelming choice of the board of directors.”
Indeed, chairman Dick Knight said: “Peter Taylor’s management experience at both Nationwide and higher levels of football make him ideal for the Albion.
“He quickly identified with the ambition and potential here and I’m very pleased he has chosen to join us.”
Top scorer Bobby Zamora was also delighted, telling The Guardian: “When I heard the list of who was being put forward, Peter Taylor was the name that stood out. He has proven his ability and has got an obvious wealth of experience.”
In young Zamora, Taylor inherited a magnificent key to unlock defences. One player he did bring in who also made a difference was a lanky goalscoring midfielder called Junior Lewis (remarkably Taylor also signed him for four of his other clubs – Dover, Hull, Gillingham and Leicester) and his contribution certainly helped to cement the title.
Working alongside Bob Booker
“Junior did exactly what he had done for me at Gillingham, which is make the team play more football,” Taylor told Nick Szczepanik. “He wasn’t easy on the eye, but he was always available to get the ball from defenders and got it to the strikers and was very useful.”
While Taylor’s eight months as manager of Brighton culminated in promotion, he was never really credited with the success because many said he achieved it with Adams’ team.
“Micky had done the hard work because he signed all the squad before I got there, and they had done well so the last thing I was going to do was to change too much,” Taylor told Szczepanik, in an interview for the club website. “He had built a team with a great spirit.
“You could see why we went on to win the division because the squad was full of incredible characters – not just experienced professionals but good professionals who were desperate to do well for the club.”
Citing the experience and ability of Danny Cullip, he made special reference to “the greatest asset” Zamora, saying: “He was an incredible player and miles too good for that level.
“Simon Morgan was another one. What a great defender – and yet he could hardly train because he had two bad knees. Whenever he played, he was such a good organiser at the back that we were always solid.”
Unfortunately, Taylor didn’t help to endear himself to Albion’s public when he quit within days of the victory parade along the seafront, but deep down not too many people could blame him considering the limitations prevailing at the time.
“People will think I was stupid to leave the club after we won the league but I think everyone understands the reasons, which were because of the budget I thought I’d need to keep them up and the new stadium not being as close as Dick promised in my interview,” Taylor explained.
“Some people assumed I must have a new job lined up, maybe at Palace, but no, I didn’t. My plans had been to win promotion at Brighton, move into the new stadium with a big budget and then try eventually to get them to the Premier League.”
Nevertheless, Knight said: “It’s a great shame that Peter has chosen to resign. He has done a terrific job for the club in leading the Albion to the Second Division title, and it’s sad that he doesn’t wish to continue.”
The captain at the time, Paul Rogers told The Argus: “It’s a big shock to me and I’m sure it will be a big shock to the other lads as well. He’s done really well here. Since he came in the lads took to him straight away.
“He is a good coach. His sessions were a lot more technical than we were used to and he’s improved some of the players during his time at the club.”
Six months after he left Brighton, Taylor took over at Hull City, who were about to move into the 25,000 all-seater KC Stadium and in four years he guided them from the bottom tier of football through to the Championship.
I recall a visit to the KC when Albion’s travelling supporters taunted him with a ‘Should have stayed with a big club’ chant, to which he responded by opening wide his arms to point out the plush new surroundings he was working in.
Born in Rochford, Essex, on 3 January 1953, Taylor was a Spurs supporter from an early age and had an unsuccessful trial with them – including playing in a South East Counties league match.
Looking back in an interview with superhotspur.com, he recalled that he didn’t perform well in his trial match at Cheshunt because he was up against Steve Perryman (who later became a close friend) and Graeme Souness in the Tottenham midfield.
Taylor also had an unsuccessful trial with Crystal Palace, so it was somewhat ironic that both clubs who rejected him as a youngster ended up paying handsome fees to sign him.
Taylor had first drawn attention while playing for South-East Essex Schools and Canvey Island but it was nearby Southend United who took him on as an apprentice in 1969.
The winger turned professional with the Shrimpers in January 1971 and scored 12 goals in 75 league matches for the Essex side.
It was the flamboyant Malcolm Allison who signed him for Palace in October 1973, paying a £110,000 fee. Allison told the player he had been trying to sign him for some time, including when he was in charge at Manchester City.
“He made me feel like a million dollars and I couldn’t thank anyone more than I would thank Malcolm for the career that I have had,” said Taylor. “He knew his stuff and he was an exciting coach, far ahead of his time, but the most important thing for me was that he made me feel that I was the best player in the world.”
Taylor went on to be Palace’s player of the season, although they were relegated to the third tier.
His time at Selhurst Park was his most successful as a player, he reckoned, and he scored 33 goals in 122 league games for the Eagles. But his notable performances when Palace made it through to the semi-finals of the FA Cup in 1976 led to Keith Burkinshaw signing him for Spurs for £400,000.
“I was desperate to play for Tottenham, because they were the team that I supported, so it was a wonderful move for me,” said Taylor.
Earlier that year, he had made his debut for England while playing in the third tier of English football, going on as a substitute in the second half of a Welsh FA centenary celebration match at the Racecourse Ground, Wrexham, and scoring the winner in a 2-1 victory.
He was the first Third Division player to be capped since Johnny Byrne in 1961, and also the first player to score while making his debut as a substitute. He went on to win four caps.
Two months later, against the same opponent, but at Ninian Park, Cardiff, in the Home International Championship, he scored again – this time the only goal of the game as Don Revie’s England won 1-0.
Taylor’s third cap came in the 2-1 defeat to Scotland at Hampden Park on 15 May 1976. And he went on as an 83rd minute sub for Kevin Keegan as England beat Team America 3-1 in America’s Bicentennial Tournament. Bobby Moore was Team America’s captain and the great Pelé was playing up front.
Although he scored 31 times in 123 league matches for Spurs, he was hampered by a pelvic injury during his time at White Hart Lane but superhotspur.com writer Lennon Branagan said: “A player with a real eye for goal, Peter Taylor was a really fine all-round winger, who also had good defensive qualities to his game.
“He was a very important player during his second season at Spurs, as he helped them to win promotion from the old Second Division, following their relegation to that division during the previous season.”
Taylor moved on from Spurs after four years when Burkinshaw couldn’t guarantee him a starting spot, leaving for £150,000 to join second tier Leyton Orient, where Jimmy Bloomfield was manager.
He scored 11 goals in 56 league games for the Os and had four games on loan for Joe Royle’s Oldham Athletic in January 1983. He then went non-league with Maidstone, apart from a brief spell back in the league, that he didn’t enjoy, playing under Gerry Francis at Exeter City.
Having returned to Maidstone to carry on playing, he eventually got his first managerial job at Dartford in 1986 as a player-manager.
He moved on to Enfield in a similar role, telling superhotspur.com: “I thoroughly enjoyed it, and I was learning all the time about coaching players, and then Steve Perryman asked me to be his assistant at Watford in 1991, and I had two fantastic years there of coaching and learning. So that was the start of my managerial career.”
His first league manager’s job then followed at his old club Southend, between 1993 and 1995, but he quit having not been able to raise them above mid-table in League One. Curiously, his next outpost was non-league Dover Athletic but he left when his former Spurs teammate Glenn Hoddle invited him to coach the England under 21 team.
A successful spell in which he presided over 11 wins, three draws and only one defeat came to an abrupt end when Taylor was controversially relieved of his duties by the FA and replaced by former Albion winger Howard Wilkinson.
Gillingham offered him a return to club management and, with Guy Butters at the back and the aforementioned Junior Lewis in midfield, he steered the Kent club to that play-off win, taking them into the top half of English league football for the first time in their history.
That achievement prompted Leicester to poach him and he got off to a great start with the Foxes, even earning a Premier League manager of the month award in September 2000.
It was during his time at Leicester that he rode to England’s rescue two months later by taking caretaker charge of the England national side for a friendly against Italy in Turin. England lost 1-0 but the game is remembered for Taylor handing the captain’s armband to Beckham for the first time. He also included six players still young enough for the under 21s: Gareth Barry, Jamie Carragher, Kieron Dyer, Rio Ferdinand, Emile Heskey and Derby’s Seth Johnson (it was his only full cap).
Describing it as the proudest moment of his long career, Taylor told Branagan: “I never dreamt that opportunity would happen to me. I knew that it was only going to be for one game, but it’s on my memory bank, and no one will ever change that.”
Back at Leicester, it all went pear-shaped towards the end of the season and when City were beaten 5-0 at home by newly promoted Bolton Wanderers in the new season opener, and then recorded a further four defeats, two draws with a solitary victory, Taylor was sacked.
He combined his job at Hull with once again coaching the England under 21 side between 2004 and 2006, and early into his reign called up Albion’s Dan Harding and Adam Hinshelwood (Jack Hinshelwood’s dad) for a home game v Wales and an away fixture in Azerbaijan. Harding started both matches and Hinshelwood was an unused sub.
Taylor oversaw nine wins, two draws and five defeats, selecting players such as James Milner, Darren Bent and Liam Ridgewell.
After promotion success with Albion and Hull, where he spent three and a half years, in the summer of 2006 Palace, in the Championship, stumped up £300,000 in compensation to take the Tigers boss back to Selhurst Park to succeed Iain Dowie.
Telling the BBC it had to be “something special” for him to leave Hull, Taylor added: “When I got the call from Simon (Jordan) there was no doubt in my mind that I wanted to be at Selhurst Park.”
Talking to cpfc.co.uk some years later, he said: “I was very confident as a manager. Very confident. I felt as though I would succeed.
“I didn’t look at my reputation too much. I looked at: ‘How can I get these into the top division?’ Even if I was worried about the reputation I had, I still would have taken the job.”
On the Palace bench with Kit Symons
After a promising start, results went awry and Palace finished the season in mid-table. When the Eagles managed only two wins in their first 10 games of the 2007-08 season, Taylor was sacked and replaced with Neil Warnock.
Undeterred, he stepped outside of the league for his next position, taking charge of then Conference team Stevenage Borough – recruiting Junior Lewis as his first signing!
Lewis followed him into his next job as well, this time as first team coach at Wycombe Wanderers, where Taylor succeeded Paul Lambert in May 2008. Taylor’s promotion-winning knack once more came to the fore when the Chairboys won promotion from League Two.
However, a poor start to life in League One cost him his job and Wycombe owner Steve Hayes told BBC Three Counties Radio: “We started the season reasonably well, but truthfully, six points from 33 is very worrying.
“We need a change. [Peter’s] body language in the last few weeks has not been great and he doesn’t seem to be as happy as he was last year.”
Taylor was approaching his fifth month out of the game when, in mid-February 2010, League Two Bradford City gave him a short-term deal to replace Stuart McCall. Once again, loyal Lewis joined him.
Hoping his stay at Valley Parade would ultimately be longer, he told the Yorkshire Post: “I remember what happened at Hull when I went in there (in 2002) with the club sitting 18th in the bottom division.
“We went on to enjoy a lot of success and I see similar potential here at Bradford. Certainly if we can go on a run then there is a potential of putting bums on seats.
“I still believe we can do something this year. But if that does not prove to be the case, then definitely next year.”
Taylor signed a contract extension and stuck at it even when he was offered the chance to become no.2 to Alan Pardew at Premier League Newcastle United at the beginning of January 2011.
“It’s flattering to be offered the position to work alongside Alan Pardew,” Taylor told BBC Radio Leeds. “I wasn’t comfortable leaving Bradford earlier than I need to, I know what the game is about, I can easily get the sack in a month’s time, I understand that, but I don’t really feel I want to leave at this particular time.”
Saying Bradford had “really switched me on”, he added: “I’ve always had a special feeling about the club, and I’ve still got that feeling.” Six weeks later he left City by mutual consent.
In the summer that year, Taylor headed to the Middle East and spent 15 months in charge of the Bahrain national side, leading them to success in the 2011 Arab Games in Doha when they beat Jordan 1-0. He was sacked in October 2012 after Bahrain lost 6-2 to the United Arab Emirates in a friendly.
The following summer, he was given a short-term contract to take charge of England’s under 20s at the Under 20 World Cup in Turkey. Hopes may have been high after a 3-0 win over Uruguay in a warm-up match but England were eliminated at the group stage after only managing to draw against Iraq and Chile and then losing to Egypt. The England side included the likes of Sam Johnstone, Jamal Lascelles, John Stones, Eric Dier, Conor Coady, James Ward-Prowse, Ross Barkley and Harry Kane.
Taylor found himself back in club football that autumn when Gillingham welcomed him back on an interim basis after they’d sacked Martin Allen. Handed a longer term deal a month later, he stayed with the League One Gills until halfway through the next season when, after only six wins in 23 matches, he was sacked on New Year’s Eve.
Another posting abroad was to follow in May 2015 when he was appointed head coach of Indian Super League side Kerala Blasters, taking over from former England goalkeeper David James.
But his time in India was brief. Despite winning five of six pre-season friendlies and the opening league fixture, the Blasters lost four and drew two of the next six matches and Taylor became the league’s first managerial sacking in October that year.
The New Zealand national side recruited Taylor to work with the country’s UK-based players in 2016-17 and a third spell at Gillingham followed in May 2017. He was named director of football at Priestfield where Adrian Pennock was head coach and he was briefly interim head coach when Pennock lost his job in September 2017.
That turned out to be his last job in league football. He joined National League Dagenham & Redbridge in June 2018 and spent 18 months in charge, leaving the club after a spell of nine defeats in 11 games.
Welling United, in the sixth tier of English football, appointed Taylor manager in September 2021 but with only six wins in 25 matches he left in March the following year. His final job was at Isthmian League Maldon & Tiptree, from December 2022 to August 2023.
RUSSELL SLADE had an eye for picking up footballing gems for nothing and he worked an unlikely miracle to spare relegation-bound Albion from the drop.
The one-time PE teacher who never played professional football himself was only Brighton manager for eight months but keeping them in League One in an end-of-season nailbiter was a much-lauded achievement.
He did it with some astute forays into the loan market and snapping up free agent Lloyd Owusu who made a crucial contribution to Albion’s injury-hit misfiring forward line.
Some years earlier, when youth team manager at Sheffield United, Slade famously picked up three young players – Phil Jagielka, Nick Montgomery and Michael Tonge – discarded by other clubs who went on to become Blades stalwarts.
At Brighton, his summer re-shaping of the squad he inherited put down the foundations on which his successor Gus Poyet was able to build a successful side capable of promotion.
In particular, Slade took great pride in bringing Andrew Crofts to the Albion on a free transfer from Gillingham, the club later selling him on to Norwich City for what was believed to be £300,000.
Slade signing Elliott Bennett, bought from Wolverhampton Wanderers for £200,000, was later sold to the Canaries for a fee believed to be £1.5million.
“The majority of my player signings went on to play crucial roles in this promotion season,” Slade asserts on his LinkedIn profile. “During my closed season I began what proved to be an extremely successful transitional period.”
If Slade had failed to keep Albion up at the end of that 2008-09 season, it is doubtful Poyet would have been drawn to the task of lifting the side through the leagues and possibly there would have been a longer wait to see Championship football at the Amex.
Slade’s tenure at the Albion may well have been longer if Tony Bloom hadn’t taken over control of the club from Dick Knight, who was chairman at the time Slade was brought in to replace Micky Adams.
Adams reckoned he was a victim of the power struggle between the two and it seems clear that Bloom wanted to install his own man once he was fully in the driving seat of the club.
Although Slade’s achievement in keeping Albion up was rewarded with a permanent two-year deal in the summer of 2009, the new season got off to a terrible start with no wins in the first six games, one of which saw Albion on the wrong end of a 7-1 thumping at Huddersfield.
Time was up for Slade after rocky start to the season
With only three wins and three draws in the next 10 games, after a 3-3 home draw against Hartlepool at the end of October, Slade was sacked with the side only out of the relegation zone on goal difference.
Bloom said: “It is not a decision we have taken lightly and one taken with a heavy heart. Russell is a good man – which made it an even harder decision to take – but it is one which has been made in the club’s best interests.
“Like all Albion fans, I am extremely grateful for Russell’s achievements at the end of last season, as he kept us in League One against the odds.”
When he reflected on his tenure in the Albion book Match of My Life, Slade explained: “Despite the club’s perilous position, I felt it was a great opportunity. I signed on a short-term deal, with the incentive to keep the club in the division.
“I inherited a huge squad but it was decimated by injuries and many of the players were loan signings or youngsters, but, in spite of that, I still thought there was enough within the squad to keep Brighton up.”
With 14 games to save the club from the drop, the first two ended in defeats but when Slade’s previous employer Yeovil Town were thumped 5-0 at the Withdean, there was cause for optimism.
A 3-2 Withdean win for Swindon, for whom Gordon Greer and Billy Paynter scored, threatened Brighton’s survival but it turned out to be the only defeat in the last seven games.
Albion memorably lifted themselves out of the relegation zone three games from the end of the season when they won 2-1 at Bristol Rovers, long-serving Gary Hart teeing up goals for Owusu and Palace loanee Calvin Andrew. Both players were also on target to earn a point in a 2-2 draw at Huddersfield.
After safety was secured in the last game of the season courtesy of barely-fit substitute Nicky Forster’s goal against Stockport, fans invaded the pitch and Slade was carried shoulder high by the Albion faithful.
“My hat got nicked and my head scratched, but it didn’t really matter,” he said. “When I finally got back to the office, I sat there with Bob Booker and Dean White and was absolutely exhausted – both emotionally and physically.”
Born in Wokingham on 10 October 1960, Slade’s route into professional football didn’t follow the traditional path.
“At 18 I had a chance to go to Notts County but I got into university so I went away to get a degree in sport instead,” he said. After completing his degree over four years at Edge Hill University in Ormskirk, Lancashire, he became a PE teacher at Frank Wheldon Comprehensive School in Nottingham (it later became Carlton Academy).
“My experiences helped me be more prepared and organised,” he explained. “I took numerous coaching courses and it allows you to be really open minded and dealing with different situations.
“I had qualifications to be a coach in swimming, athletics, badminton, basketball, cricket and tennis. It not only broadens your horizons but allows you to look at things in different ways.”
While he was qualifying as a teacher, he joined Notts County as a non-contract amateur player, appearing in their reserves and manager Neil Warnock appointed him an assistant youth coach under youth team head coach Mick Walker.
When Warnock was sacked in January 1993, County were bottom of football’s second tier (having been relegated from the top flight in the final season before the Premier League started), and Walker and Slade took charge of the first team, keeping them up with three points to spare.
The pair almost took County to the play-offs the following season, only missing out by three points, and also reached the final of the Anglo-Italian Cup, where they lost 1-0 to Brescia at Wembley.
After only one win at the start of the 1994-95 season, Walker was sacked in September and Slade took over as caretaker manager.
After managing only six wins and five draws in 23 matches, Slade reverted to assistant when ex-Everton boss Howard Kendall was appointed manager.
Kendall only lasted three months at Meadow Lane and Slade left the club at the same time but he later acknowledged how much he had learned from Kendall, Warnock and Jimmy Sirrel (an ex-Albion player who was a Notts County legend as manager and general manager).
“I’ve had a good upbringing,” he said. “The one for player management and for talking to players was Howard Kendall, without a doubt.
“He was terrific – had something about him. He had that X factor and you would listen to Howard – and when he coached you took it on board as well.”
Slade told walesonline.co.uk: “Working with Howard was massive because of his man management and his ability to give a football club direction.
“Neil was the big motivator out of all the coaches and managers I have worked with over the years.
“He took County into the top flight and his best work came at 10 minutes to three. He was exceptional, able to get every last drop of effort and energy from his team.”
Slade dropped into non-league football as manager of Southern League Midland Division Armitage but when they finished bottom of the division and then went into liquidation, Slade followed the chairman Sid Osborn to his new club, Leicester United.
That side finished 16th in the Southern League Midland Division, but they too went out of business in August 1996.
Kendall, in charge of Sheffield United, recruited Slade as youth team coach at Bramall Lane and even tried to take him with him when he returned to Everton in June 1997, but Blades demanded a compensation payment the Toffees weren’t prepared to pay.
Kendall said some while later: “I wanted Russell, who I knew from Notts County, to come and coach my kids. He was at Sheffield United at the time, and they didn’t want to lose him. He’s a talented coach who would have been a popular figure at Goodison.”
Slade remained in Sheffield and, in an interview with The Guardian in October 2013, recalled: “My best three spots were when I was at Sheffield United [in 1998].
“At the time I was doing a lot of work on released players because we needed to strengthen our youth squad and in one evening I took Phil Jagielka, Nick Montgomery and Michael Tonge – all for nothing.”
Montgomery made just short of 400 appearances for United and Tonge and Jagielka both played more than 300 games for the club. Jagielka became one of the best defenders in the top flight (at Everton) and won 40 England international caps.
“That was my best night’s work ever,” said Slade. “You don’t half get a buzz when you see those. When we played Everton in the [Capital One] Cup last season Phil gave me a signed shirt with ‘Thanks very much, Russ’ written on it.”
It was in March 1998 that Slade found himself in caretaker charge of the United first team after the departure of Nigel Spackman, overseeing a draw and a defeat, and he also stepped in for two games in November 1999 when Adrian Heath left the club, again overseeing a draw and a defeat before Warnock arrived at Bramall Lane.
It was at Scarborough where Slade landed his first full-time job as a league manager in his own right. During a three-year spell, he helped rescue the club from relegation, resigned when they went into administration but withdrew it when a fans petition urged him to stay.
A highlight was guiding the side on an excellent FA Cup run, when they memorably played Premier League Chelsea in a televised home tie. The Seadogs were only defeated 1-0 by a Chelsea side that included a young Alexis Nicolas in their line-up.
Next up for Slade was the first of two spells as manager of Grimsby Town. Supporters were calling for his head when they only managed a mid-table finish in the 2004-05 season, but an upturn the following season saw them flirt with automatic promotion and have a good run in the League Cup, beating Derby County and Tottenham.
Slade’s Mariners beat a Spurs side that included Jermaine Jenas, Michael Carrick, Robbie Keane and Jermaine Defoe 1-0. In the next round they went down 1-0 at home to a Newcastle United side managed by Graeme Souness, a goal from Alan Shearer sealing it for the visitors.
Grimsby slipped into the play-offs on the last day of the season and beat local rivals Lincoln City in the semi-finals to reach the play-off final at the Millennium Stadium.
But they missed out on promotion when Cheltenham Town edged the tie 1-0, and Slade was on his way.
He might not have reached League One with Grimsby but he was taken on by Yeovil Town on a three-year contract, declaring when appointed: “It is a fantastic opportunity for me as I think Yeovil are a very progressive club. They are going through a period of transition and I am really looking forward to the challenges that are ahead.”
Slade once again found himself a play-off final loser when the Glovers, captained by Nathan Jones, lost 2-0 to Blackpool in the 2007 League One end-of-season decider at Wembley.
It was a heartbreaking finish especially after Yeovil pulled off one of the most remarkable comebacks in the history of play-off football by coming from 2-0 down to beat Nottingham Forest 5-4 on aggregate in the semi-finals.
“Russell Slade’s side gained many plaudits for an impressive campaign in which they almost went up despite being one of the pre-season favourites for relegation,” said somersetlive.co.uk.
Small consolation for Slade was to receive the League One Manager of the Year award, but disappointment followed in 2007-08 when they won only four games in the second half of the season to leave them only four points clear of relegation.
When things didn’t improve in 2008-09, a frustrated Slade reportedly fell out with Yeovil chairman John Fry over a lack of transfer funds and he left Huish Park by mutual consent in February 2009.
The vacancy at the Albion was almost tailor-made for Slade, and chairman Dick Knight admitted he had spoken with the aforementioned former Seagull, Nathan Jones, about the managerial candidate.
“I had a long chat with Nathan and he told me some good stuff,” Knight told the Argus. “It was a very honest appraisal and I took that into account.
“When I met with Russell initially he impressed me greatly. His CV speaks for itself and his confidence and tactical shrewdness were obvious when I interviewed him.
“He has delivered at this level. He has an extremely competent track record at clubs who have punched above their weight, like Grimsby and Yeovil.
“His players like him. He will convey confidence to our squad and give them a lift.”
Stockport chief Jim Gannon had turned down the job and former England international Paul Ince didn’t even want to hold talks.
“The quality of applications was tremendous, even up to the last minute, from the top of the top league in Romania to one from Portugal which was very interesting but not appropriate at this time,” said Knight.
“By handing the mantle to Russell at this stage, the club is in good hands to address the task right now of staying in League One. We have got a very good and capable man.”
The rest, as they say, is history and, to borrow another familiar phrase, it was a case of not keeping a good man down after his departure from the Seagulls.
It wasn’t long before Barry Hearn, the sports promoter owner of Leyton Orient, was hiring Slade to try to improve the fortunes of the East London minnows.
It turned out to be a great move because Orient was where Slade had his longest ever spell as a manager, presiding over 241 matches with a 42 per cent win ratio.
Amongst the players he recruited were two who had played under him at Brighton: Andrew Whing and Dean Cox. Ex-Seagull from another era, Alex Revell, also joined and a certain Harry Kane took his first steps into competitive football on loan from Spurs on Slade’s watch.
The manager’s trademark baseball cap that he could be seen wearing at each of the clubs he served even had its own sponsor at Orient. City of London tax advisory firm Westleton Drake put their logo on the headwear.
Slade repeated the magic touch he’d shown at Brighton to keep Orient in League One and in his first full season in charge took them to seventh place, only missing out on the play-offs by one place.
Along the way was a memorable fifth round FA Cup tie with Arsenal, forcing a 1-1 draw at home before succumbing 5-0 at the Emirates.
There was certainly no questioning Slade’s commitment to the Os’ cause, as Simon Johnson, writing for the Evening Standard on 23 September 2010, observed: “His wife Lisa and four children are living more than 200 miles away in Scarborough, meaning he is all alone most evenings to worry about the side’s plight.”
Slade lived in one of the flats next to the stadium and told Johnson: “Most people get the chance to get away from the office if they have a bad day, but I wouldn’t want it any other way.
“I come back from training and work in the office for a few hours and then go to my flat. I love my job and enjoy the fact my finger is on the pulse and I’m right on top of things.”
When Sheffield United sacked manager David Weir (later to become Albion’s director of football) in October 2013, there was speculation Slade might be in the running for the job, but the out of work Nigel Clough was appointed.
The following Spring, Slade once again found himself in charge of a team in the final of the League One play-offs. Although Orient drew 2-2 with Rotherham United, they missed their last two penalties in the shoot-out to decide the winner and once again he left Wembley disappointed. His only consolation was once again being named League One Manager of the Year.
Even though the club narrowly missed out on the step up to the Championship, Slade himself made it shortly into the new season. After a change of ownership at Orient, Slade resigned and was appointed manager at Cardiff City in October 2014, succeeding Ole Gunnar Solskjaer.
History records Slade’s reign being heavily hampered by a lack of finance and being forced to cut the wage bill significantly and cancelling the contracts of several highly paid players. There was even an embargo on new signings during his second season.
The Bluebirds finished mid-table in his first season and then missed out on the play-offs the following season, losing 3-0 at Sheffield Wednesday in the penultimate game of the season to dash hopes of a top six finish.
Slade was removed from his post to be replaced by his head coach Paul Trollope (later Albion assistant manager to Chris Hughton) but was retained as Head of Football.
Slade decided it wasn’t for him and switched to a more familiar dugout job at Charlton Athletic.
Given a three-year contract by unpopular owner Roland Duchatelet, Slade lasted just 16 matches before he was sacked, although a club statement said: “The club would like to thank Russell for his tireless work during his time at The Valley, particularly the processes and disciplines he has instilled at the training ground.”
He wasn’t out of work for long, though, because Coventry City, sitting 21st in League One and enduring their worst run of results for 43 years, appointed him.
On the wrong end of a 4-1 defeat at Bristol Rovers in his opening match, on Boxing Day, he oversaw just three wins in 16 games and was sacked on 5 March.
In circumstances similar to the atmosphere at The Valley, Sky Blues fans were in dispute with the club’s owners, and the Ricoh Stadium was empty week after week.
Surprisingly, he guided the club to a Checkatrade Trophy final – Coventry later won the competition in front of more than 40,000 of their supporters at Wembley – but by then Slade had been sacked, having equalled the record for the most games (nine) without a win for a City manager before winning at the tenth attempt.
Andy Turner, writing for the Coventry Evening Telegraph, pulled no punches when he said: “Russell Slade will go down in Coventry City history as arguably the worst manager to have taken charge of the club.”
Slade’s take on it was: “It was not a good decision for me to go there, I didn’t do my homework enough before going there.”
Once again, though, Slade was back in work just over a month later when he returned to one of his former clubs, Grimsby Town.
Succeeding Marcus Bignot, Slade took charge with Grimsby 14th in League Two and they won two and drew another of their remaining five matches to stay in that position by the season’s end.
After making an encouraging enough start to the 2017-18 season, the side’s form dipped badly over the festive period, and with no wins on the board the club sank like a stone towards a relegation battle. Slade was sacked after a run of 12 games without a win, including eight defeats.
There was no swift return to management after his Grimsby departure, though, and it was another 18 months before he next took charge of a side, National League North side Hereford United, with former Albion full-back Andrew Whing as his assistant.
Not long afterwards, though, Slade started up his own business, Global Sports Data and Technology, and his tenure with the Bulls lasted only five months, club chairman Andrew Graham saying: “Unfortunately the existing business commitments of Russell Slade do not meet with the current demands of this football club.” Hereford had recorded only one win in 18 games at the time.
The ever-resilient Slade was back in the game the following month when his former player, Alex Revell, appointed manager at Stevenage, invited him to join his staff as a managerial consultant.
Revell, who played under Slade at Orient and Cardiff, said: “I have always respected Russ and it will be a great boost to be able to use his experience around the training ground and on matchdays.”
Plenty of disgruntled fans from clubs where Slade had been less than successful took to social media to mock the appointment.
Nevertheless, Revell was certainly right about experience because Slade could reflect on a managerial career that saw him serve 11 different clubs, taking charge of 865 matches, winning 314, drawing 240 and losing 311.
In his new venture, Slade champions the cause of the way performance data information is handled, as described in a BBC news item in October 2021.
It focuses on companies who take data and process it without consent. “It’s making football – and all sports – aware of the implications and what needs to change,” he said.
In parallel lines 