Calderwood’s switch to promotion rivals backfired

SCOTTISH international Colin Calderwood played for and managed Nottingham Forest in a lengthy playing and managerial career that has spanned a host of clubs across the country.

His 21 months as assistant manager to Chris Hughton at Brighton came to an abrupt end that drew harsh criticism at the time but thankfully didn’t hinder Albion’s upward trajectory.

Calderwood worked under Hughton at three other clubs: Newcastle United, Birmingham City and Norwich City.

The pair first met on the same A licence coaching badge course and Hughton was later a coach at Tottenham when Calderwood was a player. He then played a part in Calderwood becoming reserve team coach at White Hart Lane after his playing days were over.

Calderwood went on to become a manager in his own right at League Two Northampton Town, where he got them promotion at the end of his second season (in 2006).

Two and a half years as boss at Forest followed, during which he got them promoted from League One to the Championship. In 2007-08, his Foest side took four points off the Albion, winning 2-0 at Withdean but being held to a goalless draw at home.

Forest were promoted in second place behind champions Swansea City (Albion finished seventh) but Calderwood was sacked just before Christmas in 2008 with the side struggling in the Championship relegation zone.

When Hughton succeeded Sami Hyypiä at the start of 2015, it wasn’t long before he turned to trusted ‘lieutenant’ Calderwood to help Albion’s cause.

The no.2 had first worked with him at Newcastle in 2009 when, after relegation from the Premier League, the pair led the Magpies back to the elite as Championship champions in 2010.

Hibernian in Edinburgh lured him to try a third spell as a no.1 but, after just 13 months in charge, and only securing 12 wins from 49 matches, he was sacked. He was not out of work for long, moving later the same month to Birmingham to become Hughton’s assistant at the Championship side, where another of Hughton’s backroom team, Paul Trollope, was first team coach.

When Hughton left for Premier League Norwich in June 2012, Calderwood, Trollope and chief scout Ewan Chester (who also later joined him at Brighton) all decamped to Carrow Road. City dispensed with their services in April 2014.

Having helped steer Albion to the Championship promotion near-miss of 2015-16 (when they suffered the agonising play-off semi-finals defeat to Sheffield Wednesday), the Seagulls were well geared up to go one better the following season.

So it came as something of a shock when Calderwood quit in November 2016 to become assistant manager to Steve Bruce at promotion rivals Aston Villa.

Hughton was said to be “very disappointed” and “very surprised” by his assistant’s departure, “particularly at this stage of the season”. Albion watcher Andy Naylor reckoned that amounted to a “withering condemnation” from the normally placid manager.

In an excoriating article for the Argus, Naylor wrote: “He clearly feels let down – and he is entitled to feel that way. Is there any justification for treating Hughton the way he has?”

It emerged that the move gave Calderwood a much shorter daily commuting distance from his home in Northampton, but, even so, Naylor reckoned Hughton deserved better.

Thankfully, there was a ready-made replacement in the wings because Trollope had just lost his job at Cardiff City.

Naylor wrote: “Trollope is in the right place at the right moment to bring his promotion-winning mentality as both a player and manager into the camp. Let’s hope he demonstrates more loyalty than Calderwood.”

Perhaps it was the supreme irony that as Albion marched to promotion from the Championship the following spring, the side Calderwood had moved to only finished in 13^th place – although the last-game draw at Villa stymied Albion’s chances of going up as champions.

Nevertheless, there were no bitter recriminations on Calderwood’s part. “Chris did a terrific job turning around the shape and the balance of the team,” he recalled in an interview with the Argus in January 2021.

Ahead of his subsequent club Blackpool’s visit to the Amex for a fourth round FA Cup tie (Albion won 2-1), the former assistant boss said: “We found, as I’ve found at most clubs I’ve been at, there’s a core group of players that have an appetite and an ability level that can give you a chance of success.

“When it falls into place, it is really nice to watch and it is very heart-warming and you feel justified in what you preach and practice.

“A lot of the time you are determined by the quality of the person and the player within the club. We found some really good people down there.”

Born on 20 January 1965 in Stranraer, Calderwood didn’t play professionally in Scotland, instead joining Mansfield Town as a 17-year-old in 1982.

He realised in hindsight that he learned a lot from Town’s manager at the time, the experienced Ian Greaves, and he went on to play over 100 matches for the Stags before Swindon Town boss Lou Macari signed him for £27,500 in 1985.

“Ian and Lou were the ones that built the foundations of my career,” he told the Albion matchday programme.

The centre back spent eight seasons at the County Ground and is recognised as a Swindon legend having featured in 412 matches (plus two as a sub).

At only 21, he was made club captain and, despite a difficult start, led Town to back-to-back promotions as they won the Division Four title in 1986 and overcame Gillingham in a Division Three play-off final replay in 1987.

Calderwood was said to be “a rock at the heart of the defence” and eventually led Town to their first promotion to the top-flight, after beating Sunderland in the play-off final at Wembley in 1990. But Swindon were demoted due an irregular payments scandal in which Calderwood was implicated: he was arrested just four weeks before the Wembley match but released the same day without charge.
Calderwood missed five months of the 1990-91 season following a horror tackle by Wolves legend Steve Bull but he returned stronger than ever and was ever present when, under Glenn Hoddle, Swindon were promoted at the end of the 1992-1993 season, beating Leicester 4-3 in the play-off final.

But instead of featuring for Swindon in the Premiership, Town’s former manager Ossie Ardiles took him to Tottenham for a fee of £1.25 million.

Playing in the top division for Spurs earned him international recognition. He made his Scotland debut aged 30 in a Euro 1996 qualifier against Russia and was a regular under Craig Brown, winning 36 caps in four years, including playing at the 1998 World Cup.

According to Spurs fan website mehstg.com (My Eyes Have Seen The Glory), Calderwood was “a solid defender, who could tackle and was good in the air, but lacked the pace and distribution skills to be a top class centre half.

“Calderwood gave Spurs a tough presence in the middle of the back four they had been missing for some time and showed that Ardiles’ judgement had been sound.”

After 198 appearances for Spurs (more than 150 in the Premier League), he left White Hart Lane in March 1999 when a £230,000 move saw him join Aston Villa under John Gregory. A year later, he switched to David Platt’s second tier Forest for £70,000.

He had only been at Forest a month when, ironically at Birmingham’s St Andrews ground, Calderwood, by then 35, suffered an injury that would ultimately force him to retire.

Forest goalkeeper Dave Beasant had already been injured in a clash with City’s Jon McCarthy earlier in the game but recovered. Calderwood wasn’t so fortunate. He ended up being stretchered off after a collision with the same player. He had fractured his leg and dislocated his ankle, causing ligament damage.

The injury overshadowed Forest’s 1-0 win and it meant he played only a handful of games at the City Ground. He later had a brief spell on loan at neighbours Notts County before calling it a day.

Calderwood initially returned to Spurs as reserve team manager before leaving for Northampton in October 2003. Spurs director of football and caretaker manager, David Pleat, said: “Colin leaves us with our very best wishes. He’s had two-and-a-half years here as a coach which I’m sure has been valuable experience.

“Colin is young, he has energy, ideas and, most importantly, ambition. This could be a terrific apprenticeship for him and everyone at the club wishes him well in his new role.”

Fast forward 15 years, and after he left Villa along with Steve Bruce in October 2018, two months later he was back in the game at League Two strugglers Cambridge United. He was given an initial 18-month contract and a year later he was given a two-year extension on his deal.

However, after a 4-0 home defeat to Salford City in January 2020 which meant Cambridge had taken only one point from their previous six games, he was sacked.

In October that year he was taken on at Blackpool as part of Neil Critchley’s managerial team and was part of the set-up that saw the Tangerines win a place in the Championship in 2021.

In June 2021 Calderwood returned to his old club Northampton as assistant manager to Jon Brady, and he told the League Two club’s website: “I have learned a lot in the years since I was last at the club and hopefully I can put all of that experience to good use.

“The situation here is similar to the situation I arrived in at Blackpool in working with a talented young manager.
“I have spoken with Jon Brady a number of times, that relationship will build quickly and I am really looking forward to working with him and the rest of the coaching staff.”

The Cobblers finished fourth in League Two and made it through to the division’s play-off semi-finals where they lost 3-1 on aggregate to Calderwood’s first club, Mansfield.

They made up for it in 2022-23 when they earned automatic promotion in third place behind Leyton Orient and Stevenage.

Nevertheless, in October 2023, Calderwood returned to Championship level as part of Russell Martin’s backroom team at Southampton.

“First and foremost, he’s a brilliant human being. I really trust him and know him very well,” Martin told the Daily Echo.

“We worked together at Norwich many moons ago when he was the assistant manager. I used to moan all the time to him and he had a brilliant way of being able to deal with that.

“He just has a great relationship with the players, and he’s a coach throughout my career who I’ve stayed in real constant contact with and discussed football.

“We’ve spoken a lot even when he’s not worked with me. I tried to get him at my two previous clubs and it couldn’t quite happen for various reasons.

“He’s been a manager, an assistant manager, he’s helped some young managers recently get promoted in Neil Critchley and Jon Brady, and added huge experience and value to them.”

Transfer makeweight Storer became all-time Seagulls hero

STUART Storer cemented his place in Brighton’s history when he scrambled home a last-gasp winner in the final ever home game at the Goldstone Ground.

When a seemingly goal-bound header from Mark Morris bounced off the south stand end’s crossbar, fortunately it fell into the path of the onrushing Storer who managed to scramble it over the line among a sea of flailing Doncaster Rovers legs.

That moment on 26 April 1997 is often brought up with Storer via media interviews or simply when bumping into Brighton fans while on his travels. The goal is featured in the pre-match video montage shown on the TV screens at the Amex, so it has been seen by various generations of fans.

“I’m proud that people hold me in so much esteem and I’m very fortunate to be part of the club’s history,” Storer told Brighton & Hove Independent in an April 2017 interview. “Younger people that I teach watch the video and take the Mickey but they’ll never kill my pride. I’m very proud of that moment.”

*Storer provided the photographers with plenty of action shots*

The goal ensured a vital three points were secured in the fight to avoid relegation from the lowest tier in the Football League. In the one remaining game the following week, Albion managed to get the point needed to stay up while simultaneously relegating Hereford United.

Those crucial matches were just two of more than 150 games Storer played for the Albion under six different managers during an extraordinarily turbulent time for the club.

It was, though, a rather curious playing career all round that saw some of the game’s biggest names – Liam Brady, Alan Ball, Howard Kendall and Ron Saunders – sign him for their clubs. And he carried on playing until he was 42.

In 2006 and 2007, he was part of Everton’s Masters’ six-a-side team in the televised tournament featuring veteran players. Storer’s teammates included the likes of Neville Southall, Adrian Heath and Alan Harper.

Storer had been at Goodison Park the last time the Toffees were the English league champions. However, he didn’t make a first team appearance, invariably being the 13^th man in the days when there was only one substitute.

He’d arrived on Merseyside as a transfer makeweight in a £300,000 deal Kendall struck with Birmingham City to sign Wolverhampton-born striker Wayne Clarke – the youngest of five brothers who played league football.

Clarke’s former club, Wolves, were convinced Storer had been included in the deal simply to lower the sell-on amount they were due as part of a previous agreement.

Clarke scored five goals in 10 games – including a hat-trick in a 3-0 win over Newcastle United on Easter Monday – to help Everton win the League Championship. Storer had made only 12 appearances for City in three years so his chances of making an impact with the title-chasers were slim.

Although Storer was on Everton’s books for nine months, he never crossed the white line for the first team and went on loan to Wigan Athletic, making his debut on the opening day of the 1987-88 season in a 4-4 draw away to Notts County (Garry Birtles scored two of County’s goals).

Storer was no stranger to a 4-4 draw. He played in two for Albion in 1997 – on 8 March at home to Orient and on Boxing Day later the same year when they drew at Priestfield against Colchester United (Paul Emblen got a hat-trick for the Seagulls).

Storer started nine games for the Latics and came on as a sub three times under Ray Matthias but they didn’t have the funds for a permanent transfer. Instead, the loan was cut short and, on Christmas Eve 1987, Everton sold him to then Fourth Division Bolton Wanderers for £25,000. He scored his first goal for the Trotters four days later in a 2-1 home win over Stockport County.

He enjoyed seven seasons at Burnden Park as they progressed from the basement division to the third tier under former Liverpool and England full-back Phil Neal.

His time with the Trotters included two trips to Wembley. He was a late substitute in the Wanderers side captained by Phil Brown who beat Torquay United 4-1 in to win the Sherpa van Trophy in 1989. And he was a starter in the Wanderers side who lost the 1991 Third Division play-off final to Tranmere Rovers.

Having broken an ankle and seen Neal switch to become Steve Coppell’s assistant manager at Manchester City, Storer was sold to Exeter City in March 1993 by Neal’s successor Bruce Rioch. Storer made 177 appearances for Bolton, but Rioch’s signing of David Lee had signalled the beginning of the end of his time there.

It was former World Cup winner Ball, then boss of Exeter City, who paid £25,000 for Storer’s services. He made 75 appearances (plus two as a sub) for the Grecians, initially under Ball and then his successor, former Leeds and England left-back Terry Cooper in the 1994-95 season.

Financial problems at the Devon club led to his departure. Early negotiations with a view to a transfer to Brighton initially broke down but Brady finally managed to secure his services for £15,000 in March 1995.

Ironically, he then suffered an injury during his first day’s training with the Seagulls, delaying his first appearance until 29 April. But it was memorable as he scored in a 3-3 draw away to his former club, Birmingham.

He recalled in a March 2019 interview with Michael Walker for the Daily Mail: “I was in an untenable situation at Exeter because they were going into administration. I had to get out. It was from the frying pan into the fire.”

However, Storer said, at the time he signed, he was unaware of the tensions going on around the Albion, although he knew he was the first player signed after a transfer embargo had been lifted. Not for the first time in the club’s history, fans dipped into their pockets to help buy the player.

“I think the fans just wanted to buy a player, any player, and they chipped in,” said Storer.

Born in the village of Harborough Magna, just north of Rugby, on 16 January 1967, he was raised in the village of Dunchurch, just south of Rugby, attending its local junior school before moving on to Bilton High School, where his footballing ability was recognised with selection in the Rugby Boys and Warwickshire Boys representative sides.

Wolverhampton Wanderers scout John Jarman spotted him and he went along to Molineux during the Ian Greaves managerial reign. When a takeover at Wolves saw Jarman and Greaves depart for Mansfield Town, they took the young Storer on as a trainee at Field Mill.

He began playing for their youth side but he was given his Mansfield first team debut aged only 16 in a 4-0 win over Hartlepool.

*Storer and Julian Dicks at Birmingham City*

Released after only a year with the Stags, he was offered another chance to build a league career by Birmingham who he joined in July 1984, initially signing as a trainee and then becoming a professional. But after limited first team opportunities at St Andrews, Saunders’ successor, John Bond, sold him to Everton as part of the Clarke transfer.

After Storer’s crucial part in keeping Albion in the League, he remained at the club until 1999, playing a total of 152 games and being part of the side who had to spend two years playing home games at Gillingham.

He moved back to Warwickshire on the day the Seagulls played their first friendly at Withdean on 24 July 1999,signing for Southern League Premier Division side Atherstone United, but he was only there for two months before moving to Kettering Town, who were playing in the Football Conference, the tier just below the Football League.

In May 2000, Storer signed for Isthmian League Premier Division side Chesham United and spent a season with them, before moving nearer to his Midlands base and signing for Hinckley United in March 2001.

Storer was made club captain, and as he approached his late 30s, he got more involved with coaching. At the age of 40, Storer was a member of the Hinckley team that achieved their highest ever league position of fourth in the Conference North, losing in the play-off final to deny them promotion.

After eight seasons, he had made more than 300 appearances for the part-timers of Hinckley while working as a PE teacher at various colleges in Coventry.

Storer continued to play until he was 42 and since 2013 has managed Bedworth United, where he is still in charge and also runs academies for boys and girls and A Level courses. He said: “I played until I was 42 at Hinckley in the Conference and then my legs gave way and I had to do something else in football.”

There’s a Michael Portillo style to Storer’s attire here and he admitted in a matchday programme article to having a penchant for “having a bizarre choice in clothing” as well as being an avid collector of hats.

When football didn’t deliver the right break for Colin Dobson

THE architect of Brighton’s humiliating 8-2 home defeat to Bristol Rovers in 1973 was none other than a player who might have been wearing Albion’s stripes if injury hadn’t struck.

Goalscoring winger Colin Dobson turned goal provider the day Rovers were rampant at the Goldstone Ground. Twenty-one months earlier he’d left the same pitch on a stretcher, not certain that he’d ever be able to play again.

Dobson had joined Brighton on loan in January 1972, making his debut in a mid-season friendly against his parent club, Huddersfield Town, on 18 January.

Ironically, his first meaningful Albion action came against Rovers when he was a substitute in a 2-2 draw at Eastville on 22 January.

Dobson was also on the bench for the home 1-0 win over Swansea City the following Saturday. He was elevated to the starting line-up away to Wrexham on 5 February, when goals from Willie Irvine and Peter O’Sullivan sealed a vital 2-1 win.

It was during his full home debut against Walsall on 12 February that his short-lived Albion career came to a sudden halt. Albion lost 2-1 and Dobson suffered an ankle fracture.

It had been expected that Albion would sign him permanently, and he told the Evening Argus that he had been offered a good deal to do so, but the injury put paid to the transfer being completed.

With Pat Saward’s side heading towards promotion with Aston Villa, the Irish manager instead went back to Wolverhampton Wanderers to sign Bertie Lutton, who had been on loan earlier in the season.

Lutton duly played his part as the Seagulls acquired the necessary points to earn promotion, while Dobson nursed an injury which at the time threatened to end his playing days.

His six-year Huddersfield career at an end, in the summer of 1972 he accepted a role as player-coach at Bristol Rovers, working under his former Sheffield Wednesday teammate, Don Megson.

Dobson Rovers

Thus it was that he was part of a Rovers side who had gone 18 matches unbeaten when they showed up at the Goldstone on a cold winter’s day on the first day of December 1973 to tackle Brian Clough’s Albion in front of The Big Match television cameras.

The game was only five minutes old when Dobson played in Alan Warboys who beat Norman Gall before passing to his strike partner Bruce Bannister to open the scoring.

Seven minutes later, Dobson took Warboys’ pass and laid on a pinpoint centre for Gordon Fearnley to score with a header. The game was still six minutes short of half-time when another Dobson centre was met by Warboys to make the score 5-1 to the visitors.

John Vinicombe, Albion reporter for the Argus, declared in his summary: “To Colin Dobson, freed by Albion when a broken ankle looked like ending his career, the accolade for a thinking player.

“He masterminded the operation in unbelievably generous space. Bruce Bannister knifed through for the early, killing goals, and Alan Warboys, superbly balanced and fast on the slightly frozen pitch, looked the perfect striker, taking his four goals so cleanly.”

An incandescent Clough told the media: “I was ashamed for the town and the club that 11 players could play like that. I feel sick. We were pathetic. This side hasn’t got enough heart to fill a thimble.”

Rovers went on to win promotion to the second tier that season and Dobson eventually completed 63 league and cup games for them before retiring at the end of the 1975-76 season.

Born on 9 May 1940 in Eston, North Yorkshire, Dobson joined Sheffield Wednesday at 15, and made a name for himself with the Owls in the days when they played in the top tier of English football.

He earned a reputation as a goalscoring winger after making his debut in 1961 and scored 52 goals in 193 games over the next five years.

He was twice capped by England Under 23s: on 29 May 1963, he came on as a substitute for Alan Suddick as England beat Yugoslavia 4-2 in Belgrade. Alan Hinton scored a hat-trick for England and the other goal was a penalty by Graham Cross, then with Leicester but later a Brighton player. Future England World Cup winner George Cohen was the side’s right-back.

Four days later, with Ernie Hunt leading the line, Dobson started for England when they lost 1-0 to Romania in Bucharest.

In 1966, Dobson made the switch to second division Huddersfield for a £21,000 fee and he was Town’s top scorer in the 1967-68 season (with 14 goals) and 1968-69 (with 11).

Although full international honours eluded him, in the summer of 1968, he was selected for the Football Association Commonwealth tour of the USA, New Zealand, Malaysia and Hong Kong.

He was also part of the side Ian Greaves led to the 1969-70 Second Division title, but he only made a handful of top-flight appearances, and his last Huddersfield appearance was against Stoke City in an FA Cup fourth-round replay in January 1971.

Once his playing days were over, Dobson worked for a whole host of clubs in a coaching or scouting capacity, including Port Vale, Coventry City, Aston Villa, clubs in the Middle-East (Bahraini side West Riffa; Al Rayyan in Qatar; Kuwaiti side Al Arabi, and Oman’s Under-17s), Portugal’s Sporting Lisbon, Gillingham, Watford and Stoke, where he renewed his acquaintance with John Rudge, who he had known at Huddersfield and Bristol Rovers, who was director of football for the Potters.

It was during his time with Stoke that he discovered the future Manchester United and England goalkeeper Ben Foster, a chef playing part-time non-league football at the time.

Foster later told the Birmingham Mail: “There was a scout called Colin Dobson who worked for Stoke but was living in Warwick.

“One night he saw some floodlights, stopped off and had a watch of the game and I caught the eye. That was it. He made a note of it and came to watch me a few more times.

“I owe it all to him. Top man. Whether I’d still be working as a chef if he hadn’t spotted me, I don’t know.”

Dobson died in Middlesbrough aged 82 on 16 February 2023.

Pictures from my scrapbook. Originally sourced from the Evening Argus, Shoot! and Goal magazines.

Flamboyant Frank Worthington’s career included a brief Brighton stopover

3-fw-albion FRANK Worthington was one of football’s genuine entertainers and it was a privilege to witness his season at The Goldstone between 1984 and 1985.

An all-too-brief England career which saw him win eight caps in 1974 was a long way behind him by the time his former Huddersfield Town teammate Chris Cattlin secured his signature for Brighton, but what the legs could no longer do, the brain more than made up for.

He was on the scoresheet in only his second game, a bruising encounter when Notts County were beaten 2-1, even though Albion played the second half with only 10 men – centre backs Eric Young and Jeff Clarke having been hospitalised by clashes with Justin Fashanu.

Worthington went on to make 30 appearances (plus five as sub) scoring eight times in total. Two of the goals came in his penultimate match against Wolverhampton Wanderers, one being a penalty struck so hard that it broke the hand of their ‘keeper Tim Flowers.

In June 2013, in the Huddersfield Examiner, Cattlin told interviewer Doug Thomson: “He did a good job for me. Frank wasn’t only a great player, but a great bloke as well, a dedicated trainer and a great bloke to have around a club.”

Worthington reflected on his time at the club in a matchday programme interview with Spencer Vignes in 2003. “I’d known Chris since my early days at Huddersfield,” he said. “I’d liked him so when he asked whether or not I’d be prepared to come to Brighton, I didn’t really have to think too long about it. They were a good side that hadn’t long been out of the First Division, so it sounded attractive.”

He continued: “We had some good players and certainly had no problems finding the net. I felt as though I was playing OK and the fans seemed to like me. But Chris did have this thing where he would chop and change the team around quite a bit, even if we were winning. He never really seemed sure what his best side was, and I think our form began to suffer because of it.”

Worthington reckoned it led to disharmony in the dressing room, and, for his own part, while he was good friends with Jimmy Case and Hans Kraay, he couldn’t say the same for Chris Hutchings or Kieran O’Regan. Albion finished sixth in the table, three points off automatic promotion and, although he was offered a new one-year contract, he decided to move on to try his hand at management.

So Brighton was only a brief stop-off in a 20-year career which saw Worthington score 236 goals in 757 league games. Add in games he also played in the United States with Philadelphia Fury and Tampa Bay Rowdies, in South Africa, Sweden and in English non-league, and the games total amounts to an amazing 828.

Halifax-born Worthington’s father was a pre-war professional and his two brothers, David and Bob, were also professionals. Unlike his brothers, the hometown club dithered over signing Frank and Huddersfield jumped in and secured his signature.

After manager Ian Greaves selected him for the opening fixture of the 1969-70 season, he clocked up 100 consecutive appearances for the Terriers.

The flamboyant Worthington famously almost joined Liverpool in 1972 but the deal was called off when he failed a medical due to a reported high blood pressure reading.

Liverpool signed John Toshack instead while Worthington went to Leicester City for £85,000.

Having made nearly a quarter of a million pounds from the sale of David Nish to Derby County, Leicester boss Jimmy Bloomfield had a useful kitty which he splashed on Worthington, Dennis Rofe, Keith Weller, Jon Sammels and Alan Birchenall.

Worthington scored on his Leicester debut at Old Trafford and in an article with Goal magazine on 21 October 1972, he said: “It’s different playing for Leicester City compared with Huddersfield. At Huddersfield the emphasis was on hard running and effort – here it is on skill, and there is a hell of a lot of skill in this side.”

In the same publication two years later, he had finished the 1973-74 season with 25 goals to his name and he was full of compliments for Bloomfield.

“Basically I am a player who relies on skill and that fits perfectly into Jim’s plans,” he said. “I always think that teams reflect the style and outlook of their managers. That’s why Leicester’s philosophy is that there is no substitute for skill.”

His time at Leicester lasted five years and spanned more than 200 appearances before he switched to Bolton Wanderers – where one audacious goal he scored against Ipswich remains a YouTube favourite – and then Birmingham City, helping both sides to promotions.

In 1982 he played for Leeds, the following season Sunderland and the next, Southampton, before pitching up at The Goldstone.

Worthington’s first go at management, while continuing to play, came with two years at Tranmere – and his first signing was Albion’s Ian Muir. He told Vignes: “Ian Muir was a fantastic forward with great touch. He did things in training you just wouldn’t believe, yet he wasn’t even making the side at Brighton under Chris.”

Muir became a hero on Wirral, scoring 141 goals as Rovers won promotion twice and won the Associate Members Cup at Wembley in 1991. By then, Worthington was long gone, having moved on to Preston, then Stockport County, and, after a succession of brief stays with various non-league clubs, ended up with hometown club Halifax Town, where he was briefly joined by Case.

Albion’s shirt sponsor during his season with the club was Phoenix Brewery. Quite apt for a player who was famously quoted as saying: “I’ve squandered fortunes on booze, birds and gambling – it’s better than wasting it!”

Tellingly, his autobiography, published in 1995, entitled One Hump or Two, was a classic tell-all romp of a colourful career on and off the pitch.

Worthington died aged 72 on 22 March 2021 and, in a statement, his wife Carol said: “Frank brought joy to so many people throughout his career and in his private life. He will be greatly missed by everyone who loved him so much.”

The great man’s lifestyle spawned many eye-catching headlines over the years and there is no shortage of stories about him to be found on the internet.

Follow the links for just three examples.

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2016/may/06/frank-worthington-denies-being-diagnosed-with-alzheimers-disease

http://www.90min.com/posts/26691-england-s-wasted-talent-1-frank-worthington

http://www-users.york.ac.uk/~sph2/lufc/mag/worthing.htm

1-fw-hudd 2-fw-leic 4-fw-headline

Pictures from my scrapbook show Worthington in Goal magazine in Huddersfield and Leicester’s colours, in Albion’s Phoenix Brewery-sponsored shirt and a classic headline. Pictures also from the Albion matchday programme.

When Chris Cattlin rocked up to play for and manage Brighton

1-cat-in-goal IT MUST BE difficult for today’s reader to imagine a player with the opportunity to sign for either Coventry City or Chelsea choosing the Sky Blues over the London giants.

But in 1968, when the choice faced Huddersfield Town’s Cattlin, he moved to Highfield Road because the following day they were playing a star-studded Manchester United side and, as the full-back who’d be marking the legendary George Best, he couldn’t resist pitting his ability against the Irish wizard.

It was one of several career insights Cattlin revealed in an excellent interview by Doug Thomson in the Huddersfield Examiner in June 2013.

Huddersfield were happy to collect a £70,000 transfer fee when Coventry bid for Cattlin, but he told the Examiner: “Chelsea also came in for me and I was due to speak to them in the afternoon after talking to Coventry in the morning.

“City were playing Manchester United the next day and the manager, Noel Cantwell, told me I would definitely be in the team.

“I knew that if I could say I’d played against George Best, Denis Law and Bobby Charlton, I could die a happy man, so I never got as far as Stamford Bridge!

“I signed for £65 a week when the man in the street was probably getting £20, so to be paid like that for playing football made me more than happy!”

As it turned out, Cattlin marked Best out of the game and his new team won 2-0 with goals from Ernie Machin (who later left the Albion at the same time Cattlin arrived at the Goldstone) and Maurice Setters, against his old team.

Cattlin went on to play more than 250 league and cup games for Coventry, (then in the equivalent of today’s Premier League), before moving to Brighton in 1976, where his playing career finished, but he returned as manager between 1983 and 1986.

Going back to the beginning, though, Cattlin was born in Milnrow, Lancashire, on 25 June 1946, the son of a rugby league player, Bob, and his early school days were spent at Milnrow Parish School. He moved on to Ashton-under-Lyne Technical College (Geoff Hurst was three years his senior there) and then took a job in textile engineering.

In the meantime, he trained and played for Burnley’s youth team but he struggled with the 40-mile round trip travelling from his home. A Huddersfield Town scout, Harry Hooper, had spotted his potential and he was offered a professional contract with the Terriers in the summer of 1964 which allowed him to carry on working two days a week at the textiles factory.

“I went across to Leeds Road, and just fell in love with the place. It was far from luxurious, but there was just a feel about the ground and the people there,” he recalled.

Maybe it was also a feeling that Huddersfield knew a thing or two about decent left backs. Cattlin took over from Bob McNab, who later made a name for himself at Arsenal, and played four games for England, and McNab had replaced England World Cup winner Ray Wilson, who Town transferred to Everton.

Cattlin was signed by Eddie Boot only for the manager to resign the day after, following a 2-1 home defeat by Plymouth. Boot’s successor was Tom Johnston and he insisted on Cattlin becoming a full-time pro, which caused a degree of angst with Cattlin’s concerned parents, but he went for it and didn’t look back.

It was emerging coach Ian Greaves, a former Manchester United player (who later took Town to the top flight as manager), who was to have a lasting effect on Cattlin. “Ian lived in Shaw, the next village to Milnrow, and he’d give me a lift to Leeds Road each day, in the days before the M62, on that winding old road over the moors,” he explained.

“He was a great coach and later manager, and a superb motivator, just a football man through and through.”

Cattlin made his debut in a 3-1 home win over Derby on the final day of the 1964-65 Division 2 (now Championship) campaign but didn’t fully establish himself in the side until the 1966-67 campaign.

In total, he played 70 times for Huddersfield and, for a while, he was playing for the town’s football team while dad Bob was playing for its rugby league side. “My dad played for Huddersfield at rugby league, I played for Huddersfield Town at football. I think we’re the only father and son to have done that,” he said.

After that 1968 transfer to Coventry, Cattlin became a firm favourite at Highfield Road and although he didn’t quite emulate Wilson and McNab, he did play twice for England Under 23s. He made his debut on 2 October 1968 in a 3-1 win over Wales at Wrexham in a side that also included Peter Shilton in goal, West Ham’s Billy Bonds and John Sissons and Everton’s Howard Kendall and John Hurst.

Six weeks later he won his other cap in a 2-2 draw with the Netherlands at Birmingham’s St Andrews ground, when Arsenal’s John Radford and Hurst were the scorers. Cattlin also represented the Football League v the Scottish Football League.

Cattlin was part of the only Coventry side ever to qualify for Europe (in 1970-71) and remembered relative success, only eventually getting knocked out by a Bayern Munich side that included the likes of Franz Beckenbauer and Gerd Muller.

On another occasion, in a tour match, he played in a 2-2 daw against Santos of Brazil, with Pele in their team, in front of an 80,000 crowd. “Pitting your wits against those kinds of players was a fantastic education,” he said.

When manager Gordon Milne decided to give Cattlin a free transfer after nine years and 239 matches for Coventry, fans organised a petition to keep him at Highfield Road.

But there was no turning back and Peter Taylor signed him for Brighton – along with another experienced defender, Graham Cross (from Leicester City) – a short time before quitting the club to rejoin Brian Clough at Nottingham Forest.

It was Alan Mullery’s good fortune to inherit a squad that would take Division 3 by storm to earn promotion and Cattlin was able to contribute in both full back positions although mainly at left back, having the edge on Harry Wilson.

With the arrival of Gary Williams from Preston, Cattlin switched to the right and vied with Ken Tiler for the shirt, regaining the upper hand for the final two thirds of the season which ended with promotion from the old Division 2 in 1978.

“That Brighton promotion team – what a fantastic set of lads, with no little ability,” he said. “They could all play and were great characters. I was a very lucky lad to come along at the end of my career and join a dressing room like that.”

Although he made just one appearance (in the disastrous 4-0 League Cup defeat at Arsenal) during the 1979-80 season, he notched up a total of 114 games for Brighton.

And he obviously liked the place so much that once his playing days were over he opened a rock shop on Brighton seafront, as well as investing in property. However, three years after quitting as a player, he returned to the Goldstone as a coach, appointed in the summer of 1983 by chairman Mike Bamber to assist manager Jimmy Melia – without Melia’s knowledge!

It all got rather messy with Melia and Cattlin clearly not getting on and talk of a takeover rumbling on in the background.

By the middle of October, Melia quit and Cattlin took over as manager, with another well known former left back, Sammy Nelson, elevated from reserve team manager to assistant manager.

Cattlin then began to shape his own squad and among notable signings who served Albion well were Steve Penney, Danny Wilson and Dean Saunders while there were some memorable cup games, including beating Liverpool in what I believe was the first FA Cup tie – other than finals – to be shown live on TV.

One of TV’s pundits of today, Martin Keown, was another Cattlin signing, joining on loan from Arsenal and beginning with Brighton what was a memorable career with the Gunners, Aston Villa, Everton and England.

Cattlin admitted in 2010: “I had to sell a lot of the popular, best players for financial reasons and bring other ones in to keep the show on the road and make it interesting for the crowd. That was my job.” The likes of Steve Foster (to Aston Villa), Jimmy Case (to Southampton), Tony Grealish (to West Brom) and Gordon Smith (to Manchester City) were all sold by Cattlin.

In 1984, Cattlin certainly found an entertainer when he brought to the Albion a former teammate from his days at Leeds Road, the mercurial Frank Worthington, who moved along the south coast from Southampton.

By that time, Worthington wasn’t too mobile but he’d lost none of his skill and flamboyance and Cattlin told his 2013 interviewer: “He did a good job for me.

“Frank wasn’t only a great player, but a great bloke as well, a dedicated trainer and a great bloke to have around a club.”

Catt dog — *Barking up the wrong tree? Cattlin couldn’t quite restore Albion to the elite when he returned as manager*

Cattlin stayed in the manager’s chair until April 1986, overseeing finishes of ninth, sixth and 11th in the second tier, although he clearly felt the writing was on the wall as far as his job was concerned when the Albion board wouldn’t give him £6,500 to sign the experienced defender Jeff Clarke from Newcastle, as Cattlin explained at the Albion Roar live show in December 2018 (skip to 28 minutes in).

Distractions and changes in the boardroom were an uncomfortable backdrop to much of his time in charge and it was evident that the fans didn’t perceive Cattlin to be to blame for the failure to finish higher.

When he was sacked, there were protests from supporters, a 2,000-signature petition calling for his reinstatement and Cattlin himself addressed a 200-strong rally in Hove.

But it was all to no avail. His former boss, Mullery, returned and Cattlin went back to his non-football business interests.

In a 2010 interview in the matchday programme, Cattlin said: “I think I deserved another season at least to get them back into what is now the Premiership.

“If it had gone wonky then they wouldn’t have had to fire me – I’d have gone myself. Nevertheless, to play, coach and manage Brighton and Hove Albion made me a very proud man. But I wish I could have put them back where I felt they belonged.”

Pictures show (top) Chris Cattlin pictured in Goal magazine in Coventry’s sky blue; in an Evening Argus shot alongside new manager Alan Mullery and fellow close season signing Graham Cross; how the Albion programme headed his managerial notes.