Nicky Forster was the definition of a goalscoring thoroughbred

NICKY FORSTER played for and managed Brentford as well as captaining Brighton and scoring a vital relegation-saving goal into the bargain.

The Surrey-born striker, who played alongside David Beckham for England under-21s, scored more than 200 goals in 700 games and it always seemed a shame that his time with the Seagulls didn’t come sooner in his career.

He built a reputation for finding the back of the net at first club Gillingham and was prolific in his first spell with the Bees but he viewed his six years leading the line for Reading as his most successful time in the game.

Forster plundered 67 goals in 179 games (plus 35 as a sub) in six years with the Royals, mostly playing under Alan Pardew and Steve Coppell, but he left for pastures new before they reached the Premier League.

A free transfer took him to Ipswich Town, where Joe Royle’s side were competing in the Championship, and, although Forster top-scored for the Tractor Boys, his total of seven typified a rather lacklustre campaign. One of those goals came against Brighton on Easter Saturday when the relegation-bound Seagulls pulled off a shock 2-1 win courtesy of goals from on-loan Gifton Noel-Williams and young Joel Lynch.

Forster scored in each of the three remaining games that season but they were his last for Town because he moved to link up with his former Reading teammate, Phil Parkinson, at Hull City, who paid £250,000 for the striker’s services. Forster scored six times for City as the side battled to retain their tier two status. Albion tried to sign Forster in January, but Parkinson’s successor Phil Brown wanted to keep him, and they rejected Albion’s £100,000 bid.

Albion finally got their man for £25,000 less in the summer that year, and, in a side largely made up of promising youngsters, in Forster they gained more than just an experienced striker.

Brighton fans were given an idea of what to expect from the new signing when his former Reading teammate Bas Savage told the Argus: “I played a few games with him in the first team and he will definitely bring goals. He is proven wherever he has been.

“He is also a very intelligent player. He makes good runs, works hard, has got very good pace and he can finish, so he will be an asset to Brighton, especially in League One. I think he will really shine.

“He will fit in easily to the dressing room as well. He was a joker at Reading, very funny and a good, bubbly character to have around.”

Savage added: “He was one of the top strikers at Reading and I learnt off all of them.

“I was a young boy at the time and, whoever it is that plays, Alex Revell, Nathan (Elder), Gatts (Joe Gatting), I can see them working well with Fozzy.

“It will be good to link up with him again and hopefully show our stuff together. I know Fozzy’s strengths and I will be looking to help him along in the same way that he can help me along. He brings experience to the team.”

Emerging defender Tommy Elphick was certainly appreciative of the new arrival. “Apart from in games, he brings a competitive edge to training,” he said. “In my eyes he is a bit of a legend really, the model pro on and off the pitch.”

When interviewed by Mike Ward for the matchday programme later that season, Forster declared: “I really am enjoying it here at Brighton. I like being on the training ground and I enjoy playing.

“I am now getting old in football terms, but I have got as much enthusiasm and energy for the game now as I had when I started. I feel that I am a better player now and I am enjoying my football as much as ever.”

Sure enough, with 19 goals in 48 appearances in the 2007-08 season, there was no question Forster proved a great addition to Dean Wilkins’ squad, and he took over as captain when Dean Hammond left the club under a cloud.

In the second half of the season, after Glenn Murray was signed from Rochdale for £300,000, manager Wilkins declared to the Argus: “I think we have got one of the best strike pairs in the division, one of the most threatening.

“When we have got possession and play with a bit of quality they are a really potent pair. If you have got a pair that score 20 goals a season you would expect to be quite successful.”

Unfortunately, seventh place in League One (seven points off the play-off places) was not quite successful enough for chairman Dick Knight, who turned to former boss Micky Adams to steer Albion’s fortunes in the 2008-09 season (a furious Wilkins declining the offer of continuing as first team coach).

While Forster got off to a great start under Adams, scoring a last-minute goal to seal a 2-1 win for the Seagulls in the season-opener at Crewe Alexandra, the Albion’s fortunes gradually unravelled as Adams chopped and changed the side with what, on reflection, were too many loan signings.

For a while, things didn’t look too clever after Russell Slade had been parachuted in to try to stave off the threat of relegation.

At a time when the new boss could really have done with Forster and Murray firing on all cylinders, both were sidelined with injuries. Forster missed eight matches with what was thought might be an anterior cruciate ligament injury in his knee.

Thankfully another former Brentford striker, Lloyd Owusu, stepped into the breach to score some vital goals, together with loan signing Calvin Andrew and the rejuvenated Gary Hart.

Nevertheless, going into the last game of the season, at home to Stockport County at Withdean, Albion still needed to win to avoid the relegation trapdoor.

When Hart left the action early and his replacement Andrew had to be withdrawn at half-time with what turned out to be a bad ACL injury, Slade had no option but to turn to the by-no-means-fit Forster to enter the fray from the bench for a crucial second half.

Fortunately, after County ‘keeper Conrad Logan could only parry a shot from Gary Dicker, Forster was on hand to stab in the only goal of the game from six yards, sparking massive celebrations.

Forster later conceded in an Argus interview: “It wasn’t quite right but I got through the game and the goal was a gift. I didn’t have to be particularly mobile to score it.

“I dosed up on tablets and rehabbed and was really determined to be involved in that game. Thankfully it worked out for me and for Brighton. But I wasn’t 100 per cent. I still had that niggling feeling.”

In a subsequent exploratory operation, it turned out that torn cartilage had been Forster’s problem and he underwent surgery during the close season, somewhat ironically the procedure being delayed a little while because the surgeon involved was operating on Andrew!

“When they took me down to the anaesthetist’s room, there was a guy in there before me,” said Forster. “I had to wait ten or 15 minutes and they said it was an ACL reconstruction going on. I didn’t realise it was Calvin.”

Tony Bloom took over from Dick Knight as Albion chairman that summer and, when the new season got under way, Slade had decided to give the captain’s armband to defender Adam Virgo (Forster remained club captain).

The opening part of the season went horribly wrong and, with only three wins in their first 15 matches, Slade was replaced by effervescent Uruguayan Gus Poyet.

By the end of January, Forster had scored 15 times in 27 matches (plus three as sub), but the beginning of the end of his time with the Albion was nigh when a contractual dispute went public.

The player, by then 36, wanted to know whether he was going to be offered a contract the following season, but that commitment wasn’t forthcoming. Forster aired his dissatisfaction in the media and Poyet left him out of the side.

Forster subsequently clarified his position in a statement on the club website, saying: “I have thoroughly enjoyed my playing years with Brighton and genuinely hoped – and still do – that I would remain at Brighton until the end of my playing days, hopefully with the opportunity to take up a training role.

“The decision to delay the offering of contracts makes life very difficult, particularly for players of my age. I have always been totally committed to Brighton and will continue to be so.”

While the air was cleared, and he was restored to the line-up for a 1-1 draw away to Leeds, that turned out to be his last start for the Albion. Only a matter of weeks later he was sent out on loan to Charlton Athletic until the end of the season, once again linking up with former teammate Parkinson.

Nevertheless, his 51 goals across two and a half seasons at the club were the best measure of his contribution and he was later a more than interested onlooker of Brighton’s fortunes when his stepson, Jake Forster-Caskey forced his way into Poyet’s Championship side.

Born in Caterham, Surrey, on 8 September 1973, Forster was comparatively late into the game, staying on at school to take A-levels.

But he had a lucky break when he played for non-league Horley Town against Gillingham in a friendly. “It was a real right-place-at-the-right-time scenario,” he told Ward in another Albion matchday programme interview.

Gillingham offered him the chance to become a professional and after impressive displays for their youth and reserve sides, he duly signed professional terms in May 1992 when Damien Richardson was in the manager’s chair.

The Gills sent him out on loan to Southern League Margate and Hythe Town. Forster’s career stats are comprehensively recorded by the Margate history website, even though he only played one game for them, when he scored with a clever lob after three minutes of his debut.

Back with the Gills, Forster made his first team debut in September 1992, going on as sub in a 4-1 home win over Wrexham. He went on to establish himself in the side under former Charlton striker Mike Flanagan in the 1993-94 season, top scoring with 18 goals. It was an achievement which prompted Brentford to pay a fee of £320,000 to take him to Griffin Park in June 1994.

The 1994-95 season is firmly etched in the annals of Brentford’s history because David Webb’s side were denied promotion to the elite when a one-off organisational blip meant the fledgling Premier League only took one promoted side from the division below – and the Bees finished second!

Forster had proved a major hit at his new club alongside strike partner Robert Taylor, with the pair netting 47 goals between them (Forster got 26 of them). But automatic promotion was denied when Brentford “choked” in the last month of the season and their agony was compounded when they lost on penalties to Neil Warnock’s Huddersfield in the play-off semi-finals.

For Forster personally, however, his goalscoring prowess brought him to the attention of the international selectors and in June 1995 he earned four England under 21 caps at the Toulon tournament in France, making his debut in a 2-0 defeat against Brazil in a team featuring future full internationals Beckham and Phil Neville.

Forster scored England’s only goal in his third match for Ray Harford’s side, as they beat Angola. He also played in the 2-0 win over Malaysia and in the semi-final against France, when they lost 2-0.

The Bees failed to follow up their near miss the following season, finishing 15^th and, although at one point there was talk of Crystal Palace preparing a £2m bid for Forster’s services, it came to nothing. The striker damaged knee ligaments in October 1995 and managed to find the net just the eight times by the season’s end.

It promised to be a different story in 1996-97, though. With Carl Asaba and Marcus Bent supplementing the Forster and Taylor strikeforce, Brentford got off to a flyer and topped what is now the Championship courtesy of an 11-match unbeaten run at the start of the season.

However, the bcfctalk blog was incredulous at what happened next. “We were coasting at the top of the league when the quite staggering decision was taken in January to sell Nicky Forster to arch-nemesis Birmingham City for a mere £700,000.

“He was never replaced, the prolific Carl Asaba was mysteriously shifted out wide to the left wing and the remaining 17 league matches produced a mere 18 points. We failed to score in ten of our last fourteen games and won only once at home after Christmas.”

Forster’s desire to progress his career didn’t play out well with the supporters of Brentford or Gillingham.

“I get booed every time I go there,” he told Brighton’s matchday programme. “It’s sad because I feel I did well for both clubs. And what they paid for me wasn’t a huge amount, so value-for-money wise I feel I did very well for them. It’s not something I worry greatly about, but I do think it’s time they learnt to forgive and forget.

“I don’t think they can really begrudge a player wanting to move on and better himself, better his career. Sometime fans can be a bit fickle!”

While Forster hoped to establish himself at Birmingham, he struggled to get a starting berth in a side managed by former Blues playing legend Trevor Francis. Paul Furlong and Peter Ndlovu were preferred up front, and later Dele Adebola. Forster invariably had to be content with involvement of the bench. Indeed, 46 of his 75 Blues appearances were as a substitute and, when he left for Reading in June 1999, he’d got just 12 goals to his name.

That all changed once he’d made the switch to the Madejski Stadium. The goals flowed (in 2002-03 there were two hat-tricks included in his season’s tally of 17) and in his six seasons with the Royals he notched 67 goals in 214 appearances (35 of which were as a sub).

His form tailed off in his final season with Reading and he began to look elsewhere because he wanted a longer contract than the club were prepared to offer.

Nevertheless, he respected manager Coppell and, when later in his career he took over as boss at Brentford, he said: “I was with Steve Coppell at Reading and I like his manner and demeanour. He is not a ranter and raver. I just like the way he goes about his business.

“He is quite a subdued guy when he speaks, but he speaks a lot of sense. When he talked to me, whether I liked it or not, I couldn’t really argue because it made a lot of sense.”

When Forster returned to Griffin Park as a player at the start of the 2010-11 season, he reflected: “The club holds many happy memories for me. Both the club and I have moved on over the years but I still have the hunger and the mobility to give a good account of myself.”

Manager Andy Scott added: “His goalscoring is a major attraction as that is an area where we have struggled to compete with other teams.

“His ambitions match those of the management team. He is a very dedicated footballer who will add experience, competition and, more importantly, goals to the team.”

Sadly, it didn’t pan out well with Forster only making 12 starts and scoring once. After a topsy turvy six months, Scott and his assistant Terry Bullivant were dismissed and Forster took over as caretaker boss, assisted by Mark Warburton.

When the Bees collected 14 points from six games, the temporary stint was extended until the end of the season.

Remarkably during his brief tenure, Forster took charge of Brentford at Wembley for the final of the Johnstone’s Paint Trophy, which they lost 1-0 to Carlisle United.

Brentford centre back Leon Legge said later: “Growing up, Wembley was always a sacred ground that not many people get to play at. I wanted to win so bad but it was just a shame we came second-best, especially against Carlisle, who we’d played just over a week earlier and beaten 2-1. Everything went for them that day.

“I know the gaffer at the time [Nicky Forster] made a few changes and I don’t think many agreed with it – for example, Marcus Bean didn’t play when he’d been such a good player leading up to that game. I think that made a difference.

“I still remember looking at the crowd of 40,000 and to play in such a sacred ground in front of that many fans, whether we won or lost, it was a good experience.”

Despite leading Brentford to a mid-table finish, Forster was told he was not in the running for the job on a permanent basis, and Uwe Rösler was appointed instead.

Nonetheless, Forster decided management was his next step and announced an end to his playing days.

“I have had a fantastic career, but the time has come to cross over into management,” he said.

“I’ve scored 200 goals in 700 games and haven’t got anything left to achieve as a player, so I want to concentrate on management.”

The eloquent Forster popped up on Sky Sports, covering Football League matches, and also brought his boots back out to play for Sussex County League side Lingfield.

Then, in September 2011, Forster was appointed player-manager of Blue Square Bet South club Dover Athletic, whose chairman Jim Parmenter said: “Nicky has had an impressive playing career at some big clubs and did very well during his time as manager at Brentford.

“As well as having both UEFA ‘A’ and ‘B’ licences, he is also a great man manager and motivator. Nicky is totally enthused by the prospect of managing the club and we look forward to a very successful future.”

Among his signings were former Brighton teammates Steven Thomson and young goalkeeper Mitch Walker.

Forster said: “I am delighted get Thommo down here at Crabble, especially as his signature was being chased by a number of other clubs both in our league and above. He is an experienced professional who is still hungry for success.”

Sadly, after a run of five successive defeats, his time in charge at Dover was brought to an end in January 2013 when he was replaced by the club’s former manager Chris Kinnear.

Two years later, Forster gave management another go taking charge of Conference South side Staines Town. But he quit after a year, telling getsurrey.co.uk: “I enjoyed every moment even though we had some low times, but it’s a learning experience and I left on good terms with the chairman and the fans who were great to me.”

In September 2016, Forster set up his own gym – The Spot Wellness Centre – in Godstone. As well as running that, he is now self employed and, on LinkedIn, describes himself as a goal setting coach and keynote speaker.

• Pictures from the Argus, Albion’s matchday programme and online sources.

The Albion legend whose face didn’t fit at Aston Villa

*Steve Foster challenges Spurs’ Steve Archibald at White Hart Lane*

LEGEND is overused far too much in football circles but, in some circumstances, it is justified. That applies to Steve Foster.

He played 800 games in a 21-year career which included nine years with Brighton in two separate spells.

His performances in the top-flight for Brighton led him to play for England at the 1982 World Cup and he lifted the League Cup in 1988 as the captain of Luton Town.

He might have enjoyed a longer spell at Aston Villa if the European Cup-winning manager who signed him hadn’t been unceremoniously dumped by ‘Deadly’ Doug Ellis.

Foster became – and, to older fans, still is – synonymous with Brighton & Hove Albion, and football followers the world over could readily identify the captain with the white headband.

In several interviews over the years, he has explained how the distinctive headpiece was actually a piece of padded white towel designed to protect a forehead split open in collisions with centre forwards Andy Gray and Justin Fashanu.

I wonder if physio Mike Yaxley’s wife Sharon, who made up the dressing before every game, realised at the time the key role she played in helping to make Foster one of the most identifiable characters in football.

Foster’s illustrious career is warmly documented in Spencer Vignes’ excellent 2007 book A Few Good Men (Breedon Books Publishing), featuring an interview with the player himself and those who played with him.

For example, Gerry Ryan told Vignes: “Fozzie was a huge player with a huge personality, a real leader and deceptively quick for a big man.

“When he played against the best, like Ian Rush and Kenny Dalglish, he was the best. People talk about giving 100 per cent, but Fozzie gave 150 per cent in everything he did, and I mean off the field as well.”

Gordon Smith added: “He was a fantastic person, great fun and a terrific centre half.”

Vignes himself observed: “Steve’s willingness to put his neck on the line for the cause earned him hero status among the fans, together with the complete respect of the dressing room.”

Unsurprisingly, Foster pulls no punches in describing the various characters and events surrounding his colourful career, for instance describing Chris Cattlin as “definitely the wrong man. I told him the truth and what I thought of him.” And, of predecessor Jimmy Melia: “When Jimmy took over it was more like a circus than a football club.”

Foster said the two biggest influences on his career were Frank Burrows, the manager of his first club, Portsmouth, who taught him about balance as the key to strength on the pitch, and Brian Horton, the dynamic midfield driving force he succeeded as Albion captain.

“He shouted and screamed for 90 minutes to help us get results, and to keep everyone on their toes,” said Foster. “If he made a mistake, 10 other people would shout and scream at him, and he would take it. When I was captain at Brighton, and my other clubs, that’s how I tried to be.”

*Such a recognisable figure as Albion’s centre-half*

Fortunately, sufficient archive film footage remains for fans of different generations to see what a dominant force Foster was at the heart of Brighton’s defence, while I retain plenty of now-yellowing cuttings from the numerous columns of newsprint he filled during his pomp.

Born on 24 September 1957 in Portsmouth, Foster went to St Swithin’s Junior School before moving on to St John’s College. A centre-forward in the early days, he played for the Portsmouth Schools under-12s side but it was Southampton who took him on as an associate schoolboy.

He played in the same youth team as Steve Williams and Nick Holmes, who both went on to have long careers.

But Saints boss Lawrie McMenemy let Foster go at 16, urging him to go elsewhere and prove him wrong. After Foster won his first England cap, McMenemy sent him a congratulatory telegram. “That was class, nothing but class,” Foster told Vignes.

Southampton’s loss was Portsmouth’s gain, courtesy of a tip off from local schoolteacher Harry Bourne to Pompey youth team coach Ray Crawford (who’d previously held a similar role under Pat Saward at Brighton). Bourne ran the Portsmouth and Hampshire schools teams.

Crawford describes in his excellent autobiography Curse of the Jungle Boy (PB Publishing 2007) how he called at the family’s house in Gladys Avenue, Portsmouth, but Foster’s mother was at a works disco at the local Allders store. Wasting no time, he immediately went in pursuit and, against a backdrop of deafening music and flashing lights, shouted above the din that they were interested in signing her son.

Foster called the club the following day and he was invited to play in a youth team game for Portsmouth – against Southampton! “I scored twice because I was playing as a centre-forward then, and they ended up offering me an apprenticeship on £5 per week which was my entry into the professional game,” said Foster.

Reg Tyrell, a respected former chief scout from Crawford’s time at Ipswich, watched the young striker in a youth team training game and declared: “That no.9, he’s no centre-forward but he’d make a good number 5.” A few weeks’ later, manager Ron Tindall’s successor, Ian St John (later Saint and Greavsie TV show partner of Jimmy Greaves), gave Foster his debut as a centre half!

Foster played more than 100 games during Pompey’s slide down through the divisions, and, at 21, had developed something of a fiery reputation. But Brighton boss Alan Mullery saw him as “big and brave, strong in the tackle and good in the air” providing “much-needed stability at the back” as the Seagulls began their first adventure into the top-flight of English football in 1979. He was signed for £150,000.

A couple of disciplinary issues in the early days of the new season looked like proving the doubters right to have warned Mullery off signing him, but an injury to first choice centre back Andy Rollings forced the manager to backtrack on a temporary ban he’d handed out. Foster made the most of his reprieve and never looked back.

By the end of a season in which the side grew collectively Foster was named Player of the Year and he earned international recognition, gaining an England under 21 cap as a substitute for Terry Butcher in a 1-0 defeat against East Germany in Jena on 23 April 1980 (Peter Ward was playing up front).

While the 1980-81 season saw Albion struggle and flirt with relegation, Foster’s tussles with some of the top strikers in the game saw his reputation grow, and he even chipped in with a vital goal in the final home game of the season against Leeds.

When Horton and Mullery departed at the end of that season, Foster took over the captaincy under new boss Mike Bailey, and, even though fans didn’t much like the way Bailey set up his side, Foster thrived with the emphasis on defence first.

England boss Ron Greenwood, who lived in Hove, was in the process of shaping his squad for the 1992 World Cup in Spain and, with injuries affecting some of the other centre backs in contention, Foster was given a chance to prove himself.

I can remember travelling to Wembley on 23 February 1982 to watch him make his debut against Northern Ireland, a game England won 4-0 courtesy of goals from Ray Wilkins, Kevin Keegan, Bryan Robson and Glenn Hoddle.

I had been to the stadium 10 years before to watch another Albion player – Willie Irvine – make his international comeback in a 1-0 win for the Irish, but it was something special – and rare – to see a Brighton player line up for England.

To break through to the senior team in a World Cup year was a notable achievement, although, by his own admission, he accepted his good fortune directly correlated to injuries ruling out other players.

Although the record books show Foster earned three caps, in fact he represented the country four times that year.

A month after his debut against Northern Ireland, on 23 March, Foster played for an England XI in Bilbao against Athletic Bilbao. The game finished 1-1 with Keegan scoring for England. It didn’t qualify for a cap because it was a testimonial match for retiring Bilbao player Txetxu Rojo, but Greenwood used the fixture to familiarise the players with what was the venue for England’s opening round matches at the World Cup.

Foster also featured in a 2-0 friendly win over the Netherlands (goals by Tony Woodcock and Graham Rix) on 25 May as Greenwood continued to assess his options.

*Foster (circled) in Ron Greenwood’s 1982 World Cup squad*

When it was clear neither Alvin Martin nor Dave Watson would be fit for the tournament in Spain, Foster was selected as back-up to first choice centre back pairing Terry Butcher and Phil Thompson. Ahead of the third group match, Greenwood didn’t want to risk a ban for the already-booked Butcher, so Foster played alongside Thompson and England won 1-0 against Kuwait; Trevor Francis getting the England goal.

When England didn’t progress past the second phase, Greenwood’s spell as boss came to an end and he was replaced by Bobby Robson who, for his first game in charge, partnered Russell Osman with Butcher – both having played under him at Ipswich Town.

Foster didn’t play for England again.

Much has been written already about the 1982-83 season and Albion’s path to the FA Cup Final. Foster demonstrated real heroism in the semi-final at Highbury, playing through the pain of a septic elbow, and, memorably, towards the end of the game, launched into an overhead kick to clear a goal-bound shot to safety (pictured above).

History records Foster being suspended for the Cup Final – a well-documented appeal to the High Court against a two-game ban for accumulated bookings couldn’t get the decision reversed – but, as is often the case in football, his misfortune presented a golden opportunity for stand-in Gary Stevens who capped a man-of-the-match performance with the equalising goal. What he did that day persuaded Spurs to sign him.

Foster, of course, eventually got his Wembley chance in the replay but with a rampant Manchester United running out easy 4-0 winners, their fans also rather cruelly derided the Albion skipper with the chant I can still hear ringing around Wembley that evening: “Stevie Foster, Stevie Foster, what a difference you have made!”

In truth the whole defence lacked balance in the replay because manager Melia had elected to fill the right-back berth vacated by injury to Chris Ramsey with the left-footed Steve Gatting. He figured Stevens couldn’t be moved from the centre where he had performed so well on the Saturday, but it was a mistake, especially as Stevens had often played right back previously.

The relegation that went in tandem with Albion’s Wembley loss sparked the beginning of a big clear-out of the best players. First to go was Stevens, closely followed by Michael Robinson.

It wasn’t until the following March that Foster followed them through the exit, although, according to Foster, he might have gone sooner – even though he didn’t want to leave; a point he made clear in an interview with Match Weekly shortly after he signed for Villa for £150,000.

“I never wanted to move,” he said. “I had nearly seven years of my contract to run at Brighton and would have quite happily played out my career there. It’s a great little club.

“But economies dictated otherwise and, although manager Chris Cattlin wanted to keep me, he was under pressure to sell me and help ease the club’s financial problems.

“It was a wrench to leave Brighton because the club has treated me tremendously well and I’ve had some great times there – not least the FA Cup run last season.”

Cattlin had a slightly different take about the transaction in his matchday programme notes. “I feel that Steve Foster has been a fine player during his four-and-a-half years at the Goldstone, but I felt that the time was right and the offer good enough to let him go,” he said.

“I hope the move will benefit both Steve and the club. I hope it rejuvenates his career because he has been unlucky with injuries this season. It gives me breathing space for Eric Young to develop and it will also allow me to strengthen other positions if necessary.”

In a rather oblique reference to the need to get rid of high-earning players, Cattlin added in another matchday programme article: “Certain players have left Brighton in moves which I feel are important for our future. Salaries and bonuses of individual players are confidential and obviously I cannot disclose details, but the moves I have made I am certain are right.”

He added: “I can’t explain all the matters that have been considered but I will once again emphasise that we are building for the future and every move I make in the transfer market is being made with this in mind.”

Foster revealed that Villa boss Tony Barton, a former coach at Foster’s first club, Portsmouth, had tried to sign him twice before, but the clubs hadn’t been able to agree on a fee. Eventually, the transfer saw defender Mark Jones (who’d made seven top-flight appearances for Villa that season) move in the opposite direction, in addition to a £150,000 fee.

Barton wanted Foster to tighten up a leaky defence, to fill the position previously occupied by former European Cup winning centre-half Ken McNaught, who had moved to West Brom.

The relatively inexperienced Brendan Ormsby had been playing alongside McNaught’s former partner, Allan Evans, and the signing of Foster put his nose well and truly out of joint. “It’s obvious that I’m just going to be used as cover for Steve Foster or Allan Evans now and so it’s probably in my best interests to try and find another club,” he told Match Weekly.

As it turned out, it was Barton who was ousted; Ormsby stayed, and new manager Graham Turner decreed it would be Foster who was the odd one out. But I jump ahead too soon.

*Foster’s arrival at Villa Park as featured on a matchday programme cover*

A picture of Foster being introduced to the Villa faithful appeared on the front cover of the programme for the 17 March home game against Nottingham Forest although he didn’t make his Villa debut until 14 April 1984, away to Leicester City, which ended in a 2-0 defeat.

Foster made seven appearances by the end of the season and he got on the scoresheet in only his third game, netting together with future Albion player Dennis Mortimer, in a 2-1 win over Watford on 21 April.

Villa finished the season in 10^th place but it wasn’t good enough for the erratic chairman Ellis. Suddenly Foster found the man who signed him had been sacked, and the side Barton had led to European Cup success was gradually dismantled.

To the astonishment of the Villa faithful, Barton was succeeded by former Shrewsbury Town boss Turner.

Foster played 10 games under the new boss, and scored twice, once in a 4-2 win over Chelsea on 15 September and then again the following Saturday in a 3-3 draw away to Watford.

He’d started the season alongside Evans but Turner then offered a way back to Ormsby. While Foster played a couple of games alongside Ormsby, Turner preferred Evans and Ormsby together, making the new man surplus to requirements.

His last game for Villa was away to Everton on 13 October and the following month he was sold to Luton for £70,000 – less than half the fee Villa had paid for him eight months earlier. Foster simply put it down to his face not fitting with the new man.

It was a completely different story with Luton boss David Pleat and Foster’s time at Kenilworth Road coincided with the club’s most successful period in their history, even though Pleat left to manage Spurs.

Alongside representing his country, Foster said the best moment of his career was captaining the Hatters as they won the League Cup (then sponsored by Littlewoods) at Wembley in 1988 with a 3-2 win over Arsenal, his former Brighton teammate Danny Wilson scoring one of their goals (Brian Stein got the other two).

They reached the final of the same competition the following year too, but on that occasion lost 3-1 to Nottingham Forest. By then Foster was assistant manager to Ray Harford, and it looked like he was on a path to become a boss in his own right.

But that summer, when his old Albion captain, Horton, who had taken over from Mark Lawrenson as the manager of Oxford United, asked him to join him as a player at the Manor Ground, he was unable to resist and a new chapter in his career began.

It meant a drop down a division but Foster accepted the challenge and went on to play more than 100 games for United, many being quite a struggle as the side fought for survival at the foot of the second tier.

In the autumn of 1991, injury sidelined Foster from the U’s team and he believed it could have been the end of his career.

However, when the following summer he was contemplating whether or not to retire, he gave Brighton boss Barry Lloyd a call and asked if he could keep his fitness going by joining in pre-season training with the Seagulls.

Lloyd could see that the former skipper was still able to perform and, although the club was in a downward spiral, Foster seized the opportunity to extend his career and help out his old side.

Another veteran of that side, Clive Walker, told Vignes for A Few Good Men: “Fozzie might not have been so mobile then but his positional sense was absolutely brilliant, as was his ability in the air.”

Foster said: “Funnily enough during that second period I played probably some of my best football. I had to because of the position the club was in. There was no money so you had to pull out all the stops.”

Foster continued to play after Lloyd had departed, and he vented his anger publicly about the off-field shenanigans new boss Liam Brady was having to operate under.

Foster eventually called it a day at the end of the 1995-96 season, saddened at the club’s plight. He was granted a testimonial match against Sheffield Wednesday, played as a pre-season friendly in July 1996. Throughout Foster’s career he had continued to live in Hove and he retains his affection for the Albion to this day.

During his second spell at the club, Foster was the PFA rep and he had to deal with the heartbreak of telling the parents of a young player (Billly Logan) that an ankle injury was going to end his career. The youngster got just £1,500 compensation.

As a result, after his own playing days were over, Foster set up an insurance business (Pro-Secure) which continues to this day, making sure players are properly covered and get suitably recompensed if things don’t turn out as they’d hoped.

Although Foster hasn’t always been popular with the Albion’s hierarchy (courtesy of suggested involvement in potential takeovers), his association with the club hasn’t dimmed and Seagulls fans of two generations took him to their hearts for his on-field performances and leadership spanning a total of 332 games.

• Pictures from my scrapbook, the Albion matchday programme over several seasons, and some online sources.

Pass ‘master’ Steven Thomson’s unhappy year with Brighton

STEVEN THOMSON didn’t enjoy his year playing for Brighton in League One and the former Crystal Palace midfielder seized an escape route to return to Scotland to see out the remainder of his long professional career.

It had been considered quite a coup when Dean Wilkins secured the signing of the Falkirk captain in January 2008. In effect a replacement for the departing Dean Hammond, Thomson was soon a victim of Wilkins’ tinkering with the formation, and over his 41 matches for the Seagulls had a conveyor belt of midfield partners, not to mention a change in manager, as Wilkins’ replacement, Micky Adams, introduced a different style – in vain – to try to galvanise the side during his second spell as boss.

Although Thomson had signed a two-and-a-half-year contract with the Seagulls, in January 2009 the disillusioned Scot headed back north of the border.

“I didn’t enjoy it there at all and was keen to try and get myself back up the road,” he admitted in an interview with the Daily Record in 2018.

Having wound down his full-time career at St Mirren, after 18 seasons as a professional, and having moved to London to begin a business career, Thomson linked up with his former Albion teammate Nicky Forster to spend a season as a part-time player with Dover Athletic, where the former Seagulls striker was manager at the time.

In an in-depth interview for the Dover Athletic website, Thomson gave a great insight into his career, revealing the lengths he went to to get a break into the professional game.

Born in Glasgow on 23 January 1978, he explained: “After playing for a local boys club I was invited to go and train with a few clubs, so, at the age of 10, I found myself training with Rangers on a Monday, Celtic on a Tuesday, Hearts on a Wednesday and Hibs on a Thursday.”

When he reached 14, he was advised to choose one club over the others and opted for Rangers. Daunted by the high numbers of youngsters all trying for the same opportunity, aged just 16 he took the bold move to head to Croydon and signed on as an apprentice with Palace.

He progressed from the youth team to be offered a pro contract at 17, worked his way through the reserves and then got some calls up to the first team subs bench when they were still in the Premier League. He also played for Scotland’s under-18 side between 1995 and 1997.

During his brief return as manager, Terry Venables gave Thomson his debut aged 19 in the 1998-99 season. Thomson wasn’t renowned for goalscoring, but Palace fans do remember a particularly sweet strike he succeeded with in a 3-0 Worthington Cup win at Leicester City in November 2000.

Leicester’s back-up goalkeeper Simon Royce, who would later join Albion on loan, was beaten from 35 yards by Thomson’s spectacular shot.

The midfielder’s 121 games spanned the spells of five managers – Venables, Steve Bruce, Trevor Francis, Steve Coppell and Dave Bassett – before he left the club at the end of the 2002-03 season. It would be fair to say he divided opinion among Eagles supporters.

On fans forum cpfc.org, ‘Hairybear’ said: “Thomson was a warrior. Very little ability but did a good job when called upon under Bruce and co. He would never let you down.”

But ‘Baron Greenback’ said: “As well as THAT goal against Leicester, he also scored great goals at home to Sunderland in the FA Cup and Wolves.”

It was the ebullient Barry Fry who took Thomson to Peterborough United, (above) where he played 75 games in two seasons before moving back to Scotland to play for Falkirk in the Scottish Premier League.

When Brighton signed him, his former Falkirk teammate and one-time Albion loanee, Graham Barrett, told the Argus what Seagulls supporters could expect.

“They are getting a fantastic professional and a really good player,” said Barrett. “We have been going really well and he has been a massive part of that.

“He is a box-to-box player, he is comfortable on the ball and he has got a bit of everything.

“He is not particularly big (5ft 8in) but he is also very good in the air for his height.”

Barrett reckoned he would be “a massive influence” if he could continue the form he’d shown in Scotland. “He is great in the dressing room as well, a real leader,” said Barrett.

Thomson made his Albion debut in a 1-1 draw at home to Huddersfield on 19 January, starting at the base of a midfield diamond with Paul Reid and David Martot out wide and Dean Cox at the top of it.

Brian Owen, of the Argus, described him as “a neat and tidy passer who only gave the ball away when trying something ambitious”.

Within a couple of months, the Argus was reporting: “It has not been easy for Thomson since his January move back to England from Falkirk.

“He has had to adjust to playing with a number of different partners and now Adam El-Abd is a long-term casualty with the medial knee ligament injury he suffered at Huddersfield.”

Although mostly recognised as a centre back, El-Abd had been one of the options tried in midfield. Thomson admitted to the newspaper: “I know I can perform better. There is more to come. I am adjusting to playing so many games. In Scotland you just play Saturday to Saturday.

“It has been a big move for my family as well. My wife (originally from London) is a lot closer to her parents now and she has got a lot of family around, which helps with our young son.”

In rather a similar vein to the Palace faithful, Brighton fans were also divided as to Thomson’s merits. ‘The Complete Badger’ declared on North Stand Chat: “The only midfielder of any class we’ve got. A real touch of quality about everything he does in my opinion. Much better than Hammond, and much better than anyone else we’ve got.”

But ‘Napper’ reckoned: “Thomson just seems to have nothing about him, not quick, no killer passes. Just seems to either waste possession or go backwards. I’ve really given him more than enough time, but facts are he just isn’t very good. I’ve been watching him closely for many games now.”

In his end-of-season summary, Andy Naylor, Albion reporter for the Argus in 2008, reckoned Hammond had been a hard act to follow, and commented: “Thomson looks a tidy player who will benefit from playing as a central midfielder in a 4-4-2, not the dreaded diamond.”

After Wilkins was shown the door, new boss Adams recognised Thomson’s leadership qualities, making him vice-captain to skipper Nicky Forster, as well as saying he was going to play him in a role further forward than he had been previously.

“I enjoyed the responsibility at Falkirk and I will be willing to help Nicky as much as I can,” Thomson told the Argus. “The manager has stressed that he wants me to try and push forward a lot more, rather than just sitting in front of the back four, and I am quite happy with that.

“I look after myself off the park, so I’m quite fit. Maybe he thinks I have got the engine to get up and down!”

However, problems mounted for Adams when Forster was ruled out by injury and, as in the previous season, Thomson found himself alongside different midfield partners, including, at one time, the flamboyant Robbie Savage, trying to recover some fitness on loan from Derby.

As the year drew to a close, it became public knowledge that Thomson was unsettled and itching to go back to Scotland, so a deal was lined up for him to join St Mirren as soon as the January transfer window opened.

He joined them on the day they played their final game at Love Street ahead of their move to Greenhill Road, and he went on to make more than 100 appearances for the Buddies.

Their fans’ abiding memory of his time there centre on a surprise 4-0 win over Celtic on 24 March 2010, when Thomson scored twice. The result so shocked the Parkhead bosses that they sacked Hoops boss Tony Mowbray.

On joining Dover in May 2012, Thomson told the club’s website: “I made the decision last year that this would be my final season as a full-time player. I have been studying for four or five years and I’m now fully qualified and have secured a job in London.

“My wife Bryony is from London anyway and she wanted to move closer to her family. I’ve been a footballer for 18 years and now it’s time to enter the real world.”

Thomson now works as a financial advisor, with a stylish looking profile on LinkedIn.

Injury-hit Albion among six to borrow Borrowdale

DEFENDER Gary Borrowdale couldn’t have been more aptly named for a loanee which is just as well because he found himself in that situation half a dozen times over five years.

He made a temporary switch to Brighton from QPR in March 2009 to fill the spot vacated when Albion’s regular left-back Jim McNulty suffered a shocking injury in a 4-0 home defeat to Crewe Alexandra.

While McNulty needed an operation to remove a kidney, former England under 20 international Borrowdale had the chance to resurrect his flagging career with the Seagulls.

For a player who’d clocked up 100 appearances for Crystal Palace by the time he was 21, there was the inevitable ‘noise’ about helping out the arch rivals, but Borrowdale just wanted some game time, and he was one of five debutants who pulled on Albion’s sky blue second kit for the game at Brisbane Road on 7 March 2009.

Brighton lost that match 2-1 but, under Russell Slade’s astute stewardship, Borrowdale acquitted himself well during 12 matches through to the end of the season and the Albion just managed to retain their third-tier status.

Borrowdale montage “I made my debut for Palace at 17 and played my first game in the Premiership at 18, so it was a great start and Palace will always be dear to me as a result,” Borrowdale told Spencer Vignes for a matchday programme article.

“The highlight of my career would be the promotion I had with Palace when we went from the Championship to the Premiership,” he said, referring to the play-off win over West Ham, the day before Albion beat Bristol City in their own divisional play-off.

Borrowdale returned to west London after his spell on the south coast but in March 2010 he went on loan to Charlton Athletic and the following year had temporary spells at Carlisle United and Barnet.

His league career seemed to be over when QPR released him in June 2012 and he went over to Northern Ireland to join second tier outfit Carrick Rangers.

In January 2014, he looked to have got a foothold back in the English professional game when loaned by Margate to Gillingham, but he didn’t play any first-team games and was released at the end of the season.

Former Albion boss Peter Taylor told the club’s official website: “He’s done very well, lost weight every week and looked fitter every week.

“I just don’t think he’s ready for League One football, especially considering if we have to play Saturday and Tuesday. As a result, I have decided to let him go.”

Borrowdale then linked up with Greenwich Borough, initially as a player, before becoming a coach.

Born in Worcester Park, south London, on 16 July 1985, Borrowdale came through the youth ranks at Selhurst Park and Trevor Francis handed him his debut for Crystal Palace in December 2002.

When Iain Dowie took over as manager, Borrowdale quickly became a regular in the first team. He also represented England at each of the age groups from 16 to 20, playing alongside the likes of Gary Cahill in defence.

In a 2-2 draw with the Netherlands, played at Turf Moor, Borrowdale’s teammates included fellow Palace youngster Scott Flinders in goal and future Albion player Will Hoskins.

Borrowdale won Palace’s Young Player of the Year award in 2006-07, but, when Dowie moved on to manage Coventry City, Borrowdale joined him there, a tribunal fixing the transfer fee at £650,000.

The move didn’t work out, though, and, with Dowie gone, Borrowdale was sidelined, eventually being sent out on loan to Colchester United and then QPR.

Paulo Sousa took him on loan in November 2008 and, although he didn’t feature, made the move permanent in January 2009 on a three-and-a-half-year deal. He made just 22 appearances for QPR during that time.

Borrowdale stripes

• Pictures as featured in the Albion matchday programme.

Boyhood Brighton fan Simon Rodger’s 11 seasons at Palace

S Rodger v Ivor Ingimarsson SHOREHAM-born Simon Rodger was a boyhood Brighton fan but spent the bulk of his professional playing career with arch rivals Crystal Palace.

It was only at the end of his career he finally got the chance to play for the Seagulls having been rescued from football’s scrapheap by the man who had given him his chance with Palace.

Rodger in fact was on Albion’s books as a youngster and a report appeared in a matchday programme when, as a 14-year-old, he won a Soccer Skills competition run by Bobby Charlton Schools in association with The Trustee Savings Bank.

“Simon has been training with our own youngsters for two years but he is a guest today at Manchester United, where he will be seeing the match between United and Ipswich at Old Trafford,” the programme reported.

young Rodger He didn’t progress through the levels at Brighton, though, and instead joined non-league Bognor Regis Town as an apprentice in 1989. Palace manager Alan Smith snapped him up from there for £1,000 in 1990.

It was Smith’s successor in the managerial chair, Steve Coppell, who gave Rodger his first team debut in 1993 away to Sheffield Wednesday. Although that game ended in a 4-1 defeat, Rodger was part of the side who went on to secure the Division One title in 1994.

Gordon Law on holmesdale.net summed up his Palace contribution thus: “His workrate, professionalism and unsung, gritty, performances in the midfield engine room contributed to Palace’s success in the 1990s. He was never one of the club’s high earners and missed out on lucrative signing-on fees to stay in SE25.”

He did leave Selhurst Park temporarily in the mid 90s, though, having fallen out with Coppell’s successor, Dave Bassett. He went on loan to Manchester City for three months in 1996 and to Stoke for a month in 1997.

When Coppell returned to Palace, so did Rodger and was part of the 1997 promotion-winning squad.

His Palace career came to an end after 11 seasons and 328 games – all in the top two divisions – when manager Trevor Francis released him aged 31 in 2002.

It was a worrying time for a lot of players because the collapse of ITV Digital meant football finance was in a state of flux and clubs didn’t have the money to retain large squads.

Rodger had earned decent money from football and also had the financial cushion of being married to QVC TV presenter Alison Young, but she talked about her husband’s concerns in an interview with football reporter Matt Hughes.

After Brighton’s disastrous run of 11 defeats under Martin Hinshelwood during the early part of the 2002-03 season, ex-Palace boss Coppell was brought in by Dick Knight and Rodger, together with Dean Blackwell from Wimbledon, were among his first recruits to try to salvage the season.

He came off the bench in Coppell’s second game in charge, when Albion were thumped 5-0 at Selhurst Park, but the following week he scored on his home debut against Bradford City on 2 November 2002, a volley which wearebrighton.com described as the best goal of the season.

Later the same month he scored again, along with on-loan Steve Sidwell, away at Preston North End, as the Seagulls clawed back to draw 2-2 having gone 2-0 down.

Rodger talked about the shock of his Palace departure in an interview with The Guardian in January 2003, but said: “I’m just grateful to be back in professional football with Brighton, doing something that I love.”

Rodger had become a regular in the side but, despite a sterling effort in the latter part of the season, relegation was confirmed following a 2-2 draw away to Grimsby Town.

The defensive midfielder began the following season in the third tier but the league cup tie away to Middlesbrough at the Riverside in September 2003 was the last of his 38 games for Brighton.

He was stretchered off early in the second half following a tackle by current England manager Gareth Southgate and never recovered sufficiently to resume his professional career.

Albion physio Malcolm Stuart said Rodger couldn’t have worked harder to try to return to his previous level of fitness. However, he explained that the player had developed a rare growth on a skin graft called Cyclops Legion and, although it had been cut away, it returned. Stuart said it wasn’t felt fair to put him through a fourth operation.

Captain Danny Cullip told the matchday programme: “We’ve seen Simon working in the gym to get back, and he’s been working his socks off. We’re gutted for him after he fought hard to get back; he’s a very good footballer and a really nice lad.”

After his playing days ended, Rodger became a private hire chauffeur.

Screen Shot 2018-03-08 at 08.45.12

Main picture (top) shows Rodger putting in a slide tackle on Ivar Ingimarsson, who later joined Albion on loan from Wolves. Also (above), from the Argus, after scoring away at Preston.

Midfielder Alan Curbishley helped Seagulls to promotion

Screenshot

ALAN Curbishley completed a hat-trick of promotions with new clubs when he was part of Brighton’s successful third tier side in 1988.

He’d previously been promoted after switching from West Ham to Birmingham City and also when moving from Aston Villa to Charlton Athletic.

Curbishley was what you might call West Ham through and through.

Born at Forest Gate on 8 November 1957, within a mile of West Ham station, he was one of five children (elder brother Bill famously promoted and managed The Who and Led Zeppelin and was producer of the films Tommy and Quadrophenia).

Curbishley first played in Brighton at under 11 level, in a Newham Boys side against Brighton Boys at Longhill School, in May 1967. He was later capped for England Boys aged 15 and after joining the Hammers straight from school played for England Youth.

Curbishley won nine England Youth caps under Ken Burton, scoring on his debut in a 1-1 draw against Poland in Las Palmas on 21 January 1975 when England went on to win the Atlantic Cup. Among his teammates were future England captain Bryan Robson, Peter Barnes and Keith Bertschin.

He vied for a starting berth with Mark Nightingale (Palace, Bournemouth, Norwich, Peterborough), making six starts and three appearances off the bench. His last appearance was in a 1-0 win over Wales in Cardiff on 11 February 1976, playing alongside Glenn Hoddle and Gary Owen.

Almost a year earlier, on 29 March 1975, he had made his first team Hammers debut at the tender age of 17, lining up in midfield alongside Trevor Brooking and Graham Paddon in a 1-0 home defeat against Chelsea. Mervyn Day was in goal for West Ham and guarding the opposition net was John Phillips.

At the time, Curbishley was the youngest to play in the senior team although that record was subsequently eclipsed by Paul Allen.

A contemporary of Geoff Pike, Paul Brush and Alvin Martin, they were all in the West Ham youth team defeated 5-1 on aggregate by Ipswich in the 1975 FA Youth Cup Final.

In a midfield dominated by Brooking, Paddon and Pat Holland, and later Alan Devonshire and Pike, Curbishley found first team chances limited, although in 1977-78 he made 36 appearances.

After 85 matches for the Hammers, in 1979 he moved to Birmingham for £275,000. Manager Jim Smith used the proceeds of the £1m transfer of Trevor Francis to Nottingham Forest to buy Curbishley, Frank Worthington, Colin Todd and Archie Gemmill. Curbishley was still only 21 when he made his debut for the Blues on 18 August 1979 in a 4-3 defeat at home to Fulham and he went on to be ever present for Birmingham in that 1979-80 season.

Curbishley earned his one and only England Under 21 cap in a 5-0 thrashing of Switzerland at Portman Road when Justin Fashanu was among the scorers. He had hopes of going to the 1982 World Cup with England, having broken into the England B squad but fractured a kneecap sliding into a tackle with Albion’s Brian Horton. “I missed the rest of the season and the start of the next, and the World Cup squad which I might have broken into otherwise,” he said. “It was the worst disappointment I’ve ever faced.”

He was on the front cover of the matchday programme for a game I went to watch at St Andrew’s on 27 March 1982 when he played for Ron Saunders’ Blues in a 1-0 win over Brighton. But financial issues meant the side was broken up and, the following year, after a total of 155 games, he committed what today seems to be viewed as a cardinal sin by signing for Villa for £100,000, ironically making his debut against Birmingham in a 1-0 win on 4 April 1983.

“I had high hopes of success there with them just having won the European Cup,” he told Dave Beckett in an Albion matchday programme article. “It was soon obvious though that Tony Barton was under pressure from the moment he took over and all the players thought it was just a matter of time before he was sacked.

“He got a raw deal. That season we finished ninth in the league, got to the semis of the League Cup and were knocked out of the UEFA Cup in the last minute on the away goals rule. Villa have never been near that form since, but Tony Barton’s face didn’t fit and he was soon on his way along with all the men he signed.”

After only 36 appearances, scoring once, Curbishley returned to London, dropping back down to the 2^nd division, to begin what would be a long association with Charlton Athletic, punctuated only by his spell at Brighton.

Amazingly, although homeless at the time and playing at Selhurst Park, Charlton won promotion back to the 1^st Division. Unfortunately Curbishley sustained an achilles tendon injury and only played 10 games in the 1986-87 season.

“I knew I had an achilles injury but the operation was delayed until a week before the start of the new season and consequently I wasn’t fit again until December,” he said. “The manager bought two new midfield players, which I understood, but when I was fit again I couldn’t get back into the side.

“It became apparent that I wouldn’t get much of a chance unless something drastic happened so I’m pleased to have a fresh start.”

After 13 seasons playing in the top two divisions, he left Charlton having scored six times in 63 games and dropped down to the Third to join the Albion for £32,500.

He made his debut in a goalless draw at Chesterfield on 22 August 1987 in front of a crowd of just 2,286.

After the departure of Jimmy Case in 1985, the centre of Albion’s midfield had been crying out for someone who could put their foot on the ball and pass it, and Curbishley stepped neatly into that role, scoring six goals – mostly penalties – in 34 appearances as Brighton won promotion.

“Alan was a very level-headed guy, an excellent passer and really disciplined,” Albion boss Barry Lloyd told Spencer Vignes in a matchday programme article.

In total, over three years on the south coast, Curbishley played 127 games (plus five as sub) – making his 400th league appearance during the 1988-89 season – and scored 15 goals.

curbs pen The Albion matchday programme featured Curbishley when the Seagulls hosted the Hammers for a Barclays League Division 2 game on 16 September 1989. Describing his time with the East London club, he said: “It was a brilliant set up although I was definitely a bit headstrong in my early days.

“I didn’t really grow up until I moved to St Andrew’s and that’s where I had my best playing days.”

Lou Macari’s side in 1989 included Curbishley’s old pal Alvin Martin and future Albion manager Liam Brady but the Seagulls ran out 3-0 winners (goals from Kevin Bremner, Robert Codner and Garry Nelson).

In 1990, Curbishley began his coaching career, returning to Charlton initially as player-coach under Lennie Lawrence. When Lawrence left in 1991, Charlton made the somewhat unusual decision to appoint joint managers: Curbishley and Steve Gritt (who would later be at the helm when Albion narrowly escaped dropping out of the league).

Curbishley’s first signings for Charlton were former Albion teammates Nelson and Steve Gatting and he later plundered young winger John Robinson from the Seagulls. After four years, Curbishley took sole charge at The Valley and led Charlton to some of the most successful times in their history.

Considering their resources, Curbishley turned Charlton into a steady top flight club and model of stability, consistently securing a mid-table finish.

Sean Cole in The Bleacher Report described him as “one of the most promising managerial talents of the new millennium” and in 2006, in the wake of Sven-Goran Eriksson’s departure as England manager, Curbs had ‘tea and biscuits’ with then chief executive Brian Barwick – but Steve McLaren got the job instead.

In December 2006, Curbishley landed what surely would have been considered his dream job – manager of West Ham.

It was quite a reunion of old pals when Brighton visited Upton Park for one of his first games in charge, in the third round of the FA Cup in January 2007. Albion boss Dean Wilkins and coach Ian Chapman had both been teammates while physiotherapist Malcolm Stuart was still wielding the magic spray.

In front of 32,874, Hammers ran out fairly comfortable 3-0 winners with Mark Noble scoring his first senior West Ham goal and Carlos Tevez a real handful up front. These were the respective line-ups:

West Ham: Carroll, Dailly, Ferdinand (Spector 45), Gabbidon, McCartney, Benayoun, Mullins, Noble, Boa Morte (Newton 73), Cole (Bobby Zamora 68), Tevez.
Subs not used: Green, Sheringham. Goals: Noble 49, Cole 58, Mullins 90.

Brighton: Wayne Henderson, Joe O’Cearuill, Joel Lynch, Guy Butters, Kerry Mayo, Tommy Fraser (Gary Hart 51), Adam El-Abd, Dean Hammond, Alexandre Frutos (Sam Rents 67), Alex Revell (Joe Gatting 84), Jake Robinson. Subs not used: Michel Kuipers, Richard Carpenter.

Fans’ website westhamtillidie recalled: “Perhaps Curbs’ greatest legacy at the club was the £7m signing of his former Charlton protégé Scott Parker, who went on to win the Hammer of the Year prize three times and pick up a Football Writers’ Player of the Year Award during his time at the club.”

Sadly, though it was to all end in tears and Curbishley quit in protest at the then Icelandic owners’ failure to consult him over the sale of defenders Anton Ferdinand and George McCartney.

In what must have been a tough heart-v-head decision, he resorted to a legal resolution of the situation and eventually won a case for constructive dismissal, eventually receiving £2.2m in compensation. But it was the last manager’s job he had.

“It took me a year to sort out my problem at West Ham,” he told The Independent. “And then, after that, I was perhaps a little too picky. I was told by other senior managers ‘don’t be out too long’ but I was waiting for a job that I thought was the job for me.”

Job vacancies came and went, Curbishley’s name was generally on all the shortlists, but he never again made it through to the manager’s chair. There was a brief moment at Fulham when he was technical director assisting Rene Meulensteen but when Meulensteen was swiftly axed, new manager Felix Magath brought in his own people.

He rejoined the Fulham coaching staff in March 2015 and took charge of training in November 2015 when Kit Symons was relieved of his managerial duties but Stuart Gray took charge of the team before Slavisa Jokanovic was appointed.

In 2016, Curbishley brought out a book, Game Changers: Inside English Football: From the Boardroom to the Bootroom (published by HarperSport) and was a regular pundit on the Football on 5 programme covering Football League games.

Winger Mark Barham was no stranger to Wembley

1 Barham prog BRIGHTON’S wingers in the 1991 Division Two play-off final had previously been on opposing sides in a Wembley final.

Mark Barham was a winner with Norwich City as they beat Sunderland 1-0 in the 1985 League Cup Final and Clive Walker missed a penalty for the Wearsiders.

Six years on, Barham had levelled for Albion in the first leg of the semi-final at home to Millwall (more of which later) and Walker got the third when the Seagulls upturned the form book and beat Bruce Rioch’s side 4-1.

The 6-2 aggregate victory pitched the Albion against Neil Warnock’s Notts County under the shadow of the famous Twin Towers of Wembley.

Walker saw a Wembley post prevent him from scoring as Brighton’s dream of promotion was ended in a 3-1 defeat.

Folkestone-born Barham joined the Seagulls on a two-year contract after an initial trial and made his debut as a substitute for Kevin Bremner in a 1-0 home defeat to Oxford United on 30 December 1989.

He got his first start two days later in a 3-0 defeat at West Brom, who he’d played for briefly under ex-Ipswich and Arsenal midfielder Brian Talbot earlier that season.

On the second Saturday of the new decade he scored his first Albion goal in a 1-1 draw at home to Barnsley and had played 18 games by the end of the season.

Young John Robinson was beginning to get first team opportunities but Barham managed 42 appearances in 1990-91, culminating in that Wembley appearance against Notts County, although he was subbed off on 10 occasions.

That play-off first leg game against Millwall was Lloyd’s selection in Paul Camillin’s 2009 Match of My Life book (www.knowthescorebooks.com). He said: “Perry Digweed put in one of his incredibly long punts and the ball was about to bounce on the edge of the Millwall box when the centre half (David) Thompson ducked under it, I think intending to allow it to bounce through to Brian Horne in the visitors’ goal.

“But as he took his eye off the ball he also turned his back and the ball actually landed on the back of his head and squirted off right into Mark’s path. The little winger raced in and cracked the ball into the bottom corner. It really was a vital goal so close to the interval and the fans knew it.”

The goal also gave Barham much personal pleasure because he’d not seen eye-to-eye with Millwall boss Rioch when he’d been his manager at Middlesbrough.

With Robinson winning the shirt more frequently in the disastrous relegation season of 1991-92, Barham managed 25 appearances plus two as a sub but he was released at the end of the season and moved on to Shrewsbury Town.

Born on 12 July 1962, Barham’s football career began when he joined Norwich as an apprentice in 1978.

He was part of the City youth team that won the South East Counties League in 1979-80 and in the same season, at the tender age of just 17, manager John Bond gave him his first team debut. No fairytale start, though, as City lost 5-0 to Manchester United at Old Trafford.

However, he went on to make himself a regular in the City first team, making 213 appearances and scoring 25 goals for the Canaries.

Screenshot — *Barham in action for England v Australia*

He also won two full England caps on the 1983 tour of Australia in a side captained by Peter Shilton and also featuring Trevor Francis and Terry Butcher. Barham spoke warmly of Bond when he died in 2012 telling the local pinkun:

“When I first came up from Folkestone I had what you might call long hair. The first time he played me in a five-a-side in training he told me ‘I’m letting you play this one but if you don’t go out and get your hair cut you won’t be playing another one’.”

Barham continued: “He was my first manager, he gave me my debut at 17 and I went on to play for England so he must have done something right.

“He loved wingers but you had to adhere to certain rules. You had to play wide with your foot on the line, it was your responsibility to score goals, get crosses in and defend at the same time.”

A knee injury suffered in a match against Spurs was a major blow to Barham’s career. He ruptured cruciate ligaments in his left knee and he ended up in plaster for 14 months.

Although he remained at Carrow Road for four more seasons, Dale Gordon and Ruel Fox emerged as challengers for his place and eventually, in July 1987, Barham moved on to Huddersfield Town.

It was there that he teamed up with former Albion full back Chris Hutchings who spoke favourably about his time on the south coast with the Seagulls. Barham only played 27 games for the Terriers and, with former England striker Malcolm MacDonald replacing Steve Smith as manager, found himself released on a free transfer in 1988.

He joined Middlesbrough on an 18-month contract but as Rioch’s Middlesbrough were relegated he only played four games in eight months and was on the move again, ending up at non-league Hythe Town.

Determined he still had what it took to hold down a league career, Barham wrote to all 92 clubs. He joined Division Two West Brom and played four times for them but they didn’t keep him on.

Barham tight crop “I knew I hadn’t suddenly become a bad player and that I could succeed again,” Barham told the Albion matchday programme in March 1990. “So I wrote to all the clubs again and that’s when Barry (Lloyd) contacted me. His was only one of six replies.

“Since being here I’ve found that all Hutch said about the club and the area was right and now I want to prove myself, show that managers were wrong to ignore me and enjoy my time in Brighton in the hope that my two-year contract will be extended.”

After the disappointments elsewhere, Barham certainly got his career going again at Brighton.

He scored once in eight matches for the Shrews but his career was on the wane in 1992-93 and he had short spells in Hong Kong and played non-league with the likes of Sittingbourne, Southwick and Fakenham Town, who he managed for 20 months from April 1996.

According to Mike Davage’s excellent article Canaries Flown From The Nest in the 1998-99 club handbook, Barham joined Mulbarton in February 1998.

At a Norwich centenary dinner in 2002, Barham told Davage he’d had more than 20 operations on his knee. By the time he was interviewed by Spencer Vignes for Albion’s matchday programme in 2015, he’d had 38 operations on it!

After retiring from the game he ran a toolhire business in Norwich and according to his LinkedIn profile he’s now a business development manager with facilities management company, Mitie.

2 Barham stripes Barham 1

Pictures show Barham in Albion’s NOBO kit, from the Wembley play-offs programme, a portrait from a matchday programme and in a team line-up wearing the dreadful pyjama kit.

Freddie Goodwin left Albion in lurch after missing promotion

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FOLLOWING Archie Macaulay’s decision to stand down as Albion manager two months into the 1968-69 season, former Busby Babe Freddie Goodwin, still only 35, was brought in as his successor.

Goodwin had already managed Scunthorpe United and had recently been in the United States at the helm of New York Generals. The then Third Division Brighton side responded positively to his arrival, going 15 games unbeaten at home.

Utility player John Templeman, who was at the Albion throughout Goodwin’s reign, told the Argus: “When I heard he was taking over I thought the news was brilliant. His youth was a really big plus for the players.

“For many of us, we were working with someone from the same age group. We talked about the same things after training or on away trips.”

Goodwin was Albion’ manager when I first started watching them and it hadn’t been long into his reign when he populated his side with players whose attributes he had witnessed first hand in other settings.

Two former Manchester United teammates were already at the Albion before he arrived: Nobby Lawton, who was captain, and former United reserve Bobby Smith who’d played for him at Scunthorpe United.

Centre forward Alex Dawson, a teammate in United’s losing 1958 FA Cup final side, was one of his first signings at the Goldstone, and Brighton were the third club for who he signed former Wolves and Villa goalkeeper Geoff Sidebottom.

At the start of the 1969-70 season, he brought in his former Leeds teammate Willie Bell as player-coach from 1969 FA Cup finalists, Leicester City.

freddie goodwin If Goodwin appeared to be relying on experienced pros on the way down the football pyramid, he wasn’t afraid to blend them with talented younger players, signing utility player Eddie Spearritt from Ipswich Town and bustling striker Alan Duffy from Newcastle United, both of whom went straight into the side and kept their places.

Before he arrived at the Goldstone, Goodwin had already given a league debut to goalkeeper Ray Clemence, who went on to play for Liverpool and Tottenham Hotspur and won 61 caps for England. And, after he left Brighton, Goodwin gave a Birmingham City debut to 16-year-old Trevor Francis who was England’s first £1 million player when transferred to Nottingham Forest in 1979, and he played 52 times for England.

As young lads, we always got to the Goldstone as the gates opened at 1.30pm and as we claimed our places at the front of the perimeter wall near the players’ tunnel, Goodwin would have a few words with us as he came out to inspect the pitch, one time in particular I recall him commenting how heavy going it would be after an almighty downpour.

In his only full season in charge, 1969-70, Brighton were looking good bets for promotion to Division Two. They were top after a cracking 2-1 Good Friday win over Reading but lost 1-0 the following day at Halifax and 4-1 at Fulham on Easter Monday.

With three games to go, they lost two of them, away to Rochdale and home to Mansfield (only managing to beat Rotherham 2-1 at the Goldstone) and ended up fifth, seven points behind champions Orient.

Goodwin’s last signing for the Albion saw him return to his old club, Manchester United, to bring exciting young Welshman Peter O’Sullivan to Hove. Although he didn’t stay to see the youngster flourish, O’Sullivan ended up staying for 10 years.

In the summer after narrowly missing out on promotion, Goodwin still had 18 months left on his contract but Birmingham came in an offered him a three-year deal to succeed Stan Cullis.

“Albion’s board were stunned,” wrote Evening Argus Albion reporter John Vinicombe. “They felt Goodwin was the man to take them up, and initially tried to prevent his release.

“The atmosphere was strained for a day or two. When the Albion board realised it was unrealistic in attempting to hold Goodwin, they came to a financial arrangement with City.”

When Birmingham played Albion in a First Division match at The Goldstone on 7 November 1981, Vinicombe wrote about his memories of Goodwin’s time at the helm.

“I recall him telling me that during his time at New York Generals he occupied his spare time by studying Spanish, book-keeping and accountancy,” wrote Vinicombe. And when he arrived at the Albion he told the players: “Results are nothing to do with you. They are my problem. Forget them and just give me 90 minutes effort, whatever the score.”

Templeman told the Argus: “He was a success for Brighton because he represented a fresh start. Who knows what would have happened if he had stayed at the club? He won promotion with Birmingham and I think he would probably have done the same at Brighton.”

Albion’s stuation with Birmingham was further soured because Goodwin decided he wanted to take Bell and youth coach George Dalton with him. So eager was he to hire them that he made an illegal approach while they were still under contract at Brighton and Birmingham were later fined £5,000 for a breach of regulations.

Born in Heywood, Lancashire, on 28 June 1933, Goodwin came to the attention of Manchester United when playing for Chorlton County Secondary School and became a professional under Matt Busby in October 1953. He made his senior debut for the club on 20 November 1954 against Arsenal in a 2-1 home win.

However, he wasn’t able to hold down a regular spot until the Munich air disaster in February 1958 decimated the United first team. Alongside Dawson, Goodwin was given a chance to establish himself and he played in the side which lost 2-0 in that year’s FA Cup Final to Bolton Wanderers (pre-match line-up at Wembley, below). Wembley line-up

By the time United decided to sell him for £10,000 to Leeds United in March 1960, he’d played 107 games over five seasons.

From being a teammate of Bobby Charlton, Goodwin partnered Bobby’s brother Jack in the Leeds defence and captained the side until the arrival of Bobby Collins in 1962.

After 120 games for Leeds, his playing career was virtually ended when a tackle, ironically by former Leeds legend John Charles, playing for Cardiff, on 4 January 1964, fractured a leg in three places.

Goodwin went on to become player-manager at Division Three Scunthorpe (his injury restricted him to just six appearances) where he first signed Sidebottom whose place was eventually taken by the emerging Clemence.

When Goodwin tried his luck in America in 1967-68, Sidebottom was one of his first signings at New York Generals, and the ‘keeper played 44 games over there.

Birmingham fans will always remember how Goodwin launched the career of teenager Francis. In 1972, Francis, Bob Latchford and Bob Hatton spearheaded promotion for the Blues and a place in the FA Cup semi finals.

The 1973-74 season saw Birmingham escape relegation from the elite by a single point. They were marginally safer the following season, and reached the semi-final of the FA Cup again (losing in a replay to Fulham).

With Blues struggling at the foot of the table at the start of the 1975-76 season, Goodwin was sacked in September and Bell took over.

In 1976 Goodwin returned to America to become the first coach and president of the Minnesota Kicks where he remained until the early 1980s before retiring.

He settled in the US and lived there until his death from cancer aged 82 in Gig Harbour, Washington, on 19 February 2016.

In paying tribute to the man who gave him his big break, Francis told the Birmingham Mail: “I will forever be indebted to him for having the courage to put me into the team at such a young age – that tends to be overlooked.

“I had only had a season of youth football and not even a handful of reserve team games but he still gave me my opportunity.

“I held him in very high regard and had enormous respect for him. I was most saddened the day he was sacked.

“He looked after me and took care of me. He was like a father figure to me. He knew when to play me and when to take me out and give me a little bit of a rest – not that I understood that at 16 years old.

“Just before I went to Detroit, Freddie was already in the States coaching the Minnesota Kicks and he put a very lucrative offer in front of me to go out there and play.

“That alerted a lot of other NASL clubs and in the end I went to Detroit, who were managed by Jimmy Hill. I owe much of that to Freddie’s foresight.”

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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