Jimmy Case would have a claim after winning the European Cup twice with Liverpool, Sami Hyypia too as a Champions League winner with the Reds in Istanbul. Alan Mullery was an England regular and captained Tottenham Hotspur to League Cup and Uefa Cup victories, Chris Hughton won two FA Cups and a Uefa Cup, also with Spurs. But many would probably agree that Liam Brady was the most gifted footballer to pick a Brighton team.
Of course he was a great at Arsenal and is deservedly one of those former Gunners immortalised on the murals outside the Emirates Stadium, scoring 43 goals in 235 appearances for the club and winning the FA Cup in 1979. But he also starred for the Republic of Ireland and in Italy with Juventus, where he won two Scudettos, Sampdoria, Inter and Ascoli.
He finished his playing career with Albion’s next opponents, West Ham United, signing off with the final goal in a 4-0 victory over Wolves at Upton Park in his farewell game before being mobbed by the Irons faithful. The commentary on one of his nine goals in 89 appearances for the Hammers, a run and curling shot into the top corner of the net, summed it up: ‘An illustrious goal from an illustrious player.’
He was seen as less successful in management, at Celtic and Albion. But in a way his contribution to the Brighton cause was as great as any, even if his finest moment came after he had left The Goldstone Ground.
Liam had taken over from Barry Lloyd in December 1993 and his appointment was considered a coup, even if his first managerial job, at Celtic, was regarded as a failure because he had been unable to interrupt what would eventually be a run of nine successive titles for Rangers.
His first task at the Goldstone was more mundane – to avoid relegation to the fourth tier. He appointed club favourite and former Ireland teammate Gerry Ryan as his assistant, brought back Jimmy Case – now 39 – from Sittingbourne to provide know-how on the field and borrowed Paul Dickov from Arsenal, who helped steer the club away from the foot of the table.
The highlight of his time in the dugout was arguably eliminating Premier League Leicester City from the League Cup in 1994. Case was famously shown a second yellow card in the second leg victory at Filbert Street for delaying the taking of a corner, pleading as mitigation the fact that his deafness meant that he could not hear the referee’s whistle.
But results on the field were becoming less relevant. Distractions were building up as pitch invasions and protests began after the news broke that the Goldstone Ground had been sold to developers by owner Greg Stanley and power-behind-the-throne, Bill Archer.
In the end Liam resigned in November 1995, dismayed at the near-terminal decline at the club. Fans were unhappy and their fury at the prospect of a ground-share with Portsmouth boiled over at the home match against York City in April 1996, abandoned after a pitch invasion and an attack on the directors' box. I was one of the reporters dodging missiles in the press box that day.
And now Liam Brady decisively re-entered the picture.
He could have looked for another job in management, and, indeed, would soon be offered the chance to rejoin Arsenal as head of youth development and academy manager, a position he held for 25 years while commuting from his home in Hove, before retiring in 2017 and becoming an ambassador for the Arsenal Foundation.
But he had recognised the danger Albion were in and, rather than walk away, began to put a consortium together aimed at wresting control back from Archer, Stanley and their chief executive, David Bellotti. It was on the Sunday morning after the York match that he met journalists in Hove Park to outline his plans, which he hoped would include a buyout of the existing owners.
We all realised that this was a remarkable and probably unprecedented display of solidarity with a previous club from a departed manager. "I just felt I had to do something to stop what was going on," he told me several years later. "It was a bad time in the story of Brighton & Hove Albion, but I really enjoyed myself as manager and you could see that there was a real passion in Sussex and in the city for the Albion and they deserve a really good football club.
“I certainly thought that the people in charge didn't really care about the club at all, and that it needed to get some people in who would try to move them out and would have the club's interests at heart."
Part of his announcement included an offer to pay £40,000 that the developers wanted in order to allow Albion to play one more season at the Goldstone. "The directors were saying that they had to ground-share with Portsmouth or Gillingham because they didn't have 40 grand. So as a bit of a publicity stunt I said I'd pay it out of my own pocket to keep the club at the Goldstone. Dick Knight was pulling the strings behind the scenes, but because I was saying it, it probably got more coverage than it would have done."
Knight, of course, now Albion life president, became Brighton chairman a year later, but too late to save the Goldstone. Instead, he led the struggle to bring the club home from a two-year exile in Gillingham to temporary accommodation at Withdean Stadium while a new home could be found and built – a struggle that would last 14 years.
"I was first introduced to him when we were trying to help youth development when I was manager," Brady said. "A guy called John Keehan was trying to help me get a minibus and start looking after the younger age groups, because there was no money forthcoming from the people in charge.
“John mentioned that his brother-in-law Dick was an astute businessman and was somebody I should talk to. Dick led the campaign brilliantly, supported by a lot of people down there who are a part of the story as well."
Liam had intended to take a fuller part, but a call came from north London that he could not refuse. "Within about six or eight months I got the offer to be head of youth development at Arsenal and it was just too good to turn down," he said.
"I had my family to think about and it was a dream job for me. Dick understood completely although we both had it in the back of our minds that he would be the chairman and I would be the manager – but with the number of managers he sacked, it's probably best that it didn't happen.”
Dick wrote in his autobiography: “At a desperate moment for the club, [Liam] gave the fans something to cling on to. Here was a guy who was world-famous, but was prepared to stand up and be counted for a lower-division football club that he had managed for a relatively short period of time. And when the situation was at its bleakest, he did so.”
Although back at Arsenal, Liam always remained a great friend to the Albion and to the reporters who hold it close to their hearts. He was happy to let me interview him some years later about his work with the Arsenal youth teams, which had been criticised for their failure to produce any first-team players. He invited me to their then-new academy base in Walthamstow to see their work for myself, and told me about up-and-coming talents including Fabrice Muamba, Jack Wilshere, Kieran Gibbs and Wojciech Szczesny.
And when Albion drew Arsenal at home in the FA Cup fourth round in 2013, the Arsenal press officer was approached by a number of papers wanting to talk to Liam, but all were politely rebuffed with the words: “He’s only doing one interview, with a Brighton-based writer.” I had cheekily circumvented the usual interview request process by texting Liam direct.
I had been confident of a positive response because, considering that he is an enduring legend of world football, Liam is a down-to-earth and friendly man with no airs or graces, who was as much at home talking to a young Arsenal hopeful as he is reminiscing - in Italian - with a former teammate from Sampdoria, Juventus or Inter or agreeing to perform the opening ceremony for new football facilities for the Sussex FA.
That Albion-Arsenal cup tie, he said, felt somewhat overdue. "I always wanted this match. When Dick really needed the money, I was hoping Brighton would draw Arsenal at Highbury or the Emirates in a cup-tie for much-needed finance. They're in a different position now, which is great to see, and you have to give credit to Tony Bloom for taking it to where it has got to.
“Dick had to fight tooth and nail to get the stadium planning permission and some of us helped keep the club going, but when Tony got involved he brought with him the financial clout that was needed." So he put his hand in his own pocket? "I did indeed. I was one of Dick's financial backers. And no, it wouldn't be polite to ask the figures.”
During the interview, I’d noticed that when he said ‘us’, he meant the Gunners and not the Seagulls. “Arsenal are very much the number one,” he admitted. “But Brighton are right up there among the clubs I have huge feelings for, and it's great to see where they are compared to what it was like then. The supporters are happy and you can see on their faces the pride that they feel about where they are now."
And, I asked him, was there no part of him that wished the Goldstone, where he had managed the club, was still there to stage the game? "No, the club is where it had to go. We all realised the club was snookered at the Goldstone. It was never going to be a stadium for the Championship or the Premier League. But the people involved were prepared to cash in on the location and bugger the consequences.
“That had to be stopped, and it's a great story for all of football where Brighton have got to. It just shows you what can be done with people who are passionate about their clubs and about football – and not interested in just making money."