Category Archives: Photo Opportunities

Hostess tackles Lawro and Nobby

This is from an edition of ‘Roy of the Rovers’ magazine. A spot of foul play by Nobby, I suspect:

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From the Brighton v Bristol City programme of April 1980:

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Last Wednesday we held a very successful buffet lunch for the firms that have helped the club during the year with sponsorship and advertising.

With us for the first time were our new sponsors British Caledonian and we have reproduced here a novel action picture that shows Brian Horton and Mark Lawrenson in the new Albion kit that will be worn next August.

The Caledonian hostess seemed to enjoy the action in front of the North Stand and we hope that supporters will equally enjoy seeing the team play in its new strip next August.

It was certainly a radical change. Nothing quite screams top flight Albion football as that all-blue Adidas kit with the British Caledonian sponsor, making Brighton the first side in the south to be involved in shirt advertising. The Brighton v Nottingham Forest programme from March 1980 says that:

the colour change was decided upon after consultation with the players and they were virtually unanimous about the new strip. To many the stripes associate the club with the Third Division days and we are determined to be a First Division club in every way.

The Albion vs Forest matchday programme also includes this image:

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Here you can see Albion chairman Mike Bamber shaking hands with Adam Thomson, the Chairman of British Caledonian Airways, as a helicopter waits to whisk Mr Thomson back to Gatwick. Yes, the 1980s had certainly arrived!

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Evening Argus previews the season

I’m sure the Argus has been previewing the football season since time immemorial. And covered every one since the start of the 1990s. However, I don’t think they’ve ever done a job as good as this fondly remembered free magazine-sized publication from the start of the 1989/90 campaign, ditching the usual newspaper-sized format. Mine came with an ‘Evening Argus – Seagulls’ cardboard banner. If only I’d still kept it!

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A forty-page special is graced with interviews with cover star Steve Gatting, comeback kid Martin Lambert, Robert Codner and Perry Digweed, a colour team photo centre-spread, pen pictures and photo opportunities with the players in pre-season training, including in that horrid red and white patterned away kit that looked more like a dull pink from a distance.

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A full page advert for embarrassing club sponsors NOBO promised the company would be ‘top of the 1st division for display and training aids.’ However, the British Gas ad below with 1970s-style comic is splendidly retro, even for back then.

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The only downside is that the magazine is rather heavy on adverts. Even so, they help give an evocative sense of what life was like in the late 1980s, when the local dialling code was still 0273, Garry Nelson had his car sponsored by FIAT, and ASICS were a popular sportswear manufacturer proud to have Barry Lloyd (awkward, insincere smile and all) advertising its football boots.

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Horton hears a …who?

Taken from the Official Handbook 1977/78:

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It’s bad pun-a-go-go in this advert for Tony Back and Ric Carr’s Music Centre on 156 Lewes Road, Brighton. It describes Tony, Brian and Ric as ‘the most organised team in Division One’ while introducing ‘the Elka X705 Potable anyone can play!’

Towards the bottom of the advert is a football pitch with the names of various instruments in an experimental 2-3-2-3 formation.

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Horton must have been short of a few bob the week he agreed to put his name to this. Turn your nose up at the increasing commercialisation of the game… or join yours truly in a celebration of the cheese factor of this marvellous advertisement for both music and sport!

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Brighton’s teddy bear

Alan Mullery is holding Albion’s one-time mascot…

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Mark Lawrenson and teddy bear

…and so is Mark Lawrenson.

Why, you may ask, is Mark Lawrenson sitting holding a giant, cuddly teddy bear?

“After all the injuries I’ve had lately, any mascot is welcome,” explains the Brighton star. “I was out for ten weeks at the start of the season with severed ankle ligaments.”

Mullery is one of Mark’s greatest admirers, and Alan’s sure the kid from Preston can go to the very top.

“When I signed him I knew the lad had tremendous potential. Now people can see what I was talking about. I said he could be another Beckenbauer… and I stand by that.”

At 22, Mark is one of Britain’s rising young stars. To reach his full potential, he needs to steer clear of more serious injuries, And that’s why you’ll find him holding that teddy bear mascot down at the Goldstone!”

To read the full article of ‘Mark Lawrenson – Brighton’s Beckenbauer’ from the 1979/80 campaign, just click on the photo.

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Fancy dress party

Fancy dress party

There was certainly an air of fun and excitement around the Goldstone over the festive period, and everyone entered into the spirit of things. The players’ traditional fancy dress party took place, and most of the lads started the evening at the Lottery Draw at Brighton’s Lewes Road Inn.

Among the classic outfits were those of Steve Foster, in traditonal Tyrolean costume, Neil Smillie as an American footballer, and former Goldstone favourite, Gary Williams, who arrived dressed as a nun.

Also look out for the garb of Gary Stevens, Steve Foster, Gerry Ryan, Peter Ward and Chris Ramsey. Photo from the Brighton v Newcastle FA Cup programme of January 1983.

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Albion wear Farah Slacks

Farah Slacks

A truly kitsch classic. The first team in 1983 are kitted out in some rather dapper new blazers and slacks from the firm with its UK base in Gatwick.

From the Townsend Thoresen Cup programme against Manchester United in August 1983, the advert claims that Farah slacks and leisurewear are ‘styled to fit the Albion naturally.’

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