We’d beaten Middlesbrough and needed Brighton to lose at home to Ipswich I think. Brighton were getting beat but equalised in injury time.
Almost. We had to better Brighton's scoreline. We beat Middlesbrough 1-0, Brighton's game at home to Ipswich was level at 1-1. Whilst everyone was celebrating on the pitch, Wilkins scored a winner for Brighton.
It was season '90, one of my favourite seasons to be honest. I think Brighton were only drawing on the last day, and they needed to beat Ipswich as we had won our game. And they did it after about 10 extra minutes, which was really unheard of back then. We were celebrating getting into the Play offs, the players were popping the Champagne, and just about everybody was listening for radio updates (no mobiles then of course lol).
I used to go to all the reserve games. 80s - 90s And tbh watching the reserves during his time was a joy. Better than the 1st team. He put some players out in the cold so to speak.
I used to read the Reserves update page in the match programmes. Were Watson, Eaden & Liddle playing at Reserve level in the early 90s ?. Its been said that Mel really messed some players about. Well I don't know if I'd go that far, but wasting a returning talent like David Currie, out wide, is hard to explain.
Didn't they actually announce over the tannoy that we were in the playoffs? Or is my memory playing tricks on me? I was on the north terrace of the West Stand, remember some players gathered in the West Upper and I could tell from their faces that they weren't yet celebrating.
C Currie is one of my favourite ever players. Unfortunately he was never the same after his experience at Forest. He lost the knack of scoring. He still had all the talent in the world but wasn’t a goal scorer anymore. I know that Mel wished that he had DC mk1 but Dc mk2 just couldn’t cut it as forward. Think post Forest he scored about 40 goals in 8 years. Nicky, Andy and Watson were only young kids. Great talent but very young. Even Danny eased them In.
I can believe what Mark Crossley says about Currie, and how ignorantly Brian Clough treated him at Notts Forest. That might have affected my attitude as well to be honest. Speaking of mk1 and mk2 versions of the same player, that Ian Banks we had then, also wasn't as good as the first time round.
Watson was behind another young keeper - whose name I've criminally forgotten but someone will remind me in a minute - who was crocked playing against Port Vale (IIRC) with a broken leg. I don't think he ever recovered properly and had to retire in his early 20s. Going into the last game, we need to beat Middlesborough 4-0 or better the result of Brighton. We won 1-0 and at full-time people had started invading the pitch, but someone near me had a radio and told us that Brighton had equalised.
Ian Wardle. Although i think that happened earlier, around 1990, for him to be challenging with Watson for a place. I think Watson came through at around the same time as Phil Whitehead though.
Yes the silly sod did. I was listening to it on a tranny with the bloke next to me. I think that what happened was that the ref blew his whistle for the free kick and the commentator momentarily thought it was the final whistle and our tannoy man immediately announced it over the loudspeakers.
Its a long time ago now so everything is blurry, but I think Wardle was a couple of years older. I just remember him breaking through and getting injured.