Journalist and Seagulls fan Spencer Vignes spoke to former Seagulls defender Gary Stevens about our 1982/83 campaign, the season we achieved an unwanted ‘double’ of relegation from the top flight and an FA Cup Final.
Gary, 1982/83 – I doubt as far as the Albion are concerned that there’s ever been a season of greater highs and lows….
You’re probably right there. The funny thing is that we were an established top-flight side by the time the 1982/83 season came around. We’d been in the old First Division, as the Premier League was known then, for three or four years and it held no great surprises for us. Sure, we were never going to win it, but I don’t think anyone had us down as finishing bottom of the table either. We had good players with plenty of experience – Steve Foster, Gordon Smith, Michael Robinson, Jimmy Case, Tony Grealish – and around them were guys much like myself who were learning fast or had something about them.
We’d done well under [manager] Mike Bailey, someone I’ve always said was one of the best managers or coaches that I ever played under, but when he was replaced a few weeks into the [1982/83] season I think we lost something in terms of stability. Our away form hadn’t been great but we were still getting results at home and I for one didn’t feel we were in any real trouble.
From that point on, the league seemed to become a struggle which contrasted hugely with our form in the FA Cup, where we had this growing belief that we could do something truly unique. It’s strange, because nobody talks about Brighton going down that year. It’s always to do with us reaching the Cup Final because it had never happened before and it meant so much to people. Everything used to stop for the FA Cup Final back then. The streets would just be deserted which doesn’t happen today.
You played in every one of our FA Cup ties that season. At what stage did you start to think ‘We can really do something here’?
Probably when we beat Liverpool at Anfield [in the fifth round]. They just never seemed to lose to anyone back then, especially at home where they’d gone something like ten years and 60-odd matches since losing in any of the cup competitions. I think after that it became a case of us sitting round the radio at lunchtimes waiting for the draw, saying who we fancied playing, and that particular team coming out of the hat. Norwich at home in the quarter-finals – yep, we fancy that. Sheffield Wednesday in the semis, that would be the one – and there it was.
We’d had our slice of luck as well. Newcastle had a couple of goals disallowed in the third round replay up there [when Albion won 1-0]. That was a real smash and grab with Wardy [Peter Ward] tucking one away at the other end. It’s funny because they said I kicked Kevin Keegan all around the park that night which as anyone who remembers me will tell you just wasn’t my style!
The Final was memorable for so many reasons, not least of all your equaliser with three minutes of normal time left and Manchester United leading 2-1. Talk us through it.
We won a corner which Jimmy [Case] took towards Tony [Grealish]. I’d gone up towards the edge of the area and my immediate reaction was to follow Tony’s shot in, in case there were any rebounds, and it ended up landing right at my feet. Everything happened so quickly but my overriding priority was to keep my head down, keep the shot below the bar, and I knew there was a good chance it would go in. And in it went. I didn’t used to get many goals so it’s not a moment I’m going to forget in a hurry!
Your performances against Manchester United in the FA Cup Final and the replay saw you receive the BBC’s Man of the Match Award. Given that Albion had already been relegated to what is now the Championship, you must have known other clubs would be looking to sign you.
Maybe, but that honestly wasn’t what I was thinking about. In my head, I was still learning my trade. I was 21. Another couple of seasons at the Goldstone Ground wouldn’t have done me any harm whatsoever. I’d just bought a house in Shirley Drive in Hove and I remember the people I was buying it off saying, ‘Aren’t you likely to be transferred?’ and me going, ‘No way’. And then all of a sudden there’s a phone call from [Albion manager] Jimmy Melia saying, ‘Gary, we’ve agreed to sell you to Tottenham’. My immediate reaction wasn’t, ‘Great!’ it was more, ‘Shouldn’t you have consulted me about this first?’ I couldn’t understand why they wanted to sell me. I thought it was going to be a case of keeping the squad together and going for promotion back to the top division at the earliest possible opportunity.
That shows you how naive I was. I was told it was a business decision, so I said, ‘Well, I’d better go and talk to them then’. I was in Suffolk at the time visiting my mum and dad and went to see Spurs the following day. They wanted to keep it quiet because apparently Liverpool and Manchester United were also interested and Spurs didn’t want it becoming an auction. Again, that was all news to me. I started on £16 a week at Brighton and they ended up getting £300,000 for me, so they made a tidy profit.