More Albion Greats On Saturday

The “ALBION GREATS” Wall Set To Get Bigger

On Saturday April 9th when we host Lancaster City we are performing the second batch of initiations into the “Albion Greats” collection. This was originally scheduled for December but had to be postponed due to the terrible weather.

We have contacted, with just the one exception, the regular players plus of course the man himself, from the Brian Booth era.

This period encompassed almost seven seasons spanning from November 1974 until February 1981. During that time Brian’s teams’ achievements included capturing:

Cheshire League Cup + Runners-Up, Northwich Senior Cup, North West Floodlight League Twice, Cheshire Senior Cup + Runners-Up, Cheshire County League Runners-Up and at the first time of competing, the Northern Premier League Runners-Up.

An amazing total of fourteen players from this era have been chosen to be placed on the “Greats” wall. Expected therefore to be with us this afternoon along with Brian Booth are:

Mark Fielding (25/10/75-19/3/83) 272 appearances 5 goals.

John Goryl (25/11/67-26/12/79) 538 appearances – Already initiated.

Brian Griffin (26/3/77-2/5/81) 233 appearances 77 goals.

Dave Griffiths (25/8/73-29/5/79) 310 appearances 35 goals.

Alan Heathcote (16/8/75-11/12/78) 151 appearances 50 goals.

Peter Henderson (2/3/77-3/3/84) 92 appearances 70 goals.

Bob Johnston (25/1/78-30/10/82) 246 appearances 20 goals.

Tony Keyes (19/8/78-1/10/83) 275 appearances 17 goals.

Alan McNeill (24/8/77-28/3/81) 163 appearances 12 goals

John Walker (31/3/79-23/2/85) 119 appearances 85 goals

John White (17/8/74-21/9/82) 452 appearances 155 goals.

John Yates (16/8/75-27/3/82) 316 appearances 18 goals.

The two remaining players that we would like to be here are:

Bob Fletcher (19/8/78-2/5/81) 167 appearances 62 clean sheets – No contact details for him but we have put out appeals to try and locate him but may possibly be able to get to him via the RAF.

Alex Gibson (27/12/76-6/4/82) 210 appearances 23 goals – Apologises for not being able to attend as he is now Director of Coaching in Dubai for David O’Leary’s Al Ahli club.

If you digest the respective figures then these players have a combined appearance record of 3,544 matches and have accounted for 606 goals for what they all consider to be their favourite club.

In addition also with us will be Terry Murphy, who was Brian’s Assistant Manager, Keith Higgins who was the Trainer and Dave Moss who played in the first couple of our NPL seasons.

If the event goes as well as the initial one back in October then the invitees, their close families and friends together with all associated with Witton Albion, officials and supporters alike, should we hope be in for a very pleasant afternoon.

Wow what a line up so many memories its untrue, a fantastic time to be a wittoner ~ ( i know its always fantastic to be a wittoner ) many of my all time favourites in that group really looking forward to saturday now cu all there lets hope for good gate to suit the occasion.:slight_smile:

Are the dates the length of time spent at Witton or their entire playing career ?

Peter Henderson ? Did’nt he go to Chester in 1980 ? I certainly remember him scoring lots of great goals for us though as did Johnny Walker ( mostly set up by Griff ).

Alan McNeill - the original Macca - what a player,never seen one like him since in the Albion shirt ?

I would imagine they denote first and last appearance for the club Eli.

CJ - You are right it was a great time to be young and watching Witton, they were all heroes to us young uns at the time and the camaraderie of having a coach to every away game was fantastic! The team was that consistent that the only questions most week on selection were Gibbo or Alan Heathcote as sub!!!

I know my old fella has put a fantastic amount of work into organising this reunion and it would be great if as many of the supporters of the time were to get themselves down and make it a special day, tinged of course with the sadness at the passing of that fantastic Club servant Dave Leather.

Obviously i missed out on this era, but Peter Henderson was my science teacher for a couple of years in the 90s!

As Andy says, i hope there are plenty there on Saturday for both reasons.

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