ALBION will let Port Vale speak to Brian Horton if they want him to be their new manager.

But chairman Dick Knight is confident he will stay in charge of the Seagulls, rather than rejoin the club where he began his playing career.

Horton is being tipped as the frontunner for the vacant Vale post following yesterday's sacking of the long-serving John Rudge.

Knight, speaking exclusively to the Argus, revealed: "I've certainly had no approach from Port Vale and I haven't even discussed it with Brian.

"If they want to talk to him and he wants to talk to them I will allow him to do that.

"It's only fair and right that I should, but he has a contract with Brighton and a tremendous affection with the club, so I am confident he would stay.

"I'm not being complacent, but why would he want to go to Port Vale? We could be playing against them next season and, no disrespect to them, we ultimately have more potential.

"They are the second club in the Potteries, we are the only one in Sussex."

Horton told the Argus last night: "I'm shocked about John Rudge and that's as much as I know. Nobody has contacted me from Port Vale."

If an approach is made then Horton, 50 next month and under contract until the end of the season, will have an agonising decision to make between two clubs with whom he has a strong emotional attachment.

He scored 33 goals in 236 League games during six years with Vale before joining Albion for £27,000 in March 1976.

The move caused outrage among Vale fans. Staffordshire-born Horton was as popular with them as he became with Seagulls supporters.

He lives in Manchester, an hour's drive from the Potteries, and, although next-to-bottmm Vale are struggling to avoid relegation, they are currently two divisions higher than Albion.

To add fuel to the fire, Rudge, who has been offered the job of director of football by Vale, was at Albion's match at Chester last Friday night.

But Horton will find it difficult not to finish what he has started.

The Seagulls, next-to-bottom of the Football League when he took charge last February, are currently ninth in the table and pressing for promotion.

The move back to Brighton at Withdean is imminent and an announcement is expected soon on the site for a permanent new stadium, with Falmer the firm favourite.

Horton's long-time friend Ken Craggs, Albion's assistant manager in their glory days and now his chief scout, said: "Things at the moment are very similar to the way they were in the Seventies.

"We've made a big step already. Brian has turned the club around. The whole place is so much happier now and I think it is ready to take off again."

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