Russell Slade will be looking to derail Albion’s progress at the top of the Championship as he leads his Cardiff side into the Amex today.

But only quite a small percentage of another 20,000–plus crowd will have been present when the Cardiff boss kept their club on course to reach the Championship as they moved into the Amex.

It was called the Great Escape as Slade fashioned a tight-knit line-up out of an inflated, ill-balanced squad and staved off relegation from League One in 2008-09.

Albion won five of their last seven games and took 13 points from the last 15, culminating in a 1-0 last-day success over Stockport which saw Slade carried aloft as a hero.

Yet it almost didn’t happen.

“I know they were after Jim Gannon and, when Russell came along, I wouldn't say I thought he was the manager who would save Brighton,” his skipper Adam Virgo admits now.

“He had done well at Yeovil and Grimsby but Brighton was a bigger club.

“But I thought you've got to give the guy a chance and he proved me wrong in every way.

“He got the squad down to 13 or 14 players.

“Bringing in Gary Dicker was pivotal to the way we wanted to play.

“We kind of played a diamond but Coxy (Dean Cox) had a free role, more or less.

“I wouldn't say we were the best team on paper but we had a good work ethic.”

Slade coped with the loss of strikers Nicky Forster and Glenn Murray by partnering Gary Hart with short-term signing Lloyd Owusu and also brought in Calvin Andrew on loan.

Players who served him at the time talk of his excellent man-management.

Virgo said: “He was quite big on psychology.

“Once a week we would sit down at Withdean and this guy would be a kind of motivational speaker.

“He would offer individual sessions as well to try and get confidence back into you.”

Still it took a while for Slade to get Albion on the right track.

They only took four points from his first eight games, three of them coming from a 5-0 hammering of his old club Yeovil.

Virgo recalled: “We got a bit of a tanking at Scunthorpe and at MK Dons but it was the game at Colchester (a 1-0 win) that really turned it.

“We got the goal, we got the clean sheet.

The Argus:

One of the more significant goals scored by Albion in recent years - Lloyd Owusu heads the winner at Colchester

 

“The way he spoke to the press and to the players, he took all the pressure on to himself, which was a trait I learnt about massively from him.

“If we had been relegated that season, I think we'd have turned it around eventually but, at that time, it would have been disastrous.

“I still say today that he's not the best on the coaching side in terms of putting on a session.

“With Russell we just did 11-a-side every day and worked on shape.

“We went back to basics. We got to a gameplan and he simplified it as much as possible.”

Slade is now starting to make an impact at Cardiff and his assistant at Withdean, Bob Booker, said: “One thing you notice with Russell and every job he goes to is he is always a slow starter.

“Once he starts to stamp his influence on what he is trying to do, it clicks into place.

“It's hard to get in with a new group of players at that stage of the season in a short space of time and he just did a fantastic job.

“Certain players came good for him at that time, people like Gary Hart.

“Calvin Andrew and Lloyd Owusu were master strokes.

“Micky (Adams, Slade’s predecessor) used to say some players would jump on the train with you and go for the ride and some players might have their mind in other places.

“You have got to put those players aside and focus on the ones who are going to do it for you.

“It's difficult but I think that is what he did.

“I knew him as a football contact, no more than that, but we hit it off.

“We mixed on a social basis as well, with his family and getting him settled down here.”

The Argus:

Right-back Andrew Whing, pictured above, recalls Slade taking charge of a side with five debutants at Leyton Orient in his first match and said: “For that to gel so quickly was testament to him.

“He was honest. When I signed for him at Orient he told me there was no certainty of being in the team but, if I played well, I kept the shirt.”

Whing was voted player of the season at the end of the 2008-09 campaign.

He insists he always felt Albion would stay up.

“There was one stage where we were second from bottom and a few points from safety and it was worrying at the time.

“But, for some reason, I always believed we had enough. It was a really good group. We had old pros like Harty and young lads like Coxy, Tommy Fraser and Tommy Elphick.

“The manager always believed we would stay up.”

A win at Hereford proved to be a false start as Albion then let slip a lead and lost at home to Swindon.

But four wins and a draw from then on in sent them to 16th place.

Booker said: “Once you get a couple of results you get even more out of the players.

“But it was a great story in a short amount of time, one of the great Withdean times.”

Albion were helped by a run-in which saw them play mid-table sides with little left to fight for.

A draw at Huddersfield kept them just outside the drop zone going into the final game, at home to a Stockport side managed by Gannon.

That is when it turned out Dicker, pictured below, had been a clever signing in more ways than one.

Brought in on loan from Stockport, he was bizarrely allowed to play against his parent club on the last day and set up the goal by fit-again Forster which made sure of safety.

“It was a last minute deal, rushed through, and maybe the bit about not playing against them was overlooked,” the current Carlisle midfielder told The Argus.

The Argus:

“Jim Gannon rang me on the Monday before the game expecting me to go back to Stockport but I told him I was still with Brighton.

“He was pretty angry. He just said ‘That sums you up!’ and put the phone down on me.

“Apparently he absolutely battered me in his team talk before the game but I more or less knew I was leaving. Stockport hadn’t paid me for two months.

“Coming down to Brighton was a breath of fresh air.”

Dicker ended up signing on a more permanent basis.

He said of his arrival on loan: “I felt important because Russell put trust in me and that gives you confidence.

“After we lost to Swindon you wondered what would happen.

“But I remember we went to Bristol Rovers and won. The away fans were unbelievable that night - and Harty was unbelievable up front.”

Dicker added: “Russell was quite a positive person. He got people up for it and that was what the club needed.

“I think they had used more players than any other club but he got a settled side.”

The Argus:

Bob Booker celebrates the midweek win at Bristol Rovers with Doug Loft and on-loan left-back Gary Borrowdale

 

Cox, another key man in that revival, later signed for Slade at Leyton Orient.

He said: “Russell was like a second dad to me.

“He was the best man-manager I’ve had and he gave me quite a free role.

“He asked me to run at people, try and create, to come in off my wing.

“That’s something I’ve added to my game thanks to him.”

And then it all turned sour. Slade had revamped the squad over the summer and maintains he was not given enough time before being sacked.

“Not all the signings made worked for him,” said Virgo.

“But remember he brought in Elliott Bennett and Andrew Crofts, who went in to be two very significant players.

“I don’t think his best players helped him enough, myself included.

“I don’t think Muzza was firing as we know he can.

“But it's hard to pinpoint exactly why things changed.”

The Argus:

Russell Slade was sacked after this 3-3 draw with Hartlepool

 

Tony Bloom, having taken over as chairman in the summer, wielded the axe after a 3-3 draw at home to Hartlepool. It proved the right decision as successor Gus Poyet turned the side's fortunes around in some style.

“Tony did it in the right manner,” said Booker, who was also dismissed.

“He wanted to put his own mark on it and rightly so. We lost our jobs but I still think we played our part in where the club was going.

“There was no animosity. Tony proved to be right and the club is back to where it should be.

“What I remember about Russell is he was with the players. It wasn't them and us.

“It's not all about coaching, it's about man-management.

“As a player, you'd want to go out and play for Russell Slade.”