Grounds For Concern (02) : Love Street

After finding out about the Scottish signings in the late 1940s and early 1950s, it's that of Hugh Brown that's most intriguing.

Brown joined Torquay from Partick Thistle very soon after Alex Massie was appointed manager. Massie was an ex-Scotland international who'd previously been manager of Aston Villa. He must have carried a fair amount of status and influence to persuade Brown - who'd played three times for Scotland in 1947 - to leave a Partick team which had finished 7th in the Scottish top-flight in 1949/50. What was it all about? Sadly the move wasn't a huge success because, after around fifty games for United, Brown had to retire with a serious knee injury.

Torquay, like any professional club, has always had players from all over Britain. It's one of the game's enduring myths that, once-upon-a-time, teams were made up mainly of local players. For instance, I'd always assumed the Calland brothers - Albert, Ted and Ralph - who played for United in the 1950s were locally-born. In fact, they came from a mining village in County Durham with Ted being a contemporary of Bobby Robson at Fulham who was born in the next village.

Torquay's first Football League line-up in 1927 shows how players were recruited from all over the country with the traditional mix of Scots, Welsh, midlanders and northerners (although this is less apparent these days for all sorts of socio-economic reasons):

Millsom - born Rotherham (ex-Rotherham United)
Cook - Shankhouse (Nothumberland) (Preston North End)
Smith - Netherton (Dudley) (Walsall)
Wellock - Bradford (Oldham Athletic)
Wragge - Wolverhampton (Bristol Rovers)
Conner - Kirkmuirhill (Lanarkshire) (Newport County)
Mackey - Ryton-on-Tyne (Crewe Alex)
Turner - Birmingham (Brierley Hill Alliance)
Jones - Treorchy (Aberdare Atheltic)
McGovern - Glasgow (Queen of the South)
Thomson - Dundee (Bournemouth)

Thanks to the centenary history.