Football: Brown remembers class of ‘76

This weekend Carrick Rangers Spirit of ‘76 Supporters’ Club is hosting a gala dinner at the Town Hall to remember the most sensational year in the club’s history when the men in Amber and Black shocked Linfield to win the Irish Cup. This week Times Sports reporter, JOHN GILLESPIE, talks to player-manager Jimmy Brown who led the team to glory at The Oval 35 years ago ...

IT’S been 35 years since Jimmy Brown led Carrick Rangers to an unforgettable win over Linfield in the final of the Irish Cup.

Two well-documented Gary Prenter goals were enough for the ‘B’ Division minnows to shock Roy Coyle’s Blues at the Oval in 1976. It was a remarkable highlight of a remarkable season; a campaign which is still fondly remembered and extolled on the terraces at Taylor’s Avenue.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Beating Linfield was the pinnacle of an incredible first year in management for Brown and it’s an achievement he insists will never, ever be repeated by a second-tier team.

Brown was installed as Rangers boss in 1975. He was 24 years old. His arrival at Taylor’s Avenue came hot on the heels of a spell with senior club Ballymena United where, he admits, he fell out with the manager. He wanted out of the Showgrounds and was keen to sign for Ards.

Locked into a semi-professional contract and the only way for Brown to leave United and join Billy Humphries’ team was to get out of the senior league for a year.

“I wasn’t getting on particularly well with the Ballymena boss at that time and I was looking a move. Ards were the team to beat in and around the ‘73-’74 season; they had won four trophies,” recalled Brown in the comfortable surrounds of the Prom Cafe in Larne.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

“I had a disagreement with Ballymena, I went on holiday and when I came back my father told me Carrick Rangers were looking for a player-manager. I applied for it and go it.”

Read Jimmy Brown’s full interview in this week’s Carrick Times