Brighton & Hove Albion 1931-32 Season

Brighton & Hove Albion 1931-32 Season Overview

The 1931-32 season was one of the closest fought promotion battles in Division Three South for many years and although Brighton & Hove Albion fell away to finish in eighth place, they were on the coat tails of the leaders for the majority of the campaign before a run of just one win from the final eight games put paid to the Albion’s title hopes.

Brighton manager Charlie Webb added three new faces to his squad in the summer, signing Jack Eyres from Walsall, Sam Brown from Bournemouth & Boscombe Athletic and Ernie King from West Bromwich Albion. None of those players provided a solution to the lack of firepower that had dogged the Albion since Hugh Vallance’s release in September 1930 for a serious misdemeanour, something that was underlined by the fact that Webb did much chopping and changing of his side throughout the opening months of the campaign.

As a result of the constant changes, Brighton struggled to find much consistency in the first two months. They won just three times before October when beating Norwich City 2-1 on the opening day of the campaign at the Goldstone Ground on Saturday 29^th August 1931, Swindon Town 2-1 a week later on Saturday 5^th September 1931 at the County Ground and Bristol Rovers 2-0 at home on Saturday 26^th September 1931.

That poor start left Brighton in ninth spot at the start of October. At the start of November, Webb signed forward Arthur Attwood from Bristol Rovers to boost his side’s striking options. Attwood proved to be an inspired signing and he plundered 29 goals in 30 appearances to finish the campaign as top scorer, including 14 from his first nine games in Albion colours.

Had Attwood been a Brighton player from the start of the season, then he would almost certainly have surpassed Vallance’s record of 32 goals in a single season and the Albion could well have beaten Fulham to the Division Three title.

Brighton’s best run of results came just after Attwood’s arrival. Coventry City were hammered 4-0 at the Goldstone on Saturday 5^th December 1931, Luton Town were beaten 3-2 on Saturday 19^th December 1931 and the Christmas period saw the Albion take three points from Football League newcomers Mansfield Town, drawing 3-3 at Field Mill on Christmas Day before winning 4-0 at the Goldstone on Boxing Day.

A big 4-0 success away at Bristol Rovers on Saturday 6^th February 1932 sparked a three game winning run with Queens Park Rangers defeated 1-0 at the Goldstone on Saturday 13^th February 1932 and Bournemouth & Boscombe Athletic 2-1 at Dean Court on Saturday 20^th February 1932.

Three defeats from their following four fixtures left Brighton with a lot to do and although they then beat Watford 2-1 on Good Friday 25^th March 1932 and Thames 4-1 on Saturday 26^th March 1932 both at the Goldstone, that was followed by the disastrous end of season sequence of results in which only Gillingham were beaten. The victory over the Gills was at least an impressive one, Attwood scoring four times in a 7-0 Goldston success on Saturday 23^rd April 1932.

In the FA Cup, Brighton racked up two big victories before elimination at the hands of Division Two side Port Vale in the third round. Vale won 2-1 on their visit to Hove on Saturday 9^th January 1932. Brighton’s trip to Folkestone in the first round drew a record crowd of 5,557 to Cheriton Road on Saturday 28^th November 1931 with the Albion running out 5-2 winners over their Southern League hosts. They scored five again in round two, this time against Division Three North side Doncaster Rovers, who were beaten 5-0 at the Goldstone in the biggest victory of the round.