David Yelldell was pretty in pink when Brighton held Leeds

“I knew nothing about it until we were in the dressing room and the referee said he had to change. I think it’s ridiculous that of all the colours under the rainbow, we choose pink. David Yelldell got a lot of stick from the Leeds fans but he handled it very well… and as far as I am concerned the pink Brighton shirt won’t be coming out again.”

Mark McGhee was not a happy man and for once it was not because of a referee or Leon Knight. Instead, the Brighton manager was concerning himself with fashion, going all Alexander McQueen to pass judgement on what his new goalkeeper had been sent onto the Elland Road catwalk wearing.

The home of The Leeds United, champions of Europe and the world’s biggest club has never been the most tolerant of places. In fact, it used to be the ground where you could expect the most homophobic reception of anywhere in the Football League.

Some might call it banter, but when the Albion lost 2-1 to Leeds on the opening day of the 2013-14 season, being called “an AIDS faggot” among countless other homophobic insults after the game did not seem like a bit of harmless fun.

Pink kits abound in football these days but back in 2005, they were extremely rare. The Albion had released a special edition pink goalkeeper shirt to go with the navy blue Palookaville shirt designed to promote Fatboys Slim’s album of the same name, but the inevitable homophobia that would be directed at a Brighton goalkeeper wearing pink meant that there was sadly no intention of ever wearing it in an actual game.

Until Leeds United away on Saturday 29th January 2005 that is, when an unfortunate set of circumstances conspired to force 23-year-old David Yelldell into playing 45 minutes of his Brighton debut in bright pink in front of a baying Don Revie Stand.

Yelldell had begun the afternoon guarding the goal at the opposite end of Elland Road wearing yellow. No problem there, unless the people of Leeds despised cycling as that particular goalkeeping jersey resembled the outfit worn by the leader of the Tour De France.

The issue came when somebody complained that the traditional black being sported by the officials was too close to Brighton’s dark blue Palookaville kit.

To prevent a clash, referee Mike Thorpe and his assistants changed into their alternative uniforms – coloured yellow. They were now clashing with Yelldell and so Mr Thorpe entered the Albion dressing room and ordered the Brighton goalkeeper that he too would have to change.

There did exist a white Palookaville goalkeeper shirt which Michel Kuipers had worn when the Albion famously committed daylight robbery to win 1-0 at West Ham United with their only shot on target two months earlier. White though obviously clashed with Leeds’ kit – and so Yelldell’s only other available option was pink.

Talk about being thrown in at the deep end. Yelldell had been signed just 24 hours earlier on loan from Blackburn Rovers. It was a desperate signing from McGhee who needed someone, anyone, to fill the void left by the career threatening shoulder injury Michel Kuipers had suffered the previous week against Nottingham Forest.

Yelldell had only met his teammates for the first time at their hotel on Friday night. He had never trained with them, nor had he ever played a senior game of football in his life.

Blackburn were only happy to loan Yelldell out because he had recently lost his place in their reserves by a teenager from the Rovers academy.

And here he was, stepping out at Elland Road for the second half in a pink shirt. No wonder McGhee was angry – Yelldell faced a tough enough task as it was against Leeds without the added complication of representing a football club from the gay capital of England whilst wearing bright pink.

The debutant had equipped himself reasonably well in the first half in Lance Armstrong yellow. He bravely claimed a corner early on and took a whack from Brian Deane whilst lying on the ground. What a welcome to men’s football.

Yelldell could do nothing about the goal which put Leeds ahead five minutes before half time. Brighton failed to convincingly defend a corner (where have we heard that before) with Clarke Carlisle scoring at the second attempt after Adam Virgo had blocked the initial effort.

When the teams emerged for the second half, Yelldell was first out the tunnel with none of his teammates following. Adam Virgo later revealed it was a joke on the part of the players; they let Yelldell think they were behind him before letting him run towards the Revie Stand alone.

From the moment that Yelldell dropped his blue bath towel in the goal – and it was an actual Seagulls-branded bath towel, just to add to his bizarre attire – the Leeds fans let him have it.

He was wolf whistled and subjected to the usual repertoire of hilarious chants about standing up because you can’t sit down. Andy Naylor’s match report in The Argus referred to “chants too rude to repeat in a family newspaper, suffice to say one of the words was one altered letter away from maggot.”

As the game wore on, the abuse intensified – but so too did the quality of Yelldell’s performance. The only thing that Leeds fans seemed to hate more than a Brighton goalkeeper in a pink shirt was a Brighton goalkeeper in a pink shirt who was proving to be the best player on the pitch.

Yelldell made an astonishing 10 saves in pink during the second half as the hosts sought a killer second in what was a ridiculously entertaining encounter, as most Leeds v Brighton matches tend to be.

The best of those was a stunning fingertip stop from by Gary Kelly’s unexpected piledriver which looked to all the world like it was destined for the back of the net.

How important that save was became clear minutes later when Charlie Oatway took a short corner, Nathan Jones swung over a pinpoint cross and Guy Butters met it to equalise for the Albion.

It finished 1-1, Yelldell and the Seagulls ruining what was meant to be a big day for Leeds with Ken Bates in the director’s box as chairman for the first time.

“What happened to goalkeepers wearing good old-fashioned green?” quipped goal scorer Butters afterwards. To make the whole thing even more surreal, Yelldell admitted to having no idea what the fuss was all about.

He was born and raised in Germany to a German mother and an American father before moving to Blackburn from Stuttgart Kickers as a 21-year-old. When he signed on loan for the Albion, he did not even know where Brighton was – let alone its reputation.

Unsurprisingly given how well he had played on his debut, McGhee immediately began talking about keeping Yelldell until the end of the season.

If he could look like the next Gordon Banks in the cauldron of Elland Road whilst wearing pink, then he looked well set to cope with anything else the Championship could throw at him.

“It was a nice shirt,” Yelldell told The Argus after the Leeds game. “I kept a clean sheet in it in the second half, so I would wear it all the time if it meant not conceding a goal.”

Unfortunately for Yelldell, McGhee had made his feelings on the pink shirt very clear. It was never seen again and without it, Yelldell conceded five times in two defeats against Cardiff City and Derby County. He was then dropped in favour of Rami Shaaban, a bloke who had not played a competitive match for two years.

Not many players who manage just three appearances on loan are remembered in the way that Yelldell is by Brighton fans, and he has that pink shirt at Leeds to thank for that.

Remarkably, he went onto reach the German Cup Final with MSV Duisburg in the 2010-11 season and played international football for the United States.

It is doubtful though that Yelldell ever played as well in his 196 game professional career as he did that day at Elland Road. Pretty and pink and pissing off Leeds fans, what was not to like?