Paul McShane, a flame-haired light in a dreadful season

He was only here for one season that ended in relegation from the Championship, but Paul McShane wrote himself into the Brighton record books in his nine short months at Withdean.

He remains the only loan signing to have ever been voted as Player of the Season. Despite being a defender, he managed to finish as third top scorer thanks to his attacking prowess from set pieces.

And then there was that night at Selhurst Park on October 18th 2005 when he scored the only goal of the game as the Albion won 1-0 against Crystal Palace.

Let us start with that evening in Croydon. If you want to earn legend status forever more at a club, one of the simplest ways to go about it is by grabbing the winner against their arch rivals.

That was McShane’s calling when in the 79th minute he leapt 20 feet into the air, contorted his body into a shape that should have been beyond the capabilities of the human skeleton and met Sebastien Carole’s corner with a bullet header that Gabor Kiraly could only watch crash into the back of the net.

It was beautiful, it was glorious and to this day, it guarantees the Paul McShane a night of unlimited Guinness anytime he comes back to Brighton.

But there was so much more to McShane than one goal against Palace. As telling a contribution as that header in front of the Whitehorse Lane Stand was his intervention at the other end, a last gasp, goal saving tackle to prevent Jon Macken grabbing an equaliser right at the death.

It was perfectly timed interventions like that one on Macken that marked McShane out as a cut above anything else in Mark McGhee’s squad that season.

The 19-year-old centre back from County Wicklow arrived on an initial six month loan from Manchester United on the eve of the campaign, heading south with references that said he had the potential to be the next Steve Bruce. Praise doesn’t come much higher than comparisons to a title-winning captain from your parent club.

Almost immediately, McShane showed his quality. He was the Albion’s man-of-the-match on his debut in a 1-1 draw away at Derby County and followed that up with the same accolade on his home debut three days later against Reading.

It was hard to believe that the flame-haired individual partnering the veteran Guy Butters at the heart of the Albion defence was still a teenager for the first five months of his Brighton career, only turning 20 towards the end of January when the writing already looked on the wall in terms of Championship survival.

Paul McShane did his very best to try and help Brighton avoid that relegation fate. His four goals all came in vital games – the win at Palace, a 1-1 draw away at Burnley, a narrow 2-1 loss at home to Cardiff City and a 2-0 victory over Millwall towards the end of the campaign.

Despite the fact he was a Red Devil, you would not have been shocked to see blue and white blood if you had cut him open, such was the passion he put into every performance.

Sometimes that passion crossed the line and that translated into 12 bookings and two suspensions. One of those bans was for the return game against Palace when the Albion sorely missed his presence as Jobi McAnuff scored a last minute winner to give the Eagles a 3-2 win at Withdean. McShane was rash in the tackle at times but you could never doubt his commitment.

That passion and commitment shone through when Paul McShane was left in tears at the thought of his Brighton career being over during the 1-1 draw away at Cardiff in November.

He had been hurt in an aerial challenge with Cameron Jerome which forced him off after 35 minutes at Ninian Park, a worrying sign for a player who would try and carry on even if he’d been decapitated.

McShane told The Argus afterwards, “I won the header but was reaching for it, very close to him and my left foot got caught on his leg and kicked me off balance.”

“I knew straight away it was bad. I always hop off and try to run it off when something like that happens and I tried my best to come back on for a few minutes. But when I took my sock off my ankle was like a balloon. I was devastated.”

With McShane’s loan spell up at the end of December and a lengthy period on the sidelines with ankle ligament damage looking a given, it appeared as though that would be the last we’d see of the defender in a Brighton shirt. Remarkably, McShane was back within a month and United agreed to extend his stay until the end of the season.

McGhee wanted a permanent deal but even thinking there was a 10% chance that could happen smacked of a bloke living on another planet, drinking multiple pints of whiskey per day.

There was no way the Albion could afford McShane and as the second half of the season progressed and Brighton picked up just three wins between December and May, it became glaringly obvious that we were both on different trajectories – Brighton into the backwaters of League One and McShane to a stage more deserving of his talents than Withdean.

Unfortunately for McShane, that stage was not Old Trafford. That summer, he moved to West Bromwich Albion as part of the deal that took future Brighton goalkeeper and housewives’ favourite Tomasz Kuszczak to United.

McShane spent a season at the Hawthorns and has since gone onto play for Sunderland, Hull City, Barnsley, Palace, Reading and Rochdale, as well as winning 33 caps for Ireland.

On his departure from the Albion, McShane said, “Brighton have been brilliant to me. They have treated me really well. They have made me feel very welcome, the fans and the people around. That has helped a lot.”

“It has been great. The club is part of me now. You never know what will happen in the future but Brighton will always have a place in my heart.”

And yours in ours, Paul – and not just for that goal against Palace.