EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW

FOR Nottingham Forest fans of a certain vintage a visit from Arsenal will conjure images of Ian Storey-Moore and the goal once voted the greatest scored at the City Ground.

Footage of the 1-1 draw does exist but it is grainy and is not necessary if you were there on December 27, 1971 to witness the blend of pace, balance and skill which took him dancing through the mud as defenders slithered around in panic.

‘My abiding memory is Alan Ball trailing in my wake and the flash of his white boots in the corner of my eye, all the way down the pitch,’ says Storey-Moore, who tells his tales as he played his football, with a flourish.

‘The ball fell to me about 10 yards outside our box and I decided to run with it. I got to their penalty area and suddenly I was confronted by a wall of yellow shirts.

‘I skipped past three or four of them somehow and there was Bob Wilson. I thought: “Oh Christ, don’t mess it up now”. It was probably the best goal I scored in my career. Sometimes you don’t know how you did it, to be honest.’

Storey-Moore was signed from Scunthorpe and became star of the Forest side which finished runnersup in Division One in 1967, a season when they also reached the FA Cup semi-finals. His hat-trick won the quarter-final against Everton and half a century later fans still appear on his doorstep and ask for an autograph.

‘It makes me feel very humble that people still remember me,’