Where are they now?

ALBERT Cheesebrough was the archetypal local lad made good.

But being born in Burnley and graduating through school and county sides to the first-team at Turf Moor didn't mean things came easily.

And Cheesebrough proved he wasn't afraid of hard work by learning a trade for life after football while still making a living out of the game with Port Vale.

After leaving Leicester City for the Potteries, Cheesebrough knew his playing days were nearing an end, despite the fact that he had one more move to Mansfield Town left in him.

So he lined up a butcher's shop in Southport and learned the ropes of the meat trade for two hours a day prior to reporting for training at Vale Park.

Cheesebrough revealed: "Once you step down you find that the end is nigh. I had a couple of injuries and I thought it better for me to concentrate on the butcher's shop.

"When I was at Port Vale I realised I was coming to the end and decided to come back north.

"I noticed a business in Southport. My father-in-law was a butcher and he said he would look at the shop for me and he did a lot of the spadework.

"At Port Vale I lived opposite a master butcher. I had a little knowledge of butchering and I asked if I could go into the shop and get some experience to bring myself up to modern-day standards. "He said I could go in whenever I liked so I went in early mornings and he showed me a lot of things.

"I would go in before training at seven o'clock and do a couple of hours before the customers came around.

"Then I would go down to training at ten o'clock. It was hard work but it was very good for me. When the business popped up I was prepared for it."

It's hard to imagine a modern-day player who had spent 10 years in the top-flight getting his hands dirty preparing for a future career.

But Cheesebrough is certainly not bitter, acknowledging simply that times change.

And the business, which he retired from seven years ago, allowed him, wife Shirley, a Nelson girl, and their family to settle and enjoy life in Southport.

Cheesebrough was born in the Rose Grove area of Burnley in 1935 and joined the Clarets on his 17th birthday.

He made his League debut in April, 1952 but wasn't a regular in the side until the 1955/56 season, by which time he was fulfilling a boyhood dream.

"In those days it was the be-all and end-all to play for your home-town team. "I was brought up on Billy Morris and Peter Kippax who were our heroes and got to the Cup final in 1947.

"And I was fortunate enough to play with Jimmy McIlroy, Brian Pilkington, Tommy Cummings and Jimmy Adamson," he said.

An inside-forward, Cheesebrough forged a high-quality partnership with McIlroy and in 1956 he earned a call-up to the England Under-23s side.

However, the emergence of Jimmy Robson threatened Cheesebrough's place and he was sold to Leicester City for £20,000 in June, 1959.

He therefore missed out on Burnley's Championship-winning season, but has no regrets.

He added: "The club always worked on the lines in those days of raising good, young players, getting a few years out of them and if they're surplus to requirements, getting a nice fee for them.

"There's nothing wrong with that and going to Leicester turned out to be a good bet for me.

"It was a marvellous move really. I was there for five years and we got to two Cup finals."

Cheesebrough played in the first of the two, losing 2-0 to Spurs in 1961, and had four enjoyable seasons at Leicester before dropping down to Division Three to join Port Vale in 1963 and Mansfield two years later, then managed by former Clarets team-mate Tommy Cummings.

A broken leg ended Cheesebrough's career and football wasn't to occupy much of his time again. "I must admit my interest was on the wane when I took up golf. If I'm not involved I can't give myself to the game.

"It doesn't mean much. If I find myself watching television and two neutral teams, I force myself to pick one side to get some sort of meaning," he said.

Cheesebrough has three daughters, one of whom, Susan, represented Great Britain as an Olympic gymnast.

However, grandsons have re-introduced him to the game at grass-roots level and he was a guest at Burnley's recent game against Macclesfield Town, his first visit to Turf Moor since he played there for Leicester.

"It brought back memories but when you go through that tunnel it's a different world," he said. "When I saw what they had done it's obviously on the right lines."

Cheesebrough does still look out for Burnley's results though, and admitted to a bit of recent nail-biting.

But he was encouraged by the Clarets 4-3 win over Macclesfield which was almost a throw-back to the old days as Burnley piled men forward in search of a result.

"What I liked about it was that they were making chances," he said.

"When you are making chances it can go your way.

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