Pascal Gross will leave for Dortmund as a Brighton legend but was he the greatest?

I’ve never made a secret of my own personal current title holder, Mark Lawrenson, was aged just 20 years of age when singed from Preston North End by then Albion boss Alan Mullery back in the summer of 1977.

In four years he made 152 appearances for the club, predominantly playing at centre back, although he also could push into midfield, he scored five goals and in his tenure at the club The Seagulls secured promotion to the top flight in 1979.

To reiterate in my opinion he still remains the greatest player to ever pull on the Blue and White shirt of the Albion. He left the Goldstone four years later to join European champions Liverpool, where he played 356 times for the Reds, scoring 18 times, between 1981-1988, he also played 39 times at International level for the Republic of Ireland.

Injury robbed him of playing for Ireland at both the 1988 Euro’s in Germany and Italia 90, and this is where I believe my GOAT summation would have become and open and shut case.

In his time Liverpool, winning numerous domestic and European honours he was lauded by the likes of Sir Bobby Robson, Jock Stein and Kenny Dalglish as ‘world class’. Had he had the opportunity to perform on the world stage, especially in 1990 where his teammates reached the quarter final, this fact would have been confirmed.

Yet many in the Albion family would argue the allegedly soon to be departing German midfielder Pascal Gross now supersedes Lawro, as the GOAT.

Whilst Lawrenson is the throwback to the halcyon days of the Goldstone, Gross who was a then a record signing from German club FC Ingolstadt, £3million, in the summer of 2017 after the club had been promoted to EPL for the first time in their history, has consistently performed in an era which has seen the Albion not only break into the top ten of the EPL but play in European club competition for the first time ever.

He's pulled on the sacred blue and white shirt nearly a hundred times more than Lawrenson and scored 30 goals in the process, and to reiterate he was one of the star players in arguably the greatest ever Albion squad.

Germany and the Bundesliga is calling however, and none of us should begrudge Pascal the chance to play at the top end of the Bundesliga and in the Champions League for Dortmund.

He is without doubt, ONE of the greatest players to ever play for the Albion, but is the greatest? Sorry, no its close-run thing, but its still Lawrenson for me every time.