Barry Horne became a cult figure across four seasons in a blue shirt, with central roles in the 1994 Great Escape and 1995 FA Cup success etching him into Everton folklore.
But it could have all been so different. Horne was on course to join Tottenham Hotspur when an unexpected five-a-side tournament in Ireland changed the course of his career.
The midfielder was coming to the end of his Southampton contract and had already been lined up for a move to Spurs. Then, during the summer, he found himself playing in a charity five-a-side tournament with Howard Kendall watching on.
Everton’s manager was already interested in Horne, but seeing him in action was enough to push things along. What followed was remarkably straightforward: Horne told Kendall he would sign for Everton as soon as he returned home, met with the manager and completed the move within 20 minutes.
For Horne, there was never really a decision to make. Everton were his boyhood club, and the chance to play for the team he had grown up watching at Goodison Park was one he wasn’t prepared to pass up. Even the likelihood of a more lucrative deal in North London couldn’t change his mind.
Speaking to ToffeeWeb in the latest edition of our Once a Blue series, Horne recalled how a seemingly innocuous summer five-a-side tournament helped take him from a probable move to Spurs to becoming an Everton cult hero — and explains the pressure that came with finally pulling on the shirt of the club he had supported as a boy.
“So I moved to Southampton from Portsmouth. The manager was a bloke Evertonians will be familiar with, Chris Nicholl, who scored a worldie against us in the League Cup for [Aston] Villa. He signed me, and I was happy at Southampton. He then left, and we got a manager who a few of us were less happy playing for. He was basically going to dismantle what was a good team,” Horne began about how his Everton move unfolded.
“I was coming to the end of a contract, and I wasn’t going to re-sign. I don’t think there was a great appetite from them to re-sign me; I think they wanted to get some money for me because, back then, even at the end of your contract, there was still a transfer fee involved. So, it looked like I was going to go to Spurs.
“And then, during the close season, bearing in mind I was out of contract, I ended up playing in a crazy charity five-a-side event in Ireland. And our manager was Howard Kendall. Obviously, it sounds like Howard became interested because he saw me playing five-a-side. He was obviously interested anyway, but he made his interest known, and I just said to him, look, as soon as I get home, I’ll meet up with you, and I’ll sign for Everton. It was absolutely simple. A no-brainer.
“I didn’t speak to Spurs in the end, formally, because I knew that if I’d gone to Spurs, they would have offered me more money and I would have had a massive dilemma. So I met Howard, and I signed there and then. And yeah, it was done within 15 or 20 minutes.”
Horne added that the feeling of increased expectations was immediate after arriving at Goodison Park. A boyhood Blue, he described the move as the ‘best thing ever that could happen to me’, and believes his unconventional route from the fourth tier to the top division helped him deal with another leap.
Asked about the differences he felt after swapping Southampton for Everton, Horne said: “Just a bigger club. Bigger club, bigger names, even though Everton hadn’t been the force that they had been in the 80s for a couple of years.
“I played against the 85, 86, and ‘ 87 teams, and obviously they were one of the best teams in Europe. So even though they weren’t at those heights, it was still a big club, and they still had great players.
“And it’s interesting: I played against Man United teams that weren’t at their best, but they still managed to beat you. I played against Liverpool teams that weren’t at their best, but they still managed to beat you. Everton, historically, have been one of, in my life, one of those teams. They were one of the big five that formed the Premier League. They’re one of the six teams that have never been relegated. Evertonians know about their history.
“So it was a bigger club. I grew up going to watch Everton at Goodison Park, so I knew all about the stadium. Yeah, bigger expectations and a little bit of pressure, which wasn’t new to me because I went from the fourth division to the old first division, which is now the Premier League.
“Alan Ball took me to Portsmouth, so that was a massive step up. Then going from Portsmouth to Southampton as a record signing, that brought pressures of its own. But then coming into Everton, even though it was the best thing ever that could happen to me, playing for your team, I think you feel the pressure is much greater.”
The full conversation with Barry Horne, alongside our weekly ToffeeWeb Talk podcast, will be released later this week.