WANDERERS boss John Gorman bids to get his side's promotion bid off to a flier today against the club where he is a legend.

Gorman made 261 appearances for the Cumbrians and was part of the team which won promotion to the old first division in 1974 an achievement which Bill Shankly described as the greatest feat in the history of the game.' He joined the club in a £15,000 deal from Celtic and was voted Carlisle's Player of the Year on three occasions.

He said: "I went there from Celtic and, if I'm honest, I didn't really want to go. I was forced to go and ended up loving it. I had six years at the club and it was my best spell playing football. We were promoted to the top league and the only reason we never stayed there was because we had fewer players than we've got at Wycombe now."

After six years at Carlisle he moved to Spurs for £60,000 but, just 15 games later, he was on the wrong end of a horror tackle from Liverpool's Jimmy Case and never really recovered.

Gorman looks back on his six years at Brunton Park with great affection.

He said: "They were some of the happiest days of my life. We had a really great team. All the southern clubs used to really fear coming up north to play us."

For a time Carlisle, with Gorman in defence, topped the top division before falling away and getting relegated after just one season.

Gorman tried to rekindle his love affair with Carlisle in the early Nineties.

When he was youth team chief at Orient he applied for the vacant manager's job at Brunton Park with long time friend and former Carlisle colleague Les O'Neil but, before he even got an interview, he teamed up with Glenn Hoddle at Swindon, and the rest is history as Gorman was Hod's assistant at England, Tottenham and Southampton.

Gorman then cut the ties and decided to go solo when he was offered the Wycombe job.

And the gaffer insists there will be no room for sentiment when Wanderers entertain Carlisle tomorrow.

He said: "I wish we were playing another team to be honest because I want to have a great start and it's going to be at their expense.

"They will have other ideas of course as every team will.

"Carlisle are very close to my heart. I've always followed their results and always will. My two kids were born in Carlisle and I've got great memories of the place.

"They have had one year out of the League and have done brilliantly to come straight back up. I was delighted for them.

"They will be hard to beat. It's their first game back and they will still have the euphoria of it and with my connection it gives the game that extra little bit of spice."

And in an extra little twist ahead of today's clash, Gorman has employed his former United teamate Les O'Neil as a scout and one of his first jobs has been to be spy on his old team.