Out of reach: Gerve Brazier is at full stretch in a vain attempt to save. Colin Renouf (left), Art Le Page (centre) and Micky Duncan (right) look on anxiously. (0641471)

SIR ALF was never easily pleased, but the great man gave the island football team much credit in holding the FA XI to a 4-0 defeat at the Track.

It was 40 years ago this month when the Guernsey Football Association marked its 75th anniversary with a competitive visit by the ruling body in England.

Ramsey, who years earlier had masterminded England’s World Cup triumph, managed a quality team of largely emerging young professionals drawn from some of the top clubs in the land.

In goal for the FA XI was a 19-year-old Peter Shilton, still cutting his professional teeth with Leicester City before his first big money move to Stoke City and still two years away from his first full England cap.

In midfield was Colin Todd, then of Sunderland, who later became a full England international, and in attack was the flying Sheffield Wednesday winger, Jack Whitham, Hull City centre-forward Chris Chilton and the big Burnley winger, Steve Kindon.

A disappointingly small crowd of 1,732 spectators watched the early evening kick off and Ramsey said the island team had been well-prepared by coach Bill Spurdle.

‘I thought it was an entertaining game and that your team played extremely well,’ he told Rex Bennet after the final whistle.