In October 1965, a diminutive university student walked through the gates of Melwood and sat patiently in the visitors' dressing room waiting to take part in amateur training session.
He was joined by the club’s manager Bill Shankly who was a little bemused by the 18-year-old, dressed in a bus conductor's uniform.
"When I was a student during the summer holidays, I was a bus conductor in Preston," explains Brian Hall.
"It was the only time to train with the pros being there one night a week with the rest of the amateurs. I turned up in my busman's uniform because I had to go straight there after I finished my shift.
"The boss walked in and started getting changed. He took one look at me in my busman's uniform and just said "Are you the student, son?" and asked me where I was from so I told him Preston.
"Of course he played for Preston for a long time so he went into this great eulogy about Sir Tom Finney and what a wonderful player he was.
"In the middle of it all he just stopped and said 'do you need a degree to be working on the buses?' I didn't really bother explaining but even in that first encounter, he had this phenomenal persona; this huge character."
Hall spent three years at the University of Liverpool where he graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree but it was at L4 where he found his true calling.
Following a shock FA Cup defeat to Watford in February 1970, Shankly began to rebuild his team for a new era; a second Anfield revolution. The line-up that used to host the likes of Lawrence, Yeats and St John now read Clemence, Lloyd and Toshack. However Hall felt no added burden taking over the mantle of his predecessors.
“I never felt particular pressure from that side of things and I don’t think any of the lads did quite frankly,” he admits.
“It was about winning football matches and we started to do that. Our first year was a very good year because we got to the FA Cup final.
“We didn’t win it but we got there and I think that showed to the boss, the coaching staff and the fans that we had a young team that a lot of potential and of course that was proved right.”
That run to the 1971 cup final is one Hall remembers with fondness, having scored the winning goal in the semi-final against Everton. However there would be no glory for the Reds as they were downed by league champions Arsenal who completed an historic league and cup double.
Despite losing to Charlie George’s spectacular long-range effort, Liverpool received a heroes’ welcome when they arrived back home and Hall remembers Shankly demonstrating messiah-like qualities as he silenced the Kopites assembled at St George’s Plateau.
“We came back on the open-top bus from Allerton train station in south Liverpool. I didn’t anticipate there being too many people about because we’d lost.
“The journey from the railway station all the way down to Lime Street was just phenomenal. We went out onto St George’s Plateau and there must have been between 200-250,000 people there.
“The Lord Mayor went over to the microphone to say something but you couldn’t hear him through all the noise. Somebody else tried to calm the crowd down but to no avail.
“Shanks just went over to the microphone. I was stood about a yard or two away from him, facing this huge wall of noise that was in front of us. He just put his arms up in the air, that classic pose that I think everybody has seen.
“Everyone went deftly silent. I’ve never seen anything like it before or since. It was just stunning.”
Three years later Liverpool returned to Wembley and took home the cup but behind the scenes Shankly was agonising over whether or not to continue. Despite having no knowledge of this, Hall remembers one or two incidents that made him think that something was not right with the Kop boss.
He said: “I have to say that there were one or two little instances where I thought ‘Is he cracking up a little bit? Is the pressure getting to him?’
“He was quite an eccentric character normally, and I mean that in a very good way, but there was one of two little instances where I had this little thought of ‘that’s not like the boss’.
“But you get carried away with the entire euphoria of winning the FA Cup final so at the end of the day, everything in the garden is sweetness and light.”
However life was far from rosy in the Anfield garden as Hall remembers all too well the day he arrived at the famous old ground to the devastating news that Shanks had resigned.
“It was the close season and I was doing a bit of gardening. My wife stuck her head out the door and said “I’m sure they’ve just said on the radio that Shanks has retired”. It was one of those moments where everything stopped.
“I went back into the house, cleaned up a bit, jumped in the car and went straight to Anfield to find out. Like the rest of the football world, I just could not believe that this man had given up and retired. Of course when I got to the club the answer was yes, he had retired. I was just in shock.”
Despite the void left by Shankly’s departure life at Melwood in the 1974-75 season was no different than it had been under his tenure, something Hall believes is a real testament to his legacy as the trophy haul that followed testified.
He added: “I thought as a player that there was no way Bob Paisley could take over from Shanks; they were just completely different characters. But we started pre-season training and it was exactly the same as we’d been doing because that was the way Shanks, Bob, Joe and Ronnie had always done it.
“Nothing changed; it just carried on but this is what Shanks had built. He built all those foundations; the club was on the right path and nothing needed to change. It was absolutely amazing, stunning really.”
"The boss walked in and started getting changed. He took one look at me in my busman's uniform and just said "Are you the student, son?" and asked me where I was from so I told him Preston.
"Of course he played for Preston for a long time so he went into this great eulogy about Sir Tom Finney and what a wonderful player he was.
"In the middle of it all he just stopped and said 'do you need a degree to be working on the buses?' I didn't really bother explaining but even in that first encounter, he had this phenomenal persona; this huge character."
Hall spent three years at the University of Liverpool where he graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree but it was at L4 where he found his true calling.
Following a shock FA Cup defeat to Watford in February 1970, Shankly began to rebuild his team for a new era; a second Anfield revolution. The line-up that used to host the likes of Lawrence, Yeats and St John now read Clemence, Lloyd and Toshack. However Hall felt no added burden taking over the mantle of his predecessors.
“I never felt particular pressure from that side of things and I don’t think any of the lads did quite frankly,” he admits.
“It was about winning football matches and we started to do that. Our first year was a very good year because we got to the FA Cup final.
“We didn’t win it but we got there and I think that showed to the boss, the coaching staff and the fans that we had a young team that a lot of potential and of course that was proved right.”
That run to the 1971 cup final is one Hall remembers with fondness, having scored the winning goal in the semi-final against Everton. However there would be no glory for the Reds as they were downed by league champions Arsenal who completed an historic league and cup double.
Despite losing to Charlie George’s spectacular long-range effort, Liverpool received a heroes’ welcome when they arrived back home and Hall remembers Shankly demonstrating messiah-like qualities as he silenced the Kopites assembled at St George’s Plateau.
“We came back on the open-top bus from Allerton train station in south Liverpool. I didn’t anticipate there being too many people about because we’d lost.
“The journey from the railway station all the way down to Lime Street was just phenomenal. We went out onto St George’s Plateau and there must have been between 200-250,000 people there.
“The Lord Mayor went over to the microphone to say something but you couldn’t hear him through all the noise. Somebody else tried to calm the crowd down but to no avail.
“Shanks just went over to the microphone. I was stood about a yard or two away from him, facing this huge wall of noise that was in front of us. He just put his arms up in the air, that classic pose that I think everybody has seen.
“Everyone went deftly silent. I’ve never seen anything like it before or since. It was just stunning.”
Three years later Liverpool returned to Wembley and took home the cup but behind the scenes Shankly was agonising over whether or not to continue. Despite having no knowledge of this, Hall remembers one or two incidents that made him think that something was not right with the Kop boss.
He said: “I have to say that there were one or two little instances where I thought ‘Is he cracking up a little bit? Is the pressure getting to him?’
“He was quite an eccentric character normally, and I mean that in a very good way, but there was one of two little instances where I had this little thought of ‘that’s not like the boss’.
“But you get carried away with the entire euphoria of winning the FA Cup final so at the end of the day, everything in the garden is sweetness and light.”
However life was far from rosy in the Anfield garden as Hall remembers all too well the day he arrived at the famous old ground to the devastating news that Shanks had resigned.
“It was the close season and I was doing a bit of gardening. My wife stuck her head out the door and said “I’m sure they’ve just said on the radio that Shanks has retired”. It was one of those moments where everything stopped.
“I went back into the house, cleaned up a bit, jumped in the car and went straight to Anfield to find out. Like the rest of the football world, I just could not believe that this man had given up and retired. Of course when I got to the club the answer was yes, he had retired. I was just in shock.”
Despite the void left by Shankly’s departure life at Melwood in the 1974-75 season was no different than it had been under his tenure, something Hall believes is a real testament to his legacy as the trophy haul that followed testified.
He added: “I thought as a player that there was no way Bob Paisley could take over from Shanks; they were just completely different characters. But we started pre-season training and it was exactly the same as we’d been doing because that was the way Shanks, Bob, Joe and Ronnie had always done it.
“Nothing changed; it just carried on but this is what Shanks had built. He built all those foundations; the club was on the right path and nothing needed to change. It was absolutely amazing, stunning really.”
