AS Billy Hamilton languished in the QPR reserves almost two years after making the move to English football he wondered if his career had stalled permanently.

Since moving from Linfield he’d spent 20 months at Loftus Road, but had played just 12 times, and his career was regressing before it even had truly begun.

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Then came the call that would change Hamilton’s life for ever. His West London nightmare was over, Brian Miller wanted him at Turf Moor, and as soon as Hamilton rolled into East Lancashire he knew it was a match made in heaven.

“They sort of rescued my football career,” he said. “At QPR I was languishing in the reserves and I couldn’t get a first team place.

“The chance to move to Burnley came up and I jumped at it. One of the first things that struck me were the similarities between Burnley and Northern Ireland, it was very much like home, the people were so friendly and I fitted straight in.”

The Northern Irish international, who played in the 1982 and 1986 World Cups, signed at the end of November 1979, and the first of his 76 Clarets goals arrived over Christmas.

Speaking to the Lancashire Telegraph from the trophy show he owns in Bangor, Northern Ireland, Hamilton picks out the game when he got his first Burnley goal as one of his abiding memories from his time at Turf Moor.

“I remember one game against Newcastle on Boxing Day in 1979,” he said, “I scored my first goal and we beat them 3-2, the atmosphere was electric.

“It was a great day for me to score goal and for us to get the result because they were a good side at the time.

“I had a great rapport with the fans, I used to like celebrating goals down the length of the Longside! I used to run a lot further than I needed to when celebrating.”

Hamilton, now 57, spent five seasons at Turf Moor, playing 248 times, and his spell included two relegations from the Second Division and a title-winning season in the Third Division.

During his time in East Lancashire the Clarets never finished higher than 21st in the Second Division, but Hamilton thinks the side was better than results would suggest, and that the club’s policy of cashing in on promising youngsters meant they never quite managed to kick on.

“We had some very, very good players in that team,” he said, “I think we suffered a couple of relegations and a promotion.

“We had Trevor Steven, Brian Laws, Lee Dixon was in that squad, Micky Phelan, Martin Dobson, there were some good players.

“Burnley had a great reputation for bringing young players in but they didn’t tend to stay too long.”

Hamilton was Miller’s first signing after taking over from Harry Potts, and the two forged a close bond during their time together.

Miller was sacked two days before his 46th birthday in January 1983, on the morning of the Clarets Milk Cup quarter-final at White Hart Lane.

Burnley were struggling at the wrong end of the Second Division and they came up against a midfield featuring Ossie Ardiles, Glenn Hoddle and Ricky Villa, but Hamilton was determined to pay a fitting tribute to his old boss.

“He was a great man to work for,” he explains. “He had done it all as a player, he was a great servant to Burnley Football Club and I had the utmost respect for him.

“I remember when he got sacked we were playing Spurs away in the quarter-finals of the Milk Cup. We were told in the afternoon that he was going, it was really tough for us and not ideal timing, but I think it did something to the team, because we went and won 4-1 at White Hart Lane that night. I got two goals and I dedicated them to Brian, I thought he was very hard done by.”

When Miller left Hamilton admits he ‘found it hard’ to play under his replacement John Bond, and at the end of Bond’s first season in charge, the 83/84 campaign, Hamilton was sold to Oxford United for £95,000.

“To be honest I found it hard to play under John Bond,” he said. “When he came in a lot of us were moved on, everything was changing in the John Bond era and I had to go.”

Despite the somewhat sour ending, Hamilton looks back at his time at Turf Moor with fondness.

The fans took to him immediately, and he took to the fans, and his exploits in Spain at the 1982 World Cup had the Clarets, who had won the Third Division title that season, captivated.

It wasn’t everyday a cult hero at a third tier club jetted off to take on the best in the world during the summer, and the Green and White Army made quite an impression, beating the hosts as they made it through to the second round group stage.

“I had some very, very happy times at Burnley, I made a lot of good friends there,” said Hamilton.

“For me to come from Burnley, I think we had got promoted that year from the old Third Division to the Second Division, and to then go and play in a World Cup against some of the best players in the world was incredible."