Everyone is a winner at Club Legends Cup

"Everyone is a winner for their participation," said the former Baggies defender. "That is everyone who was in the arena, across the whole board.

"What we have raised for this cause, it's amazing."

The West Brom hero was talking just minutes after his team had suffered the agony of a penalty shoot-out defeat to Birmingham City the inaugural Club Legends Cup final.

The Baggies had, perhaps, been the best team across the tournament at Birmingham's LG Arena on Saturday night.

But they were denied at the last by the heroics of Blues goalkeeper Maik Taylor, who saved one penalty and was presence enough to ensure two others missed the target.

As Moore pointed out, the result was always of secondary importance on a night when the main focus was raising money for Cure Leukaemia.

An idea first floated during a conversation in a curry house ended up being a showpiece event featuring former heroes from the Midlands' six biggest clubs, watched by a crowd of more than 3,000 supporters.

Midlands football has been closely linked to the disease in recent years with former Aston Villa captain Stilyan Petrov and Toby, the son of former Wolves defender Jody Craddock contracting the disease.

The money raised on the night ran comfortably into the tens of thousands and the overall total well into the hundreds of thousands.

Yet while charity was the chief concern, the action on the pitch did not disappoint and there was plenty of excitement for supporters to enjoy.

There were unforgettable moments too for those fans who were successful in an online auction to play alongside their heroes.

One of them, Michael Rhodes, made a significant contribution to Albion's progress, scoring two cracking goals and was named Fans Legend of the day.

Lifelong supporters Sandra and Alisan Coley took charge of a team including Moore, Bob Taylor and Russell Hoult.

Event organisers Cure Leukaemia held a 'snap auction' when it emerged West Brom would be without a manager, mother and daughter Sandra and Alisan submitted the winning bid.

Sandra, 57, said: "It's been absolutely brilliant. It's such a wonderful event for a good cause, we were delighted to be here anyway.

"When we heard you could bid to be West Brom manager, we thought, why not? The opportunity to mix with our heroes has been incredible."

While Sandra originally hails from Birmingham, the family now live in Preston and had travelled down to the event on the day.

Despite the distance which now separates them from the Hawthorns, Sandra explained how she and Alisan, 26, still have season tickets and go to most of the away games.

Alisan said: "The team have really made us feel like we are managing them. They have been asking, 'should we do this, or that'. They all played brilliantly, Russell was excellent in goal."

Moore was full of praise for their efforts adding: "They did superbly, they were inspirational and kept us going. We enjoyed it."

Wolves supporter Jake Everley won goal of the day for a stunning strike against Walsall.

It was an otherwise tough day for Wolves, who lost both group games. before beating Walsall in a fifth place play-off.

Goalkeeper Matt Murray said: "You don't like losing. But it's been good fun. All in all it's a great cause and it is great to see so many people turning out."

Walsall, managed by legendary boss Ray Graydon, were unfortunate to lose all three of their games but could console themselves with having the most vocal fans.

Chris Marsh, who made more than 500 appearances for the Saddlers, said: "There were a lot of Walsall fans there and they made themselves heard.

"It's good to see and they are getting behind the lads."

Aston Villa's hopes were ended by a 2-1 semi-final defeat to Albion, who were many people's tip for overall victory in the final with Blues.

But they were unable to find a way past Taylor and, after the game ended goal-less, it was Blues who won 1-0 in the shoot-out.

Moore said: "I really thought we were going to win it. But considering we had the smallest squad we haven't done badly. We had eight players and I think they did superbly."

By Matthew Maher