Bob Higgins, 66, abused 24 aspiring footballers, Bournemouth Crown Court heard
A paedophile former football coach was today smiling and joking just minutes before he was jailed for more than 24 years for sexually abusing 24 young trainees.
Bob Higgins was found guilty of 45 counts of indecent assault, carried out on trainees at Southampton FC and Peterborough United, between 1971 and 1996.
Bournemouth Crown Court heard his status as a 'God-like' figure enabled his campaign of abuse that took place over 25 years.
Waiting for his sentencing hearing to start today at Winchester Crown Court, Hants, Higgins sat smiling and joking with a dock security officer, covering his mouth.
Yesterday victims lined up to describe a 'conveyor belt of abuse' at the hands of 'pure evil' Higgins.
They fought back tears as they spoke of having suffered shame, guilt and depression for decades as well as suicidal thoughts and having difficulties forming relationships, and each received applause from the public gallery.
The 66-year-old was found guilty last year of one count of indecent assault, and a further 45 at a retrial.
Higgins was convicted of groping his victims during post-exercise soapy massages as well as at his home and in his car.
Former international stars Matt Le Tissier, Dennis Wise, Alan Shearer and Danny Wallace were among those trained by the coach during his time at Southampton.
There was no accusation any suffered abuse at the hands of the coach.
Today, Judge Peter Crabtree told Higgins that he knew he 'held the key' to the children's professional footballing dreams and asserted his 'power and control' to fulfil his sexual desires.
Judge Crabtree added the 'vicious' mentality of the terraces at football grounds through the 70s and 80s meant his victims were, for years after, too terrified of revealing what had been done to them.
Higgins sat straight faced, wearing a court-provided hearing aid to help him hear the judge, as he was jailed.
Ex-football coach Bob Higgins (pictured left at a trial last year and right in his coaching days) was found guilty of 45 charges of indecent assault against teenage boys
There were muted cries of 'yes' as the judge jailed Higgins for 24 years and three months.
Judge Crabtree said: 'There is no doubt that as a scout and a football coach, working for Southampton and Peterborough United, you were good at spotting and developing talent in young footballers.
'This was such that many went on to have success as professional and international footballers.
'However, there was another side to you. This was the systematic abuse of aspiring young teenagers, most of whom were carefully groomed.
'You gave them gifts such as boots, shirts from professionals or international players you had trained and took them to what would have then been First Division football matches.
'It's also clear you invited many, if not all of them, to treat you as a father figure. That had a profound effect.
'In many cases, you played love songs and invited boys to touch you while in your car.
'You invited many to stay at your home overnight or at weekends.
'Little did their parents know their young sons were being invited to participate in stroking and cuddling by you.
The former football coach, pictured leaving court in a car and obscuring his face with a shopping bag, abused his 'position of extreme power' to molest youngsters
'You asserted the power and control you had to ensure they would not be able to tell people what had happened, or if they did they would not be believed.
Former footballer Billy Seymour, pictured, campaigned to bring Higgins to justice but died in a car crash months before the trial
Ex-professional footballer Billy Seymour campaigned to bring Bob Higgins to justice but died just months before seeing his abuser convicted for offences against him.
Mr Seymour, a Southampton youth player who went on to play for Coventry City and Millwall, was the only alleged victim in the trial to waive his right to anonymity.
The ambassador for the Offside Trust, which campaigns against child abuse in sport, told the first trial how he took to drugs and alcohol as a 'coping mechanism' for the sexual abuse he suffered at the hands of Higgins.
But before the retrial could begin at Bournemouth Crown Court, Mr Seymour died when he was the passenger in a van driven by a drink-driver that crashed in Sonning Common,
