Brian Clough RIP

[David Gwilliam]

Brian Clough died ten years ago and it is over twenty years since he retired from football. Time passes and there is a new generation who do not remember him. There may even be some younger Leicester fans who resent him because his success was with Derby and Forest. Some may even be led astray by the dreadful inaccuracy of The Damned United book or movie. The cliché is that he is the best manager England never had. This undervalues him. In the many decades I have been watching football Clough was IMO the greatest character British football has produced.

Brian Clough took two underachieving clubs Derby and Forest and made them the best teams in the country. He went on to make Forest the best team in Europe for two years running. As Clough liked to say in retirement "Manchester United Arsenal, Liverpool we used to beat them,"

His team included John Robertson who had been booed by Forest fans as not up to Second Division football, Martin O'Neill a journeyman Second Division player, Larry Lloyd whose clumsiness was a footballing joke and bad boy Kenny Burns who turned up to meet Clough in a stolen car. They all have the equivalent of Champions League medals.

He detested the Leeds manager Don Revie. The Leeds team was noted for its fouling, diving and harassment of referees. Clough's teams symbolised everything that was good about football. They did not foul, did not dive and treated referees with respect. He was the Anti-Revie

His career ended in 1962 when he was fouled by the Bury goalkeeper. Lying in agony a Bury player accused him of diving. Derby and Forest teams were noted for their clean play and once when a Forest player dived Clough was heard to shout "Get up you cheating bastard". In retirement Clough would boast that Roy Keane never got a red card playing for Forest. Keane was asked who was the better manager Clough or Ferguson and answered without hesitation "Brian Clough".

There have been other great managers. Shankly Paisley Cullis and Busby were successful with big clubs. Although popular they never matched the affection for Clough by the general public. Sir Alex Ferguson was a great manager but made Man U unpopular. Perhaps the nearest in success to Clough was Sir Alf Ramsey but while he was respected he never had Clough's rapport with football fans. I cannot judge Herbert Chapman except to say that he was obviously a great manager.

Martin O'Neill who was not known for being timid said that "If you even dreamed of arguing tactics with Brian Clough you woke up in a sweat desperate to apologise."

The later years were disappointing for Clough. He missed his close assistant Peter Taylor - O'Neill described them as "Bad cop and Bad cop" His health began to fail partly linked to heavy drinking and his retirement came perhaps too years too late. However, IMO in 1970s and early 1980s Brian Clough was the greatest manager of my lifetime.

 

[pork pie fox]

Good post DG.

 

[Brown Nose]

The later years were disappointing for Clough. He missed his close assistant Peter Taylor - O'Neill described them as "Bad cop and Bad cop" His health began to fail partly linked to heavy drinking and his retirement came perhaps too years too late. However, IMO in 1970s and early 1980s Brian Clough was the greatest manager of my lifetime.

Characteristically, it was his ego that ruined him for me. You're quite right that he stayed in management far too long. In his latter management career, he was a sometimes pathetic and sometimes abusive alcoholic. Frankly, he was embarrassing, hitting supporters and slurring his speech. He also evaded very serious corruption claims, citing ill health.

In his prime, he was a terrific manager of a certain type of footballer. For 3-4 years at Derby and then at Forest for similar period, he was excellent. But he was a manager for almost 30 years and there were more disappointing seasons than successful ones. He wasn't anywhere near as good as someone like Ferguson or Shankly because he had a self-destruct. He felt he was the most important person in every scenario. He failed miserably when he took over a genuinely big club with big players. Someone like Mourinho handles his ego far better.

Much of the fawning about Clough is based on his comical persona and witticisms. Journalists loved him. I loved watching him in action. But if I was putting together my top 10 managers in England, he may just sneak in at the bottom.

 

[Ike O'Noclassed]

There's always room for tributes to old big 'ead,. Shame that this one has to perpetuate the (Damned United) bollocks that Clough and Revie were polar opposites of good and evil, I always consider their clubs (and most of the other top teams of the late 1960s, Man U, Liverpool and Chelsea in particular), as different sides of the same turd, teams with a good number of players prepared to do the necessary when needed, and often when it wasn't. I remember City - Leeds games of the time were always comparatively gentle affairs with lots of good flair football, not many goals - always assumed that Revie wanted some sort of absolution from his old club, or maybe his wife Elsie (nee Duncan), a lovely Leicester lass, would have given him hell if his lads were nasty to the Filberts.

It's also somewhat unfair to describe Clough's career-ending cruciate ligament injury as the result of a deliberate foul, when the collision with the Bury 'keeper, Chris Harker (who died only a few weeks ago), was a 50-50 challenge on a Boxing Day iced pitch. Ironically, the person who accused Clough of feigning injury was none other than Bob Stokoe, later to claim that Revie had tried to get him to take a bribe for Bury to throw a game against promotion-chasing Leeds, earlier in 1962.

 

[Kettering Pete]

I had the pleasure of meeting Brian Clough. I was fourth official at Villa v Forest reserves a few years ago. He made the effort to speak to all officials and shook my hand saying - "Nice to meet you, young man". Ron Atkinson, the villa manger at the time was completely the opposite and ignored us. Villa res won 4-0 (all goals in the first half). Villa Park was cold and there was a crowd of about 50 and BC frequently asked me if I could blow my whistle and stop the game so we could all go home!

 

[Brown Nose]

 

[homer]

https://www.theguardian.com/footbal...saunders-nottingham-forest?CMP=share_btn_link

 

[Brown Nose]

I didn't expect that the anecdote was entirely accurate. They rarely are.

However, I take exception to attempts to defend Clough. He was someone that publically ridiculed others at any opportunity as can be seen from the accepted comments made towards the agent.

It's a bit like the story about Vaz. Some people don't merit this kind of defence.