Football writer Daniel Taylor’s traditional working patch is Old Trafford and reporting on Manchester United, but his loyalties remain with his boyhood club, Nottingham Forest. The central plank of his book is to track down the 14 players he considers the best and most indispensable in Forest’s history. Inevitably, the presence of Brian Clough hovers benignly above the lot of them. One thing you can be sure of in a book packed with anecdotes about the great man is that it will be entertaining. In essence, this is really a book about Clough and a tribute to him via the vehicle of the 14 greatest.
One quibble: why on earth is there no Peter Shilton? Surely he has more pecking rights than Neil Webb, Garry Birtles or Ian Storey-Moore? The other 11 greats are fine choices — Stuart Pearce, Des Walker, Trevor Francis, Viv Anderson, Kenny Burns, Larry Lloyd, Clough’s son Nigel, Archie Gemmill, Roy Keane, John McGovern and John Robertson. And it helps that Taylor’s writing is witty and vibrant, a choice mix of the professional and the fan of 25 years.
The words of Clough appear like a hammer on a nail. Pearce tells him he has been picked for England for the first time. Clough ‘congratulates’ him with the words: ‘Well, you aren’t good enough in my opinion — now get out.’
Clough’s blood pressure rose dangerously when his assistant, Peter Taylor, recommended that he buy Kenny Burns from Birmingham. Clough exploded: ‘Forget it, I don’t want trouble-makers, and I don’t want an ugly bastard like Kenny Burns littering my club.’
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Clough eventually welcomed Burns by saying he looked ‘like a bloody tramp’. Clough transformed him from a bruiser of a centre-forward into a classy centre-back who would become a European champion. The author sums up Clough’s Midas touch as having an ‘unrivalled ability to rehabilitate and re-motivate underachievers’. Of course, he also carefully nurtured such gems as the game’s first £1m signing, Trevor Francis, and that midfield colossus, Roy Keane.
One afternoon before the First Division match at Liverpool in August 1990, Keane, as was the youngest player’s remit, was laying out the kit in the away dressing room. Clough said to the youngster: ‘Roy, go and put that shirt on, see what it’s like.’ Then: ‘Roy, you look fantastic. Tell you what, keep it on, you’re playing.’ Great stuff
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