BRIAN CLOUGH was perhaps the most charismatic football manager this country has produced. He was also one of the most successful, winning a total of 12 major trophies with the previously unfashionable Derby County and Nottingham Forest, both of whom he elevated from the second division to the League championship. He was one of only two managers to have won the old English first division title with different clubs, the other being Herbert Chapman with Huddersfield and Arsenal. In addition, Clough led Forest to victory in the European Cup in 1979 and 1980.
However, it was the manner of Clough’s success which made him one of the most instantly recognisable figures in the land and a gift to mimics because of his distinctive nasal tone and strident manner. He was possessed of the ego, the innate genius for manipulative psychology and the public relations skill of a Muhammad Ali. Clough’s achievements rested partly on the sheer force of a personality which fascinated and often intimidated his players and the media alike. He revelled in his nickname of “Old Big ’Ead”. As he once said about dealing with a player who disagreed with his views: “We talk about it for 20 minutes and then we decide I was right.”
The public generally loved his willingness to assail any authority, and even when they did not, they consumed it voraciously. Clough earned steadily from newspaper columns and television appearances. He was long-touted as the people’s choice for England manager and at one stage he threatened to enter politics as a Labour candidate (being supported at various times by factions in the constituencies of Richmond, Loughborough and Stretford). Yet his bulldozing approach made him enemies and there were many who rejoiced when hubris overcame him. Clough’s 18-year reign as Forest manager ended with relegation from the Premiership, amid persistent allegations of alcoholism and accusations in the High Court that he liked to receive money illicitly from transferring players from Forest.
A man of many contradictions, Clough was a lifelong socialist who wrote a column for The Sun and a money-hoarder who could also be extraordinarily generous. He once talked a suicidal man out of drowning himself in the River Trent by stopping his car and chatting to him about football until he calmed down. He was an anti-authoritarian extrovert, yet he turned out teams of such discipline that referees looked forward to officiating over their games for weeks. Clough despised hooligans, but was himself capable of behaving like one. After one Cup victory he waded into a crowd of exuberant Forest fans who had invaded the pitch and began to hit them systematically before an amazed television audience. A few days later, he invited the cameras to see him make peace with the fans he had assaulted, and made all of them kiss him.
Clough’s principal successes as a manager came with teams and individuals he could mould unchallenged. His approach was to break down their resistance through whatever technique was expedient. After he bought Trevor Francis for £1 million — a record at the time — he played the England striker in the Forest third team to let him know who was boss. He exerted a mesmerising effect on players. This he partly achieved through his unpredictability. He might suddenly order his team to run into a field of stinging nettles, and on one occasion asked a player whether he had ever been hit in the stomach, and on receiving a negative reply, dealt him a forceful blow, saying: “You have now.” He had many players convinced he could make them look at him in the “dugout” at any point during a game through a mere act of will. However, when Clough tried the same dictatorial approach with seasoned international players at Leeds United, the result was a mutiny.
Another key ingredient in Clough’s success was his partnership with Peter Taylor. The two met as Middlesbrough players in the mid-1950s. Taylor, the club goalkeeper and six years the senior of the pair, became Clough’s mentor, feeding his ego and touting him as a future England player. The two spent every spare moment together, developing a joint philosophy of the game and attempting to control how it was played at the club. When Clough went into management, at fourth division Hartlepools, he insisted that Taylor be appointed with him. This unusual arrangement flourished, with Clough specialising in publicity and man-management while Taylor concentrated on improving the team. The pair reproduced the formula at Derby, Brighton and Forest. But their relationship was soured by rows over money and Taylor walked out on Forest in 1982. The rift lasted until Taylor’s death in 1990, and it was one of Clough’s few regrets that there was no reconciliation. Many believed that Clough’s passion for the game was never the same after the split.
Clough was born and raised in Middlesbrough, the sixth of nine children, who slept three to a bed, head to toe. Having left school with no qualifications, he signed as an amateur for Middlesbrough, then in the old second division, at 16. He turned professional the following year. Clough had six seasons in the Middlesbrough first team before being transferred to their northeastern rivals, Sunderland, in 1961. He was one of the most effective goalscorers in the history of the English game. In his 274 League matches he scored 251 goals, giving him the best ratio of goals per game of any postwar player.
Yet he only made two appearances for the national team. This was widely attributed to his alienating arrogance. He once infuriated the England manager Walter Winterbottom by demanding that he drop either Jimmy Greaves or Bobby Charlton.
On Boxing Day 1962, Clough’s playing career was virtually ended by a knee injury on a frozen pitch in a game against Bury, an incident which left him unable subsequently to bear the sight of an injured player. Suddenly deprived of his career, Clough fell into a depression from which he sought relief in alcohol. He was saved by the manager, George Hardwick, who had him qualify as an FA coach and take control of the Sunderland youth team. Clough took to the role with relish, but he had made enemies among the club’s directors and was sacked as soon as they received the insurance payout for his injury. The drive and the anger which fuelled Clough’s managerial career could be traced to the injury which ended his playing days. In 1965, after three months without work, Clough became the youngest manager in the league with Hartlepools United (as the team was known before it shed its plural). There he rediscovered his self-belief, learnt that he had the ability to inspire even mediocre players, and saw off his first antagonistic chairman after the latter had tried to sack Taylor. Clough also learnt to exploit his natural talent for showmanship to his club’s and his own advantage. His two years at the club made enough impact for him to be offered the manager’s job at Derby County.
Clough and Taylor led Derby to the second division title in 1969, with a team comprised of shrewdly bought younger players mixed with inspirationally rehabilitated older ones. Of all his managerial achievements, this gave Clough the most pleasure, although greater triumphs were to follow. Within three years of their promotion, Derby were League champions. Yet the following season, with the footballing world seemingly at their feet, Clough and Taylor walked out on Derby after an attempt by the club chairman to curtail Clough’s media commitments.
After a brief spell at Brighton, dominated by Clough’s attempts to have himself reinstated at his previous club, he was offered the managership of Leeds United, at that time the dominant team in the country. Clough got off to a disastrous start, telling his new players that they could throw away their considerable collections of medals, as they had won them all by cheating. He was sacked after only 44 days in the job, although not before negotiating a substantial payoff.
Clough followed one of the shortest reigns as a league manager with one of the longest. In January 1975, he was appointed to Nottingham Forest. Within six months he was reunited with Taylor, who had remained at Brighton in the interim, and the pair, revitalised by a fresh challenge, set about surpassing what they had achieved at Derby, following up the League Championship of 1978 with successive European Cup victories. These triumphs were the zenith of Clough’s career. Although he continued to have modest success with Forest after Taylor’s departure, winning two League Cups, his later years were dominated by him becoming increasingly eccentric, such as when he refused to talk to his players at the 1991 FA Cup Final before extra time. Forest, including his son Nigel, who appeared 14 times for England, lost the match — and the one trophy that eluded Clough.
His departure in 1993 was soured by the allegations of one of the Forest chairmen that Clough had twice almost died through drink. Clough himself said of his status: “Walk on water? I know most people out there will be saying that instead of walking on it, I should have taken more of it with my drinks. They are absolutely right.”
At the same time he was accused of having demanded personal payments for the sale of Forest players and of ticket-touting. Clough defended himself against these attacks with characteristic vigour.
In retirement he was widely portrayed as a ravaged alcoholic. He had a liver transplant in January and had been suffering from stomach cancer for some while.
Asked how he wanted to be remembered, he once said: “I want no epitaphs of profound history and all that type of thing. I contributed. I would hope they would say that and I would hope somebody liked me.”
Brian Clough, footballer and manager, was born on March 21, 1935. He died on September 20, 2004, aged 69.