 |
|||||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
||
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
 |
 |
Brian Clough
| Category: | Manager |
| Year Inducted: | 2002 |
Profile by Robert Galvin, the author of Football's Greatest Heroes, the official book of the National Football Museum Hall of Fame:
Brian Clough astonished the football world when he transformed unfashionable, modest provincial club languishing in the second tier of English football into the champions of Europe for two successive seasons.
Nottingham Forest won the European Cup at their first attempt in 1979, beating Malmo of Sweden in the final, and then repeated the trick the following year, against even greater odds, by defeating SV Hamburg, the German champions.
‘We gave Hamburg a lesson in application, determination, dedication and pride; all the things we don't hear enough about and that are taken for granted in English football,' Clough said afterwards.
His achievement at the City Ground, in partnership with his assistant, Peter Taylor, was no fluke; Clough had already done much the same at modest, provincial Derby County in late 1960s and early 1970s. The method was much the same at both clubs: Taylor found the players and Clough motivated them. Of Taylor, Clough once said: ‘There's no better judge of talent in the game.'
In both cases, promotion to the top flight was quickly followed by success in lifting the First Division championship title. In 1973, Derby reached the semi-final of the European Cup, also at their first attempt.
As a player, Clough scored 204 goals in 222 games for Middlesbrough and 63 goals in 74 games for Sunderland following his transfer between the clubs in 1961. He also won two England caps.
Then, at the age of 29, a serious cruciate ligament injury forced Clough to retire as a player, precipitating his early entry into management.
Brash, self-confident and opinionated, Clough was the first manager to win the title with two different clubs since Herbert Chapman achieved the feat with Huddersfield Town and Arsenal during the inter-war years.
Clough insisted that his players strove to play neat, stylish football, with the emphasis on keeping the ball on the deck. He also instilled in them a respect for referees, and dissent was not tolerated - behaviour that contrasted sharply with his own willingness to challenge the authority of the Football League and FA.
Denied the funds available to his rivals, Clough nevertheless spent boldly – notably, in 1979, when he made Trevor Francis the first £1 million pound footballer; three months later, Francis scored the winning goal in a European Cup final.
His unorthodox, abrasive and often confrontational style divided opinion. Time and again, readers voted him the people's choice for the England job in newspaper polls; the Football Association, however, found his controversial opinions and methods unpalatable, and looked elsewhere.
Similarly, in 1973, Derby County players staged a brief strike in an attempt to keep him at the club in the wake of his resignation as manager; a year later, however, the Leeds first team took the opposite stance: they campaigned for his removal – and only six weeks in the job, the board heeded their message and sacked him.
‘A player can never feel too sure of himself with Clough,' Archie Gemmill, a midfield player at both Derby and Forest. ‘That is his secret.'
At half-time at one home game, with Forest losing, he kept his team-talk short. ‘You were rubbish,' he said, handing the players a football. ‘so the least you can do is go back out there now and do something to entertain the crowd for 10 minutes while they're waiting for the second half to start.' Taken aback, the Forest players did as they were told – and went on to win the game.
‘He always kept us on our toes,' Peter Shilton said. ‘He had a unique style, but it certainly worked.'