ImagesPA; Getty ImagesTwice during his management days,
Brian Clough took a club from the
second tier and turned them into First
Division champions.
If his feats with Derby weren’t impressive
enough, he went on to lift two European Cups
with Nottingham Forest in 1979 and 1980.
In the years before his death in 2004, Old
Big ‘Ead penned a monthly column in these
pages. Typically opinionated, Clough railed
against everything from the FA to Victoria
Beckham, even tipping Rushden & Diamonds
to reach the top flight one day. There were
also some revealing insights into how he
became the greatest English boss on our list...
BE HONEST WITH
YOUR SQUAD
“Football management isn’t about using
swear words every two seconds. It’s about
a deep conviction that what you’re doing is
right; about taking responsibility and
carrying the team with you. One of my
biggest tests came in 1979 when I had to
tell Martin O’Neill and Archie Gemmill they
wouldn’t be playing in the European Cup
final. They were almost like sons to me, but I
couldn’t take a chance on Martin’s
hamstring or Archie’s ankle. Both had to be
faced and told the truth. The hurt
in their faces was obvious, but the
justification came when we won the
European Cup.”
DEALING WITH THE PRESS
“I had my run-ins over the years with
certain journalists, because there are s**ts
in every profession. The way to sidetrack
inquisitive journalists is to throw them a
different bone than the one they want to
chew on, and make them laugh with a
throwaway line. By the time they’ve finished
laughing, you’re gone!”BOOSTING AN OUT-OF-FORM
STRIKER IN NEED
“I’d tell him it only takes a second to score;
that he needs to be in the penalty area
twice as much as normal, looking for
scraps, hoping one will go in off his arse.
It’s like being lucky enough to have a
beautiful wife and watching her get
dressed in all her finery to go out to dinner.
You don’t say, ‘That boil on your face looks
terrible’. You tell her it’s gone down and
nobody can see it. With your striker
struggling for goals you tell him, ‘I fancy
you to get a few today, son’ and build up
his confidence.”PUTTING MEN IN THEIR PLACE
“I punched Mark Crossley in the stomach
after we lost 1-0 at Portsmouth in the FA
Cup. Not because his blunder led to the only
goal, but because he had spent a night in
police cells earlier that week, after some
daft incident in Barnsley that led to asmashed window. He knew the rules and I
thumped him – probably not hard enough. I
did the same to Roy Keane when he hadn’t
followed my instructions in a game. He did
what he was told after that.”GETTING INFO ON TARGETS
“I’d use my international players to find out
what the form was with a player I fancied.
Does he fag it or booze it? Does he get to
bed early and alone? Is he married, with
bairns? I’d say, ‘By heck, he can play. See if
he’s happy when you meet up next week’.
Stuart Pearce would sometimes say to me,
‘You won’t fancy him, gaffer – I whacked
him in training and he didn’t like it’. I
wanted to know as much as possible before
I committed my club’s money. For the rest
of my transfer dealings, I’d speak openly to
the press about a player that I liked. Peter
Taylor was brilliant at spotting players, then
I would move in for the kill.”THE IMPORTANCE OF FAMILY
“I used to encourage players to get
married young – a settled family life and
fatherhood can really help a player
improve in his career. Sometimes, I
would take them away for a few days.
Their wives weren’t very happy about
that, so I sent them flowers and
chocolates. I once fell out with Roy
McFarland at Derby. He barged into my
office, and I thought he was going to clock
me. Just in time, I opened my desk drawer
and pulled out a pair of airline tickets.
‘Take you and Linda off to Spain for a few
days,’ I said. ‘You deserve it after what
you’ve given me for years’. He was
speechless. That’s management.”11 BRIAn CLOUGH
“I THUMPED ROY KEAnE
WHEn HE DIDn’T FOLLOW
MY InSTRUCTIOnS. HE DID
AS HE WAS TOLD AFTER”
GREATEST
MAn AGERS100