The Damned Utd

Day Forty-three

I wake up in that modern luxury hotel bed in that modern luxury hotel room and the first bloody thing I hear is the sound of my own fucking voice:

‘It is ridiculous to suggest that I would deliberately go out of my way to destroy a team … I am no destroyer … No man in the country wants Leeds United to continue to be successful more than I do … It was the kind of thing I believe they call a “clear the air” meeting. I had a few words, the chairman spoke and then the lads had their say … The chairman asked if I had any objection to him having a word and obviously I am in favour of anything that might help to restore confidence … It was agreed the best thing for the club would be for everyone to give their utmost so that we could win a couple of matches. That is what we need most of all. That is how we can regain confidence and then there will be no need for meetings like these …’

I switch off that modern luxury radio and then I smash that modern luxury hotel room into a million fucking pieces and check out, a message waiting for me at reception.

* * *

You’ve been in this wilderness too long; this drunken, lonely seven-day week where the only sound is the sound of your own name repeated endlessly: Cloughie, Cloughie, Cloughie …

Now it’s someone else’s turn. Now it’s Ramsey’s turn.

In February 1974 the FA set up a sub-committee to ‘consider our future policy in respect to the promotion of international football’ under the leadership of Sir Harold Thompson, Bert Millichip, Brian Mears, Dr Andrew Stephen and Len Shipman –

On 3 April 1974 England draw 0–0 with Portugal in Lisbon –

‘I’ve had a very long journey and I’m tired,’ says Alf. ‘No autopsies.’

On 18 April 1974 Ramsey announces his summer squad for the upcoming Home Internationals and the tour of eastern Europe –

‘If you ask a stupid question,’ he says, ‘you’ll get a stupid answer.’

On 19 April 1974 Ramsey is summoned to Lancaster Gate to hear the Thompson Committee make its report, to hear ‘a unanimous recommendation that Sir Alf Ramsey should be replaced as England team manager’.

Ramsey is given £8,000 and a meagre pension. Ramsey goes on holiday –

‘I still believe in England,’ he says. ‘And Englishmen and English football.’

On 1 May 1974 the FA make an official statement terminating Ramsey’s position as manager of the England football team and, pending the appointment of a successor, appoint Joe Mercer as temporary caretaker of the national side –

Down beside the seaside, you wait for the phone to ring, for the call to come –

But the phone never rings, the call never comes and another season ends.

Brighton have played thirty-two games under us. Brighton have won twelve, drawn eight and lost twelve for us. Brighton have scored thirty-nine goals and conceded forty-two for us. That got Brighton thirty-two of their forty-three points. That left Brighton and us nineteenth in the Third Division –

It is your lowest ever league finish as a manager, lower even than your first season at Hartlepools United, lower than your first season at Derby County –

Derby County and Mackay have finished third in Division One –

Revie and Leeds are the Champions of Division One –

You are still in this wilderness, this drunken, dark and lonely place where the only sound is the sound of your own name repeated endlessly: Cloughie, Cloughie, Cloughie.

* * *

In the centre of Leeds. In a multi-storey car park. His headlights flash twice. He is in his sunglasses. In his hat. His collar up –

‘They say you’re going,’ whispers Sniffer.

‘Who says?’

‘The players, the papers,’ says Sniffer. ‘The whole of Leeds.’

‘It’s what they all bloody want, isn’t it?’

‘Not everyone.’

‘You could have fucking fooled me.’

‘That meeting yesterday,’ says Sniffer. ‘That was wrong.’

‘You tell them that, did you?’

‘I was too bloody angry to speak,’ says Sniffer. ‘Them folk with their knives out, folk revelling in it. I might have said something I regretted. But it’s left a nasty taste in my mouth. I can’t get it out of my mind. It was wrong.’

‘Thank you.’

‘Not just me feels that way,’ says Sniffer. ‘Joe Jordan and Gordon McQueen. Terry Yorath and Frankie Gray. McGovern, O’Hare and Duncan McKenzie, of course. But Paul Reaney too. Trevor Cherry and all. None of them said a bad word about you.’

‘None of them said a good word though, did they?’

‘How could they?’ asks Sniffer. ‘They’re young or new or …’

‘Don’t worry about it,’ I tell him.

‘But I do,’ he says. ‘And I just wanted to let you know that you have my full support and I’m sure you have the full support of them other lads too.’

‘Thank you,’ I tell him again. ‘But it’s too late. I’m off to see Cussins today.’

‘Well then,’ says Sniffer, ‘I want to come with you.’

‘In disguise?’ I ask him. ‘You sure about that?’

Sniffer takes off his sunglasses and his hat and says, ‘I’m sure, Boss.’

* * *

On 4 July 1974 Don Revie is appointed as the new manager of England –

‘I made the first move, not them,’ says Don Revie. ‘I made the call, not them. Because I fancied being the manager of England …’

There was a shortlist and there were interviews; Ron Greenwood (West Ham), Jimmy Adamson (Burnley), Jimmy Bloomfield (Leicester City), Gordon Jago (QPR), Bobby Robson (Ipswich) and Don Revie of Leeds –

You were not on the shortlist and not at the interviews, not even on the long list.

‘You should have called them,’ says your wife.

‘I’ll not beg,’ you tell her.

‘That’s what Revie did,’ she says.

‘I’ll not bloody beg,’ you tell her again. ‘I’ll never fucking beg.’

‘I shall be very sorry to be leaving Leeds,’ says Revie. ‘And the first result I will look for every Saturday will be Leeds United’s. But, when you are ambitious, you want to get to the top, and the England team manager’s job must be the ultimate ambition of every top-class manager … every manager’s dream.’

‘Sod it,’ you tell your wife. ‘Let’s go on holiday.’

* * *

I turn off Elland Road. Sharp right and through the gates. Into the ground. The West Stand car park. Past the big black dog. The writing on the wall. The space reserved for the manager of Leeds United. The press waiting. The cameras and the lights. The fans. The autograph books and the pens. I turn off the engine. I open the door. I do up the cuffs of my shirt. I get my jacket out of the back. I put it on. I lock the car –

The hills behind me. The churches and the graveyards …

I look at the press. The cameras and the lights. The fans. Their autograph books and their pens. The rain in our hair. In all our faces –

‘Fuck off, Cloughie!’ they shout out. ‘You’re not good enough for us!’

Up their steps. Through their doors. Into their foyer. Their silence –

No one says, ‘Good morning, Mr Clough.’ No one says, ‘Hello, Boss’ …

Round their corners and down their corridors, past the photographs on their walls and the trophies in their cabinets, the ghosts of Elland Road, Syd Owen and Maurice Lindley turning on their heels –

‘The peacocks screaming and screaming and screaming …’

‘Morning, Sydney,’ I shout. ‘Morning, Maurice.’

Down their corridor. Past more photographs. Past more trophies. More ghosts. More feet and more voices. Down their corridor to the office. Jimmy outside the door. Jimmy waiting. Jimmy smiling. Jimmy saying, ‘£3,500.’

‘You talk to the wife?’ I ask him. ‘You tell her what’s happening?’

‘She knows.’

I open the door. I sit him down. I pour us both a drink. I ask him, ‘And?’

‘And she thinks it’s for the best.’

‘Even if you can’t get another job? Even if you end up on the dole?’

‘I’ll do anything,’ says Jimmy. ‘As long as I don’t end up back down a mine.’

‘It couldn’t be worse than this,’ I tell him. ‘It couldn’t be.’

‘Well, it’s never lonely,’ laughs Jimmy. ‘I’ll say that for the pit.’

We smile. We raise our glasses. We touch them –

‘Down in one,’ I tell him. ‘Then let’s go find that bloody axe again.’

* * *

You are face down on a beach in Spain: Majorca, Cala Millor –

A man in a suit is walking along the beach. A man with his trouser legs rolled up. His socks and his shoes in his hands.

This man in a suit stands over you. This man you’ve never met before. His shadow cold. He takes out his handkerchief. He wipes his brow. His neck –

‘You’re a hard man to find, Mr Clough,’ he says.

You don’t turn over. You just lie there. Face down and ask, ‘Why me?’

‘They saw what went on when you left Derby,’ he says. ‘They want the kind of manager whose players are prepared to go on strike for him. Walk on water, run through fire. They want the kind of manager who can command that degree of loyalty.’

Now you turn over. Now you tell him, ‘There’s no answer to that.’

‘So now what?’ he asks. ‘Job’s yours if you want it …’

You blink into the sun. Sand in your mouth, sand …

‘On a plate,’ he says. ‘So do you want it?’

* * *

In their Yorkshire boardroom, behind their Yorkshire curtains. No Samuel Bolton today. No Percy Woodward. No Roberts. No Simon. Just Manny Cussins, Sniffer and me –

‘You have to give him more time,’ Sniffer begs Cussins.

‘There isn’t any more time,’ says Cussins.

‘That’s ridiculous,’ says Sniffer. ‘Bloke’s only been here five minutes.’

‘The players don’t want him.’

‘That’s rubbish,’ says Sniffer.

‘There was more than just him speaking yesterday.’

‘That was all wrong,’ says Sniffer. ‘To go behind the manager’s back like that.’

‘It was the only way to find out how they felt,’ says Cussins.

‘But players have always got axes to grind; be the same at any club in the land. And the minute the directors do that, the manager’s got no chance. No chance.’

‘You should have been a lawyer, not a footballer,’ smiles Cussins.

‘I’d like to be a manager one day,’ says Sniffer. ‘But I tell you this, if a board of directors ever treated me the way you lot have treated Mr Clough, I’d tell you where to stick your bloody job.’

‘I understand what you’re saying,’ says Manny Cussins. ‘I even agree with it. But the board have made a decision and Leeds United is a democratic institution —’

‘What?’ asks Sniffer. ‘You’ve employed the best man in the business and before he’s even had five minutes you’re bloody sacking him?’

‘There’s nothing more I can do,’ says Cussins.

‘Back him and let him get on with the job.’

‘It’s too late,’ says Cussins. ‘It’s too late.’

Sniffer looks over at me. Sniffer raises his palms –

I smile and I wink. I shake his hand and I thank him. He asks me if I fancy a farewell drink. Not tonight, I tell him. Not tonight …

Tonight I walk out of that Yorkshire boardroom and down that long, long corridor. There is a clock ticking somewhere, laughter from another room, behind another door –

I open that door on a meeting of the Norman Hunter Testimonial Fund. I look around that room, at the men in that room, and I point at Norman Hunter. ‘You lot who are looking after this lad,’ I tell them, ‘you work as hard as you bloody can to earn as much money as you can for him, because there is no one in this fucking club who deserves it more than he does.’

* * *

You put down the phone. You walk back out onto the balcony –

White concrete and sand, blue sky and the sea –

Your boys with a ball on the beach below.

You come up behind your wife. Your beautiful, beautiful wife. You put your hands on her shoulders. She tilts the ice in her glass. She has caught the sun –

‘You’ve never?’ she says.

‘I have.’

‘What will Peter think?’

‘He’ll think what I tell him.’

She shakes her head. She says, ‘Why, Brian? After all the things you’ve said.’

‘Because of all the things I’ve said.’

‘But you hate them. You hate him,’ she says. ‘And they hate you.’

‘All water under the bridge now.’

‘But it’s such a hateful place,’ she says. ‘Such a spiteful place.’

‘Back in the First Division? The European Cup?’

‘Silly bugger,’ she smiles. ‘You’ll regret it.’

‘I might,’ you tell her. ‘But I know I would if I turned them down.’

‘Can’t win then, can you?’

‘I hope I can,’ you tell her. ‘I bloody hope I can.’

* * *

Tonight I go straight back home. Tonight I make my plans. Tonight I make my calls. To my mate at the Inland Revenue. To my accountant. To my solicitor. I make my calls and I make my plans –

For tomorrow’s Big Match.

Then I get a taxi into Derby. To the Midland Hotel. To meet John Shaw and Bill Holmes and the rest of the Derby County Protest Movement. These people still want me back. These people who have not watched Derby County play in the year since I resigned. These people still want me back. These people who have not watched Derby play since the day I left –

These people still want me.