Blue Moon: Down Among The Dead Men With Manchester City

by Mark Hodkinson

  When Francis Lee took office, his vindictiveness spilled forth immediately. The fallen members of City’s previous hierarchy were described variously as ‘reptiles’, ‘the enemy within’ and ‘little shits’. This street talk is anathema to Bernstein; he is a peacemaker, heavy on forgiveness and conciliation. ‘I like to be able to relate to people in a positive way. I think I have a certain pragmatism. I get things done and I am happy to delegate,’ he said.

  His subtle diplomacy and skill with words have been noted among the few Manchester journalists who have seen him at close quarters. ‘It’s obvious straight away that he is not on some kind of ego trip,’ said one. ‘It is probably in City’s favour that he is so low-profile. He is willing to answer questions, though I think he is a bit like Tony Blair. When you actually dissect his answers, I’m not sure that they say a great deal.’

  Many feel he is in situ precisely because he is an antidote to the recent past. Where there has been hyperbole and profligacy, he will bring realism and stability. ‘It was like wading through treacle,’ he volunteers when asked about the club’s infamously muddled financing. Some feel he is a bridge between the past and future, someone reflective and calm to hold court until he is superseded by someone drawn from the ruthlessly charismatic breed that drive football clubs to absolute glory. ‘He will bring an air of respectability to the place, and that’s been missing from Maine Road lately. Everyone says how nice he is, but bland people rarely make great football clubs. There is always a point where you have to stop being nice,’ said an insider.

  Aside from the administration of City, Bernstein holds directorship with several multi-national companies. His laid-back, thoughtful style of management may be misconstrued among the hurly-burly men of football. It probably masks a degree of implacability that would surprise the sceptics. Tea and biscuits are on the table, followed by a civil chat, but more than a few have been informed of their redundancy before the custard creams have left the plate.

  Supporters are invariably suspicious of the personnel entrusted to run their clubs, and Bernstein’s background has been appropriately scrutinised. The hard facts do not bode well. He was born in St Helens in 1943 but has lived most of his life in north London. He is not, then, either a Mancunian nor has he been a habitual attender at Maine Road. He developed a ‘romantic attachment’ to City in the 1950s and watched them play whenever they visited a London ground. Trips to Maine Road were an occasional ‘pilgrimage’.

  He is aware – as you might expect – that fans demand a chairman as smitten with the club as themselves, and more so. He must share the pain and elation. Every missed scoring opportunity must stab him in the heart, every victory send him dancing. He is popular with supporters, and is keen to develop fan forums which, for once, he promises will not be mere talking shops. For their part, supporters are pleased that he is not drawn from the club’s murky past and they kindly overlook his links with Merseyside and London; Francis Lee was considered one of their own, and many view his chairmanship as a spectacular failure.

  Bernstein sometimes over-emphasises his love of the club, perhaps apprehensive that his background will not ring true enough for the City faithful. At the end of our conversation he talks of City’s last brush with success, the FA Cup final of 1981. Many remember Glenn Hoddle’s equaliser for Tottenham Hotspur, deflected off the shoulder of City’s Tommy Hutchison, but few will remember a miss by Kevin Reeves in the dying minutes. Bernstein recalls the moment. ‘All he had to do was stick his leg out like this . . . ’ he says, and directs his right foot towards the coffee table. He is not a man who has stood shoulder-to-shoulder on the Kippax, sipping Bovril and shouting his love of the club, but he still flickers with his own kind of passion.

  He poses for our photograph sitting in the directors’ box in the main stand. Afterwards, he comes across the gate that is not a gate as he moves down the aisle. In just a few seconds he shows the kind of patience and perseverance that has been long overdue around these parts. They’ve had a bellyful of bravado.

  • The ideal football club chairman is an amalgam of many qualities, some of them contradictory. He must be sympathetic yet decisive, eloquent yet direct, diplomatic yet forthright, speculative yet prudent. He must also be inordinately wealthy, foolhardy and a believer in dreams. Inevitably, these men are extremely scarce. David Bernstein was the chairman City required during a crisis.

  Unlike many chairmen, he is not egocentric. He has no desire to be bigger than the club, indeed much of his actions appear genuinely altruistic. He does it for the love. In company he is reserved and discreet, but not without a kindly demeanour. He ponders over his words, almost with the solicitude of a lawyer. This understated but discerning approach has clearly served him well in business where he has become one of the UK’s largely unseen, yet potent corporate power-brokers. Conspicuously, he has both Dennis Tueart and Chris Bird at his side, men with the sixth-sense gleaned from living closer to street level.

  During the season, some observers suggested Bernstein was little more than a stooge for the parties vying for power in the background. Tueart, many claimed, was in the shadows, allowing Bernstein to finally bring some class and poise – of the traditionally patrician variety – to Manchester City, before the club’s stewardship reverted once more to the hustlers and self-made men that had served the club before with varying degrees of success. To bolster this theory, it would seem peculiar that Bernstein should take on such a fraught, demanding role on anything but a short-term basis. If it wasn’t for his ego, or financial gain, why should he do it, especially when it necessitated many days away from his family in north London?

  His laboured manifesto throughout was of stability and consolidation. On a purely business level, he undoubtedly brought some much needed pragmatism to the club’s financial affairs. Most of it was common sense, but he also had an innate understanding of the financing of businesses. In laymen’s terms, he was an accountant par excellence.

  The plea for stability was a reaction to the erratic nature of the club’s recent history. Supporters, and the club’s staff, were convinced that City’s failings were due entirely to its policy of continually changing personnel, both at boardroom and dressing-room level. Stability, in itself, however, was not necessarily a prerequisite of success. It was certainly beneficial to the sense of well-being within a club, but it was meaningless if it became dogma and people remained when the club was clearly ailing. Stability was only relevant when all the key people had been put in place, otherwise it was stability for its own sake which was worthless.

  David Bernstein’s allegiance to Royle was, on a superficial level, commendable – he granted him a new contract just days after relegation to Division Two. While this was widely held to be a statement of honour and faithfulness, others saw it as an example of the benign nature of the club’s hierarchy, supportive whatever the circumstances. Royle had been appointed with enough time to avoid relegation during the previous season but had failed to motivate the team sufficiently. Their early form at the new lower level was also patchy and unconvincing. Whether he and Donachie, and the players they chose or discarded, were appropriate was a matter of opinion. In the prevailing climate of a search for permanence, counter-opinion was discouraged and stifled; in fact, it was seen as disloyalty. Royle and his boot-room team were granted a rare immunity from meddling and criticism. It was all down to trust.

  Bernstein was extremely popular with supporters. They liked his self-effacing personality and the fact that he arrived at the club without any ‘history’. He was often waylaid by City fans on train journeys to and from London. He regularly sat among them, sharing opinions, outlining his plans. He was not the man-of-the-people to which Francis Lee aspired, but he was approachable, friendly, a gentleman.

  As is so often afforded to men of finance and business, little was known of his background. To ask him is to invoke a convoluted list of directorships where one company is a subsidiary of another, where the trading name is not the rec
ognised name, where one company amalgamates with another and, before the end, the biographical thread is lost amid the complexities. He was, therefore, taken pretty much on face value; football supporters have little choice but to accept the caricature presented to them. In this respect, Bernstein was judicious, well educated, well groomed, good with money (‘A jew and an accountant: could City have a better man looking out for them?’ – Stuart Hall), and the antithesis to Francis Lee. What more did they need to know?

  Saturday, 10 October 1998

  Kevin Horlock played for Northern Ireland as they beat Finland 1–0 in a Euro 2000 Championship qualifier.

  Monday, 12 October 1998

  Manchester City 0 Preston North End 1

  Former chairman Francis Lee returned to Maine Road for the first time since relinquishing overall control of the club. Lee, still a major shareholder, witnessed a woeful performance by City. A second-half penalty from Gary Parkinson saw them slump to their first home defeat of the season.

  The team left the field to boos. ‘We have no arguments because we were crap. We didn’t deserve anything and we didn’t get anything,’ said Kevin Horlock. City had collected just four points from their last five matches.

  Michael Brown, the 1997–98 player of the season, made his first full appearance of the season after falling out of favour with Joe Royle. He was subsequently left out of the side again, and did not return until nearly two months later, during which time there was much speculation about his future at Maine Road.

  Tuesday, 13 October 1998

  Cheeky City fans wrote to the Queen complaining that she should not have signed a Manchester United football on her visit to Malaysia. They were surprised to receive a reply stating: ‘Her Majesty is well aware that there is more than one football club in Manchester.’ City ’til I Cry! claimed to have seen the message scrawled on the ball by the Queen. They reprinted it in issue five: ‘Why doesn’t one naff orrfff and support one’s local team? City ’till one dies – Elizabeth R.’

  Friday, 16 October 1998

  The club’s AGM was held in Manchester’s Bridgewater Hall. Back after his hip operation, Royle heard the views of fans distressed to see the club struggling in ninth place. ‘I also hate this division,’ he said. ‘It drives me mad. We’ve got to get out of it this season.’

  David Bernstein received an unsolicited vote of confidence from the shareholders. Several remained unconvinced, one insisting that the team were ‘garbage’, and another claiming that only Merlin the magician could bring promotion to Maine Road.

  DEFINING THE EXTENT OF DISASTER

  (The Times, Saturday, 17 October 1998)

  Eventually, frustration gets the better of him. He speaks quickly, very quickly, without a pause for breath. ‘I’m sick of my dad and his mates going on about Colin Bell and Francis Lee and all that lot. It all happened years ago. I’m 24 and all my life I’ve been fed . . .’ He tails off suddenly, his voice shrill: ‘Shit, 20 years of shit.’ He is almost screaming now.

  The panel – each of them connected in some way to Manchester City – is momentarily apoplectic. Chris Bird, City’s combative PR man, is the first to counter: ‘Look, we’re all frustrated, but shouting and swearing will get us nowhere.’ The disgruntled fan shuffles in his chair, and tries to speak again but his voice has gone, evaporated. He has given his all.

  After this impassioned interruption, the supporters’ club meeting returns to form as the fans have their say: grumble; nostalgia; a joke at Alan Ball’s expense; the 5–1 win against Manchester United in 1989; another grumble; another Alan Ball joke; thank you and goodnight. May all your nightmares be blue, laser blue.

  The season is more than a quarter of the way through and clubs can no longer claim that the league table is merely a directory of participants. Each team in Division Two has played 11 or 12 games. This is more than enough football to deduce which teams are playing well, and which teams are not. City, in ninth place, are not playing well.

  They lost at home in midweek against Preston North End and the verdict on their current form ranges from execrable to abysmal. Richard Burgess, the sports reporter who covers City for the Manchester Evening News, used the words ‘trash’, ‘abject’ and ‘ghastly’ in his match report, and this from a man who must maintain a certain level of diplomacy since he has to knock on the door at Maine Road every day of his working life.

  Now, damn it, City were supposed to storm through this division. It was proclaimed as a glorified bonding session. They would put their arms around one another, flatten all oncomers. In the league, they have inflicted just one heavy defeat, a 3–0 win against Blackpool on the opening day of the season. The scoreline was delusive; in the flesh it was a nervy affair, more a St Vitus’s dance than a glorious hokey-cokey.

  On the other three occasions when they have won, fans have muttered the old cliché that their team has not fired on all cylinders or is stuck in second gear. They are deceiving themselves. City are a rusty Fiat Panda left standing for two weeks in the January frost. There’s an engine in there somewhere, but it sounds like death. Second gear would be an achievement.

  It is widely accepted that there are two ways of escaping the lower reaches of English football. The first is via a slick, passing game, a metaphorical laugh in the face of the broad-shouldered athletes snapping at your ankles. The other is to embrace the mêlée of elbows, knees and shin pads and slug it out defiantly. City are doing neither.

  Willie Donachie made matters significantly worse by comments he made prior to the match against Preston North End. Football people should trust the vocabulary of physical expression, deed above dialogue, especially in crisis. Writing in the match programme, he proffered: ‘I feel there is too much negative criticism of the team. Maybe it stems from years of failure. We have the most loyal fans in the country and their support is unwavering. But there are too many critics who want to emphasise the black side of everything here.’

  He felt that four successive draws should have been viewed positively since they formed part of a nine-match unbeaten league run. He complained that some saw it as a ‘disaster’. City fans, to their eternal credit, have the wisdom to look beyond mere results. They care little for statistics, and know they can be dressed up. They trust, above all else, their eyes and hearts and they see and sense a City team out of sorts, providing football on the edge of a nervous breakdown. Three consecutive home draws, against – wait for this – Bournemouth, Chesterfield and Burnley, followed by a defeat against Preston, is not in itself a ‘disaster’ but their frenetic, aimless football is.

  The worry among supporters is that their club is set to become a Burnley or, indeed, a Preston; a footballing giant that is not so much sleeping but distinctly comatose. They can currently count on support that is four times greater in numerical terms than their two Lancashire rivals. A few seasons among the grafters and grapplers of the lower two divisions will, surely, cause this support to wane.

  Joe Royle has spent the last two weeks in hospital after a hip-replacement operation. By all accounts, he has been in jovial mood and is enjoying the rare privilege of a life without constant, nagging pain. Within the game, Royle is renowned for his generosity of spirit. He has the necessary ruthlessness, but he is fundamentally a relaxed, blithe character. It will take time for this to permeate the team. There will be more scrappy draws and ignominious home defeats, but Royle’s record suggests there will also be flamboyant 4–2 away wins, and players confident enough to hold the ball and skip past desperate tackles.

  In the meantime, like his assistant, Donachie, he will talk the good talk in defence of his team. He knows, though, that they are floundering, that there is no joy in their play. A life of constant nagging pain is no life at all.

  Saturday, 17 October 1998

  Wigan Athletic 0 Manchester City 1

  Torrential rain almost led to a postponement but referee David Pugh decided the pitch was playable. Shaun Goater’s tenth goal of the season, a volley, gave City their f
irst win in six games. Wigan hit the woodwork three times and afterwards complained that City had been lucky.

  ‘It wasn’t pretty, but there were lots of good things for us. It wasn’t our greatest performance, but I think that’s only the second game of the season we haven’t totally dominated and we’ve got three points out of it. So maybe it’s a good omen,’ said Joe Royle.

  Again, tickets for the game had been much in demand. Many City supporters had queued overnight in heavy rain for them. During the game, they were housed on uncovered terrace and cheered themselves with renditions of ‘Singing in the Rain’ and ‘All we are saying is give us a roof’.

  Tuesday, 20 October 1998

  Lincoln City 2 Manchester City 1

  City’s defence twice fell victim to goals from set-pieces. Tony Battersby scored after four minutes following a long throw-in and Kevin Austen added another from a corner. An own goal by Steve Holmes eight minutes from time brought City a scrap of consolation.

  The City backroom staff were upset by the reluctance of the Lincoln bench to shake hands after the match.

  Friday, 23 October 1998

  Nigel Clough was named player-manager of Dr Marten’s Premier League side Burton Albion. At a press conference he chose not to dwell on his experience at Maine Road, commenting briefly: ‘My time there coincided with an unhappy time in the club’s history.’

  BUILDING UP HOPE FOR THE ROYLE ASCENT

  (The Times, Saturday, 24 October 1998)

  The two giant projections quivered in the curtains and added a touch of eeriness to the mood of solemnity. It was raining heavily outside, the sky lost in a grey wash, and they walked from sodden streets like extras in a Fritz Lang movie.

  Beneath the ghostly holograms, Manchester City’s board of directors sat in silence while people settled into their seats, shaking the rain from their anoraks, nodding to acquaintances dotted around the hall. It felt like the last supper without any food, the last rites without a priest.