We Are the Damned United

by Phil Rostron

  In the wake of the incident, some commentators went so far as to suggest that both clubs should be demoted from the First Division. The article by Geoffrey Green that appeared in The Times condemning the display of violence was representative of the general view:

  That [the brawl], in itself, would have been enough to disgust. But both men compounded the felony as they began the long walk to the dressing-rooms by shamelessly stripping off the shirts they should have been proud to wear, Bremner, indeed, throwing his petulantly to the ground, where it lay crumpled like a shot seagull until cleared away by a linesman. It was a disgusting scene, the volcanic climax of three earlier affrays which had seen Smith and Giles booked.

  Sadly, Keegan could have been the man of the match. Leeds patently realised this by half-time and seemed intent on eliminating him by fair means or foul. They chose the unfair method, finally goading the little Liverpool man into hot-headed retaliation with all the dire consequences for those who consider themselves above the law.

  Never before had Wembley witnessed such a disgrace as two British players for the first time were dismissed from the stadium. It made child’s play of the Rattin affair in the World Cup of 1966.

  Argentine central midfielder Antonio Rattín was dismissed against England in the quarter-final at Wembley for repeatedly protesting to German referee Rudolf Kreitlein over decisions given for his teammates’ misdemeanours. England manager Sir Alf Ramsey famously labelled the Argentinians ‘animals’ and Rattín’s sending-off was the incident that sparked the introduction of yellow and red cards.

  Green concluded:

  If clubs are held responsible for the behaviour of their supporters, so should they be for their players. The final responsibility and remedy rest with all directors and managers and they also should share the penalty. The harder they are hit where it hurts most, the better – either through their pockets, with heavy fines, or by deducting points from a club’s league total. That might make everybody think twice.

  One way or another, a solution has to be found if the game is to survive as a respectable spectacle. The final sanction may be for all reasonable people simply to stay away and let ritual violence destroy itself.

  The fallout from this debacle was immense. Bremner and Keegan were each fined £500, with Bremner being suspended for eight games and Keegan for three. It would be October before Bremner played again. The FA must have been disappointed that their new Wembley showcase had been ruined, and the chairman of their disciplinary committee, Vernon Stokes, confirmed that the harshness of the punishments had been influenced by the fact that the match had been televised.

  It was certainly a baptism of fire for Clough, who was to comment in Clough: The Autobiography:

  Billy Bremner’s behaviour was scandalous, producing one of the most notorious incidents in Wembley history. It was as if the players were offering grounds for all my criticism that they had resented so much.

  Bremner seemed intent on making Kevin Keegan’s afternoon an absolute misery. He kicked him just about everywhere – up the arse, in the balls – until it became only a matter of time before a confrontation exploded. There is only so much any man can take. Eventually, inevitably, Keegan snapped – and they were both sent off, Keegan whipping off his shirt and flinging it to the ground as he went. It was a stupid gesture, but I could understand the man’s anger and frustration. It was the action of a player who felt he had been wronged, not only by an opponent but by a referee who had failed to stamp out intimidation before it reached the stage of retaliation. Keegan will have regretted his touchline tantrum immediately. A Liverpool shirt was not something to be thrown away.

  Keegan was a victim, not a culprit, that day at Wembley. The double dismissal was all down to Bremner. Keegan was an innocent party who had been pushed beyond the limit by an opponent who appeared determined to eliminate him from the match, one way or another. I told Bremner afterwards that he had been responsible for the confrontation. He should have been made to pay compensation for the lengthy period Keegan was suspended.

  Long-serving Reds defender Tommy Smith, talking to the Sunday Times in 2008, remembered feeling that the match had the potential to be explosive:

  We had players who could look after themselves, and so did Leeds. We went at each other hammer and tongs. Nobody was going to shy away, and there was no complaining or whining on the field that day. As for the sendings-off, Leeds had been getting at Kevin all day, Johnny Giles in particular. It was at a corner, and Giles came up behind Keegan and whacked him. Kevin whirled round but Giles had disappeared and Billy was the nearest Leeds player so Kevin went for him. OK, so Billy ended up throwing punches too, but it should have been Giles who got Kevin’s attention.

  Despite the dismissals, there were only two other bookings: me, for a foul on Allan Clarke, and Giles. The disciplinary committee tried to throw the book at us too, accusing us of starting the ill-feeling. But Matt Busby [the former Manchester United manager] was on the panel and he soon put a stop to that and we both got off without even a fine.

  As a rule, Giles made no apology for his or United’s combative approach to football, which he claimed was both legitimate and necessary. Looking back on his career in an interview with the Irish Evening Herald, he said:

  It’s a physical battle. You have to go through the battle. It was my living, not my sport and if I didn’t respond in the way I should respond, I was going to be out of this game, so I became as big an assassin as there was and as dangerous in my own way. You keep your head, you do it coldly, you do it clinically, but you let everybody know in the game that there are no liberties taken here. I was given the choice of becoming a lion or a lamb and I was determined not to become a lamb.

  Liverpool’s Glaswegian midfielder Brian Hall was in no doubt beforehand that the match would be bruising. Also talking to the Sunday Times, he recalled:

  Manchester United were in decline at that time, so our big games then were against Leeds and Everton. There was always something about playing Leeds. They were tough matches and I had to learn fast. I remember lining up in the tunnel to face Leeds for the first time when Tommy Smith nudged me and said, ‘Hey, Brian, that fucking degree won’t do you any good against this lot.’ He was right, too. My background was different from most of my teammates. Like Steve Heighway, I’d come to Liverpool late, having played amateur football after leaving university. The difference was that I was more of a passer while Steve liked to run with the ball at his feet. Before that first game, Shanks told me that Big Jack [Charlton] and Norman Hunter in the Leeds defence were not quick and that I should run at them when I got the chance. Well, Norman kicked me all over the pitch. I was counting my bruises in the bar afterwards when this big arm wrapped around my neck and Norman leaned over and said, ‘Sorry about that, Brian, I thought you were Steve Heighway.’

  Of the notorious match, Peter Lorimer says: ‘The Charity Shield was always a huge occasion and no matter how antagonistic our feelings towards Clough were, there was no way we were going to underperform. Firstly, this was at football’s Mecca, with the eyes of the world upon us, and secondly we were up against opponents who were our arch-rivals and enemies of the time. It was a big day for Mr Clough, too, having come up from the relative obscurity of Brighton. This did not need stoking up as a contest. For a decade, we had traded blows with Liverpool as the best two teams in the land and pride was very much at stake. This was the game, of course, in which Billy Bremner and Kevin Keegan wound each other up so much that they both ended up rolling round the pitch a few times like fighting dogs, for which they both got their marching orders.

  ‘There had been no specific pre-match instructions from the new manager, who was content to tell us that we’d all been in this kind of situation before and therefore knew what we were doing. In a way, that was a refreshing change for me personally, because I had come to loathe Don Revie’s dossiers on the opposition. Such was the detail in his analysis of players we were up against that he could make Hartlepo
ol United sound like Real Madrid. It was all very tedious and you could be forgiven for wondering why, for example, Hartlepool, as our cup opponents, were two or three divisions below us, and we were the champions of England, when, according to Don’s dossier, they were such fabulous players.

  ‘By and large you wouldn’t be nervous when you sat down to listen to him, but by the time he’d finished you’d be on the verge of collapse with fear. He’d make the full-back marking me sound like the world’s best defender, but five minutes into the game you’d discover he was the tosser you always thought he was before Don planted his seeds of doubt. He’d be saying, “He’s got a great left foot, he really gets stuck in, he’s up and down the line for 90 minutes,” and so on, and in the third minute you’ve nutmegged him, he’s fallen over and you’ve got an unmissable chance from three yards. Pretty soon, Don’s dossier was going in one ear and out of the other, but that suited me anyway. That’s how I was about football – laid-back and very relaxed. Really, it was just Don’s way. He felt you had to know everything and that if you didn’t he hadn’t done his job.

  ‘Cloughie, on the other hand, was very basic. “Get out there” was about the sum total of it, and to be honest that suited me. My idea of playing football was just getting out there and playing football. I know what I’m doing, I know what I’m good at, I know why I’m in the team, I know what’s expected of me. So let’s get on with it.’

  With a fractious Charity Shield defeat behind Clough and Leeds, that was exactly what they were going to have to do. The English league season was about to begin.

  7

  RAIN ON OUR PARADE

  What I tell my players about defending a lead is this: ‘If you have the ball and you are in their half, they cannot score.’

  Brian Clough

  Some venues are considered bogey grounds by clubs who struggle to achieve victory on their travels to certain stadia, and for Leeds United, Stoke City’s old Victoria Ground came very much into that category. If Brian Clough had not already had a difficult enough start at Leeds, then the fixture list would ensure that life was not going to get any easier. The opening-day fixtures of the 1974–75 season put Leeds on the road to the Potteries. Peter Lorimer recalls: ‘There was some consternation in the camp, given our introductory meeting, about what the match-day build-up would be like and the tone and contents of the manager’s pre-match team talk. As usual with Clough, it was amazing. We were staying at a hotel not far from the ground and a couple of hours before kick-off he said, “Come on, we’re going for a walk.”

  ‘Bizarrely, he took us to the central reservation of a dual carriageway, and as we followed, looking at each other and shrugging our shoulders, he ordered us to sit down. We did as we were told, and right there and then he embarked upon his team talk. He wasn’t far into it – I think he got as far as “Things are going to be different . . .” – when the heavens opened and within seconds, dressed only in casual shirts and trousers, we were drenched. We thought we’d better find shelter indoors fast, so we all got to our feet with the intention of heading back to the hotel. “Oi, you lot,” he bellowed. “Where do you think you’re going? Sit back down. You’ll get back up when I tell you to get back up.” That was him again, wanting to belittle us – you’ll sit in the rain and listen to me. Well, of course, the reaction was a derisory guffaw and “You can please yourself. We’re not sitting here in the pissing rain.”

  ‘So off we went to the match venue. We lost 3–0 and I think that was no surprise to anybody in the Leeds camp. At half-time, he had a rant about this and a rave about that, but nobody was listening. We just thought of this individual who held us to be thieves and thugs, “You can go and fuck yourself.” None of us needed to be boastful. You could ask many of the big-name players who played against us at the time – the great Arsenal centre-half Frank McLintock springs readily to mind as one of them – and they would be of the opinion that Leeds were unquestionably the best team in England and just possibly one of the best teams that the country ever produced. And Clough was treating us with disdain and contempt. It was unacceptable.’

  * * *

  SATURDAY, 17 AUGUST 1974

  STOKE CITY 3, LEEDS UNITED 0

  ‘We played enough football to have won three matches. In the first half we could have been three up. I am sorry for the lads, they wanted to win this one very much.’

  That is the new manager Brian Clough’s verdict on Leeds United’s shock 3–0 defeat by a lively and skilful Stoke City side at the Victoria Ground.

  At first glance this defeat does nothing for the morale of United players or their supporters, but there was something in what Clough said. Analysed more closely, defeat does not seem depressing.

  United will play far worse and win and will create fewer openings in a match and score goals.

  At Stoke, United’s main problem was their inability to make the chances they created in front of goal count. There were several times when they could have scored had the finishing been a little sharper or more accurate.

  I could not help wondering if the story might have had a happier ending had Clough been able to call upon suspended striker Allan Clarke, or the injured Mick Jones and had not new signing Duncan McKenzie been at a disadvantage through his comparative lack of pre-season preparation.

  Clough’s dilemma up front forced him into thrusting McKenzie into the demanding arena of First Division football with little or no pre-season training behind him.

  Because he had been in dispute with his previous club, Nottingham Forest, McKenzie trained with amateur teams in the Derby area and with the best will in the world this, as Clough says, is no substitute for the preparation he would have received had he been at Elland Road for the full pre-season build-up.

  United’s best chance fell to McKenzie at a crucial period. They were trailing by only a goal – a 50th minute 30-yarder from Welsh international John Mahoney – when Peter Lorimer, United’s most industrious player, found him with a low right-wing pass, standing some two or three yards from goal.

  Somehow the ball stuck between McKenzie’s feet and when he recovered his poise he shot weakly into the grounded Stoke goalkeeper John Farmer.

  Had that gone in Stoke might not have been basking today in the glory of such a resounding triumph at the expense of the league champions.

  Paul Madeley had two close-range efforts – a header and a shot – blocked by Farmer, the second more by good luck than good management, Lorimer shot narrowly wide and so did Johnny Giles, who also brought a fine save from Farmer with a well-taken free kick.

  Jimmy Greenhoff got the goal that sickened his former teammates four minutes from the end, his 18 yards shot deflecting off Trevor Cherry and wrong-footing David Harvey.

  When John Ritchie fired in the third with two minutes left it hardly mattered, United were already beaten.

  Though it might have been different had United taken their chances and had that bit of luck when it mattered, there was no doubting Stoke’s right, in the end, to victory.

  They won because Alan Hudson, one-time Chelsea rebel who has settled down surprisingly well in the austere surroundings of the Potteries, gave them the edge in midfield, with a display that would have earned him the man-of the-match award had there been one.

  Stoke are no longer the pushovers they once were. They are an entertaining team – strong in defence, imaginative in midfield and powerful up front.

  It would come as no surprise to me if Stoke chairman Albert Henshall’s belief that this season could be his club’s greatest came true.

  A 3–0 victory over the league champions, which has made Stoke 12/1 to win the championship compared to 28/1 before the game, is good enough for starters . . .

  Stoke City: Farmer, Marsh, Pejic, Dodd, Smith, Mahoney, Haslegrave, Greenhoff, Ritchie, Hudson, Salmons.

  Leeds United: Harvey, Reaney, Cooper, Bremner, McQueen, Cherry, Lorimer, Madeley, Jordan, Giles, McKenzie.

  Referee: Mr Ken Burns.

  D
on Warters, Yorkshire Evening Post

  * * *

  Eddie Gray was beginning to fear the worst. ‘It just wasn’t working,’ he says. ‘Clough was no inspiration with his team talks, and his treatment of the players was shoddy. He showed nothing. There was no mutual respect, and in the end the players treated him with disdain. I felt sorry for little Jimmy Gordon. I don’t know whether Clough planned these things or not, but when it came to training Jimmy would be jogging us round and round, and Cloughie would be messing about shooting at one of the goals, completely ignoring us, as much as to say, “I’ll show you. I’ll come out when I’m good and ready, not when you think I should be ready.”

  ‘I think Brian without his right-hand man Peter Taylor – and I don’t know the ins and outs of what happened to effect a split in their professional relationship – wasn’t the same Brian Clough who had done such extraordinary things with Derby. They had known and trusted each other for so long, and had their partnership survived and Peter accompanied him to Elland Road rather than going solo at Brighton, where together they had had a bit of a nightmare, things might have been different. Peter would maybe have been able to calm him down and say to him, “Now come on. They’ve got some good players here. Let’s just slowly do what we want.” But Peter decided against accompanying Clough to Leeds. Maybe he thought, “I know what Cloughie’s like. He doesn’t like Revie. He doesn’t like Leeds. It has all the ingredients of one big mess.” He would have been right.’

  * * *

  WEDNESDAY, 21 AUGUST 1974

  LEEDS UNITED 0, QPR 1

  ‘Don’t jump to gloomy conclusions.’ These were the words of comfort offered to Leeds United supporters by Queens Park Rangers’ manager Gordon Jago.