Inspired to Give up Football

Hello there. I'm away on holiday this weekend, so will be missing today's big fixture against the Champions-elect. What a disgrace! Anyway, here is an article I wrote for today's programme. You can let me know if the naughty programme editor doesn't publish it.

It has a rather tenuous link to today's game, but it is about football - and this is a football blog. So I'm publishing it here.

Don't read if you like to keep things a bit more relevant on a matchday.

Chesterfield: Crooked Spire comes to Dreaming Spires.

The Clough, My Uncle, Steve Ogrizovic and his Lover.

Chesterfield are one of those teams I have a soft spot for due to the fact that my Father grew up in nearby Tibshelf. My uncle was also on the books of Chesterfield as a youngster, playing alongside a certain Coventry legend Steve Ogrizovic in the youth team (Younger readers may not remember him but anyone of a certain age will. And I am of a certain age. At least these days if you are too young to remember him you can look him up online. We only had Panini stickers as reference tools in my day).



Ogrizovic: Coventry Goalkeeper turned Ghostbusters foe.



My uncle never made it into the Chesterfield first team, nor as a professional footballer at all – but things might have been very different for him were it not for the whims of a certain red-nosed managerial genius at a nearby first division side. So different in fact, my uncle will often be heard to recount, that instead of owning a flooring business for a living he might have a European Cup winner’s medal were it not for that certain manager’s dismissive and rambunctious style.

My uncle you see went for a brief trial as a teenager in the late 1970’s at Nottingham Forest, whilst Brian Clough was manager. This was certainly a very prestigious opportunity for him, and the chance to get on the books of one of the country’s top sides at the time and play a part in a potential football league championship and European Cup-winning squad.
He was invited to play in a game with other trialists at Forest’s training ground, in front of a number of Forest coaching staff, including Clough’s right-hand man Peter Taylor. Now, whether my Uncle embellishes the tale or not is up for debate – but he tells me he had a remarkable game and even bagged a couple of goals. Surely, he had done enough to impress Forest enough to take a second look, he thinks.

Ol' Big 'Ead with Ol' Jug Ears.

The trialists were then told by Taylor that Mr Clough was on his way down to the training ground to pick out a couple of trialists to come back and feature in a full reserve team game later that week. My uncle was clearly very excited as he knew he’d done enough in that game to impress and Taylor would surely be highlighting that fact to Mr Clough on his arrival.
So in pulled Clough to the car park, who then strolled across to the group, asked them to do a quick lap of the pitch, and then stand in line as he walked past them giving them all nothing but a cursory glance.
He then picked out 4 of the 20 or so boys stood in line with a jabbed finger in their direction and a simple “You, You, You and you. You can come back tomorrow. The rest of you, thanks for your time.”


"You are a bloody disgrace!"

I can just imagine my uncle’s perplexed face at this point, as he still has that pained face whenever he recounts the tale today. He stood forward nervously to ask Old Big ‘ead a question.

Clough:    “What do you want lad?"
My Uncle: “Well, I’m sorry Mr Clough but you haven’t even seen us play, you’ve only seen us run around the pitch! How do you know if we are worth coming back if you haven’t even seen us play?”
Clough:    “I don’t need to see you play, because you don’t even look like a footballer.”

And with that, quick as a flash Clough was off back to his car. He had not even spoken to a single member of his coaching staff about how any of the boys had played.
It would be nice for my uncle to be able to say that this disillusioned him with the world of football so he simply quit the game forever, but that wouldn’t be true of course, he still had other opportunities and was obviously just not quite good enough. Something that the genius of Clough could obviously tell just by the look in his eyes.
Still, a nice little story, I hope you’ll agree.
A silly little story though and quite vaguely related to today’s fixture maybe, but hey, Whad’ya want from me?

Up the U’s.