Nottingham Forest: the return to the elite of a two-time European champion

Nottingham had been lost in a forest called Championship for 23 years.

Thomas Osborne
Thomas Osborne
16 July 2022 Saturday 11:28
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Nottingham Forest: the return to the elite of a two-time European champion

Nottingham had been lost in a forest called Championship for 23 years. It even fell to League One. Categories to which a two-time European champion team should not belong in any case, or at least not for such a long period of time. But Forest is a special champion. It already was at the time, in the transition from the 70s to the 80s, at the height of British football. Defining him as a rare bird is an understatement, because his story is unique in the world of football. A newly promoted First Division who dares to win the league in his first year, the European Cup in the second and another European Cup in the third. Unthinkable feat in the current drift of the sport.

That team was led by one of the most famous personalities in the sport, one of the most loquacious and communicative figures in living memory. He is also one of the most egocentric and controversial coaches, always with sincerity ahead, which often does not help maintain good relationships or a positive image. Brian Clough (Middlesbrough, 1935) never cared what others thought of him, or at least that's the feeling he projected.

As a footballer he was an elusive scorer in the English Second Division, in which he scored 251 goals in 296 games wearing the shirts of Middlesbrough and Sunderland, the best average in the history of British football among all players with more than 200 goals. As a technician he was a genius touched by the gods, capable of working miracle after miracle. Like many other geniuses, he was harmed by his egomania, his vanity and the excessive sincerity of him, moreover the source of some of the most famous quotes in the history of sports.

Alongside his inseparable Peter Taylor, a former teammate from his time as a Middlesbrough player, he led modest success to Derby County, first, and Nottingham Forest, later. Al County was promoted to the First Division after twenty years out of the elite and led, in his third season in the category, to the title. Not only that, but in the following campaign he reached the semifinals of the European Cup, where he fell against what he himself defined as "cheating bastards" from Juventus. His case ignored the directive in the transfer section and his outbursts publicly ended up costing him his job, but his results were the prelude to what was to come at Forest.

Before reaching Nottingham he infiltrated the enemy. Dirty Leeds father Don Revie has left the club to succeed Alf Ramsey as England manager. According to Clough, the FA didn't pick him because they knew they wouldn't be able to control him. Then he succeeded a Revie much loved by the players and fans of Leeds United. "You can throw away all those medals you've won over the years, since you've won them by stealing," he told them on their first day in the locker room. It lasted 44 days, which was enough for a book and a movie. "Today is a dreadful day... for Leeds United," he said at his farewell.

The next step was, in 1975, Nottingham Forest. By then, the world had already witnessed the genesis of Clough's prodigious abilities. Also his style book, which could be summed up in his mythical phrase: "If God had wanted us to play football in heaven, he would have put grass on it." In other words, the ball must roll from foot to foot, possession is the main tool to achieve victory according to Clough's vision, which was not in line with the general current of British football at the time.

What might seem like a step backwards (Forest were in the Second Division), was nothing more than an additional handicap to make their own story and that of the club even more unlikely. There he found peace and freedom to build his project, as well as reuniting with Peter Taylor, whom he had parted with during his brief stay at Brighton before going to Leeds. He took John McGovern, a midfielder who accompanied him from Hartlepool United in the fourth division to kiss national and continental glory. Because yes, Nottingham Forest was a glorious story.

In the 1976-77 season, his third at the club, with his squire Taylor finally back, they achieved promotion to the First Division. There begins one of the most incredible stories of romantic football. Recently promoted, with names like Peter Shilton, Martin O'Neill, John Robertson or McGovern himself on the squad, they won the League and the Cup and remained unbeaten for 42 games, until December 1978, a record only surpassed in 2004 by Arsenal . In 1979 they reconquer Wembley and complete an unprecedented feat: they win the European Cup. He wasn't going to stay there. In 1980, again, they achieve the impossible. They defend their European title. In three years, Nottingham Forest went from Second Division to First Division champions, two-time League Cup winners and two-time European champions.

Then Brian Clough and Peter Taylor parted ways. The second went to Derby County, Nottingham's historical rival, and their relationship, until then idyllic, cracked and never recovered. They did not speak to each other again. Clough did not win a title again until 1989 and was relegated from his position as Forest manager in 1993, already with an advanced degree of alcoholism that was taking its toll on his health and that would lead to the cancer that would end his life in 2004. " They say Rome didn't get up in a day, but I wasn't in charge of that task." One of his most legendary phrases perfectly sums up his career on the bench.

Since Clough's departure, the club has been plunged into a serious institutional and sporting crisis. In 1999 they went down to Championship, the new denomination of the second category of English football, and they did not go back up until this season. 23 years in which they reached rock bottom, descending to League One in 2005 and becoming the first European champion team to play in the third division of their country. They return to Championship in 2008 and since then they have been in a constant struggle to return to the elite, always frustrated.

The club was sold in 2012 to a Kuwaiti family and changed hands again in 2017. Evangelos Marinakis, a Greek tycoon who also owns Olympiacos, was the buyer of the English team. A peculiar and controversial businessman, accused of match-fixing in Greece and drug trafficking (case dismissed in 2021), under which Nottingham Forest ended up regaining its place in the elite. In last season's Premier League promotion final, they narrowly defeated Huddersfield Town at Wembley and sealed their comeback 23 years later.

In the return year, players such as Ryan Yates, James Garner (on loan from Manchester United), Jack Colback or Lewis Grabban stood out. The team, managed by Steve Cooper, has already announced important signings, such as that of Taiwo Awoniyi, revelation striker in the Bundesliga with Union Berlin; Omar Richards, left-back for Bayern Munich; or Neco Williams, Liverpool right back. It will be impossible to repeat a feat like the one in the late 1970s. The business of modern football would never allow it. At least on the banks of the River Trent a new generation of fans will be able to enjoy watching their team compete in the Premier League.