Summary
Other years were worse still: 1971, when 66 fans were killed in the Ibrox Stadium disaster; 1975, when Leeds fans rioted in Paris after their team were victims of appalling refereeing in the European Cup final; 1976, when weeks of pitch invasions led to the erection of iron fences at many grounds, so that spectators were now caged like animals; 1977, when drunken fans ripped up the Wembley pitch after Scotland's victory over the AuId Enemy; and 1980, when hooligans disrupted the European Championship game in Turin between England and Belgium. Even as Revie and Clough were leading Leeds and Derby to League championship success, the newspaper headlines were full of sectarian murder in Northern Ireland, picket-line violence and the endless miseries of the national economy.\n First Division footballers earned between £5,000 and £10,000 a year, more than twice what the average working man took home, and were often photographed by football magazines like Shootin front of neat, semi-detached suburban homes and gleaming, brand-new cars.
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Extract
The Showman and the Reluctant Revolutionary
The Times carried the news on its front page in September 1974: "Mr Clough dismissed by Leeds United". To readers preoccupied with soaring inflation and the general election campaign that had just begun, the sacking of their manager by the English Football League champions after 44 days must have seemed insignificant. Certainly, few would have imagined that, 35 years on, Brian Clough's brief but tumultuous spell as manager of Leeds would be the subject of one of the finest English novels of the early 21st century, David Peace's The Damned United, now adapted for the cinema by the director Tom Hooper and the screenwriter Peter Morgan.
In making football his subj ect matter, Peace was taking a risk. For all its current popularity, the sport has seldom attracted the attention of serious literary wri...See the full content of this document
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