The Damned United by David Peace another book nominally about sport but really about so much more.
David Peace has become one of the leading contemporary British novelists with his Red Riding Quartet. This book first published in 2006 and recently filmed with Michael Sheen in the main role is, to quote the author, “another fiction based on another fact”.
This is a fictionalised study of Brian Clough the enigmatic individual who never failed to provoke controversy in his lifetime, nor after it judging from his family’s response to both the book and film. Featuring the 44 days that Clough spent at Leeds United at the start of the 1974 football season it also traces in parallel his playing career, his movement into management, success at Derby County and his demise as their manager.
What we know of course is that Clough went on to huge success 30 years ago this month with Nottingham Forest taking a once mediocre team and leading them to two European Cup successes. What is left behind is the nagging question of why a man who had managed a successful team couldn’t resist the challenge of taking on the champions of England and then trying to change them from a team who he doubtless disliked into something they were not.
Get it from Amazon here.
The Incisal Edge 