The Damned Utd by David Peace (easy readers txt) 📕

1 0 1 0 0 0 1 13 Everton 1 0 1 0 0 0 1 14 Coventry City 1 0 0 1 2 3 0 15 Burnley 1 0 0 1 1 2 0 16 Luton Town 1 0 0 1 1 2 0 17 Birmingham C. 1 0 0 1 0 3 0 18 Chelsea 1 0 0 1 0 2 0 19 Leeds United 1 0 0 1 0 3 0 20 Leicester City 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 21 Tottenham H. 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 22 West Ham Utd 1 0 0 1 0 4 0

I have come to turn the stones –

Eleven round stones to place one upon another, one after another –

On the Cursing Stone.

One after another, one on top of another, I place them stones –

But if one should slip, if one should fall, the curse will fail –

But I place my stones. Then I say your name –

‘Brian.’

Day Nineteen

I wake up on Sunday morning at the Dragonara with another bloody hangover, of booze and dreams, thinking how fucking ungracious they are; never ever been gracious in defeat have Leeds United; always had their excuses have Leeds; always the poor tale –

Runners-up in the league and the cup in 1964–65; runners-up in the Inter-Cities Fairs Cup, 1965–66; two disallowed goals in the FA Cup semi-final against Chelsea and runners-up in the Inter-Cities Fairs Cup again in 1966–67; finally winners of the Inter-Cities Fairs Cup and also of the Football League Cup in 1967–68, but lose the semi-final of the FA Cup through a Gary ‘Careless Hands’ Sprake howler; finally League Champions in 1968–69 but go out of the Inter-Cities Fairs Cup in the quarter-finals; 1969–70, they finish second in the league, runners-up in the FA Cup final and are knocked out of the European Cup in the semi-finals by Celtic, blaming ‘fixture congestion’, ‘injuries’ and Gary Sprake; 1970–71, they go out of the cup to Fourth Division Colchester and claim only to have lost the league thanks to a referee called Ray Tinkler, who allowed an offside West Brom goal to stand, though they manage to pull themselves together to win the Inter-Cities Fairs Cup for a second time; then, in 1971–72, they are made to play their first four home games away from Elland Road – because of the pitch invasion following the West Brom game and because of the comments made by Revie and his chairman, Woodward – and that season they do win the cup but lose their very last game of the season at Wolverhampton Wanderers, Derby County winning the league –

Derby County and Brian Clough.

‘There were no congratulations from Revie,’ I tell the Turkish waiter over a very, very late breakfast. ‘It was always Leeds had lost the title, never Derby had won it.’

No congratulations. No well done. No nice one. No good for you, Brian …

‘I tell you, it still makes me seethe; the things they wrote in the papers, the things they said on the telly; that Derby had won the title by default. Default? Fucking idiots. How can you win a league fucking title by default? You tell me that, Mehmet?’

The waiter shakes his head and says, ‘You can’t, Mr Clough.’

‘Bloody right you can’t,’ I tell him. ‘You know that and I know that; you can’t win a title by default, not over forty-two fucking games, you can’t. We had a fine team who had achieved the best results over a season of forty-two games and so we were the Champions. Not Leeds. Not Liverpool. Not Manchester City –

‘Derby bloody County and Brian bloody Clough, that’s who.’

Just hard feelings. Ill will. Hostility and enmity –

And a police investigation.

‘Nothing was ever proved mind,’ I tell the waiter. ‘But where there’s smoke there’s fire, and old Don certainly knows how to light a fire.’

The waiter smiles and says, ‘Fires are dangerous things, Mr Clough.’

‘Exactly, Mehmet,’ I tell him. ‘But you’ve got to remember that Revie and Leeds only needed a point; just one single fucking point and that title was theirs. The league and cup double. They’d just won the cup, don’t forget that. Beaten Arsenal only forty-eight hours before. The bookies still had Leeds as 10–11 favourites for the title, Derby right out at 6–1. And don’t forget Liverpool; Shanks and Liverpool were still in the race. The atmosphere was white hot, apparently. The atmosphere at Molineux before the Wolves game. There were allegations of bribery, you know?’

The waiter looks confused. He asks, ‘That the bookies bribed the Wolves?’

‘No, no, no,’ I tell him. ‘It was in the Sunday People; Sprake, their own former fucking keeper, putting it about that former Leeds United players had been in the Wolverhampton dressing room, having a word or two, asking Wolves to go easy and throw the match for £1,000; having a word or two with the referee and all, offering cash in an envelope for a penalty in the Wolves box, and – this is the fucking irony of it all – Leeds actually had a decent penalty appeal turned down, apparently. Handball, clear handball. Bernard Shaw was the player’s name, I think. Blatant penalty, from what I hear. But you know what I think? I think all Don’s chickens came home to roost that night because of all the rumours and what-have-you, the rumours of a fix, they probably made the referee think twice before giving Leeds anything. Referee doesn’t want people saying that he turned a blind eye or gave a penalty for an envelope under the table, does