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

These are my boys and my boys know me.

‘Champagne,’ I tell Steve the barman. ‘And keep it bloody coming, young man. Because tonight it’s on Leeds United Football Club.’

* * *

Chelsea beat you 2–1 in your first home game of the season; your first home game in defence of your title, in front of 32,000. You play with frenzy and anxiety, bookings and dissent; no retention and no penetration, no calmness and no method. You have lost faith in yourselves; faith in yourself.

There’s also trouble on the terraces, fighting among the fans for the first time, police dogs and police sirens up and down the side streets, trouble and fighting –

Off the pitch and on the pitch; in the boardroom and in the dressing room; upstairs and downstairs; round every corner, down every corridor.

You will beat Manchester City and you will climb to twelfth in the league before the end of August 1972. But before the end of August 1972 the press already have a new title for Derby County: Fallen Champions –

Last year’s men managed by last year’s man; Farewell Cloughie.

Peter takes you to one side. Peter says, ‘Sell John Robson.’

‘What you talking about?’ you ask him. ‘He’s just got a Championship medal; played in all but one of our games last season, not put a foot wrong this season.’

‘Fuck him,’ says Pete. ‘We’re talking about the European bloody Cup, Brian. Not resting on our fucking laurels. Robbo’s got his medal, now let’s get rid.’

Pete’s had his ear to the ground, got out his little black book, lips to the phone; Leicester City have been flashing the cash; buying Frank Worthington for £150,000 and signing Denis Rofe at full-back for £112,000 –

‘Where does this leave David Nish?’ asks Pete.

‘On his way to Derby County perhaps?’

Pete nods. Pete pats you on the back. Pete says, ‘Go do your stuff, Brian.’

* * *

The press switch on their microphones and pick up their drinks –

‘I could not let down the Leeds supporters in the type of quality players they are used to. We were faced with an absolute crisis for Wednesday night with Allan Clarke, Norman Hunter and Billy Bremner under suspension, Terry Yorath recovering from enteritis, Eddie Gray out of action after breaking down in the reserves with thigh trouble, Mick Jones recovering from a knee operation and Frank Gray going down with influenza.

‘So I am absolutely delighted to get McGovern and O’Hare, for the type of players they are and the type of people they are. They are both players of character and skill and they give me cover at a time when injuries and suspensions are a real problem.’

– the press put down their drinks. The press pick up the telephones.

* * *

You did not make an appointment. You did not telephone. You do not wait in line and you do not knock. You just walk straight into the Leicester City boardroom and tell them, ‘I’ve come to buy your full-back.’

Len Shipman, the chairman of Leicester City and the president of the Football League, is not impressed. Shipman says, ‘This is a very important meeting and you can’t just come barging in here, uninvited.’

‘Very good,’ you tell him. ‘I’ll wait outside, but you’ll still be skint.’

You don’t care; don’t give a fuck. You’re going to buy David Nish for £225,000 whether Leicester like it or not; whether Derby like it or not –

‘Derby County – the Biggest Spending Club in the League!’

Derby County do not like it. Sam Longson says, ‘That’s a hell of a lot of money to spend on a full-back with no caps; a full-back who won’t even be eligible for the opening European Cup games. A hell of a lot of money to spend without even asking.’

‘There wasn’t the time,’ you lie. ‘There were other clubs knocking.’

‘Look, Brian, we’ve always done our best to provide cash for Peter and yourself. But where is the consultation, where is the conversation? The respect and the trust?’

‘Like I told you, no time.’

‘But the board firmly believes we could have got Nish for considerably less than the £225,000 you paid for him, had we been consulted.’

‘I telephoned, didn’t I?’

‘From the hotel bar,’ says Longson. ‘Drunk as a lord.’

‘We were celebrating a job well done.’

‘I will bite my tongue,’ he says. ‘And I will swallow my pride as best I can.’

‘You do that then,’ you tell him. ‘You do that, Sam.’

* * *

It is late when I get a taxi from the Midland Hotel back to the house. I make it go past the Baseball Ground on the way, the long way home –

‘Never should have done what they did to you,’ says the driver. ‘Outrageous.’

‘Did it all to ourselves,’ I tell him. ‘It was all bloody self-inflicted, mate.’

‘I don’t know about that,’ says the driver. ‘But it wasn’t right, I do know that.’

‘You’re a good man,’ I tell him.

‘Not right,’ he says again. ‘Everybody knows that. You ask anybody.’

‘Not in Leeds,’ I tell him.

The driver stops the taxi outside the house. He turns round to face me in the back. He asks, ‘What did you go there for, Brian? They don’t deserve you. Not Leeds.’

* * *

Kirkland stops you and Peter in the corridor outside the visitors’ dressing room at Carrow Road; stops you after you’ve just lost to Norwich City on David Nish’s début for Derby County; Derby County, the Champions of England, now sixteenth in the league; Jack Kirkland stops you and says, ‘That’s your lot.’

‘Our bloody what?’ says Peter.

‘Big-money signings like Nish,’ Kirkland says. ‘That’s your lot.’

‘The influx of players must never stop,’