Cloughie.

Reading his biography " Walking on Water". Talks about players he signed that he came to regret
and devotes a chapter to slating Justin Fashanu who ultimately killed himself. Never used to fancy
any player who's signing he hadn't personally authorised. For that reason John Sheridan never stood
a chance of establishing himself at Forest and was sold to Sheffield Wednesday. Biggest regret was
signing Carl Tlier from Barnsley. Once he'd rocked up at Forest , Cloughie unfortunately never rated him.
Stuart Pearce was on Talksport at teatime and recalled the occasion when Forest had taken David Currie
from us. The players were all sitting in the dressing room before a match and Clough asked " Hot stuff"
if he'd found anywhere in Nottingham to live. Currie replied " not yet boss." Clough replied " don't bother
son, you're not for me." and left the room. Not long after, he offloaded him. Quite a number of former players sing Cloughies praises, but it can't have done much for the confidence of those players he dissed and to my mind great Manager or not, his conduct in those circumstances left a lot to be desired.

 

The belief is that, as Cloughie's health deteriorated, signings were made by Ronnie Fenton instead. Cloughie hadn't always seen these players until they turned up for training and he didn't see them as his signings, so had less belief in their abilities. Pretty certainly this is true and explains the Currie story. I hadn't heard the one about Carl Tiler.

 

In the book he says this about the Tiler episode.
" Drink was becoming my escape. I know now my judgement was impaired when I allowed Hill and Fenton to
convince me of the ability of a young centre half from Barnsley called Carl Tiler. I paid £1.5 million for him and
I continued to play him in the side not only to justify the money I'd shelled out but because my pride seemed to
be at stake as well. I should have dropped him. I'm not blaming Carl Tiler for the fact Forest were relegated that
would be cruel and wrong. I blame myself because if I'd been totally with it, I would never have signed him.
If I hadn't have been boozing to excess already, Carl Tiler might have driven me to it."

 

Tiler was class in a 352 with taggart by his side, was diff in a 442

 

Tiler must have been one of the last players booked for obstruction, shielding the ball as it went out of play.

 

I loved to watch the uncanny partnership between Carl and my favourite player at the time, the
imperious Paul Futcher. You could hear Futch advising Carl where to go and what ball to play.
They were a formidable part of our defence and for the life of me, I can't understand why Carl couldn't do the business
at Forest. I read somewhere he was absolutely s*it scared of Cloughie, so the fear of making
mistakes and incurring the Managers wrath, will probably have had some bearing on his performances.

 

Carl had a decent career after forest, his fee bought the stand I sit in, so I think Cloughs head was done by then tbf. top Barnsley centre half’s i remember;
1, de zeuew
2. Stonesy
3. Gerry Taggart
4. Carl Tiler
5. Mawson

I was too young to judge Mick though I saw him play I know.

 

Great shout mate. I also liked Jason Shakell, Darren Moore and Malcolm Shotton when they played for the
Reds as well. We had to sell quite a number of our best players to pay for improvements to the ground re-
Beresford, Tiler, Agnew, Ward and Hignett. We even got Newcastle to part with £450 k to sign Mark Robinson
who couldn't tackle a good dinner. Was it his fee or Beresford's that paid for the upgrade of our floodlights.?

 

I remember hearing Tony Woodcock being interviewed.
Peter Taylor had fetched him in to the squad, Cloughie didn't know who he was but said words to the effect of
"Don't forget this lad...if you're any good, I signed yer...if you're shi*e...he signed yer"

 

Beresford paid for the floodlights. You may remember a four man protest in the West Stand getting chucked out of the next home match against Sunderland. Their frustration was understandable, as we were still well in with a shout of the playoffs at the time.

As for Robinson - very harsh, I thought he was a fine player.

 

Paul Futcher? Possibly the best centre half I've seen playing for us and that includes big Mick.

 

I agree, he was quality for us in my opinion too.

 

Futcher, my favourite too, class act on and off field

 

Futcher was a different league. Absolutely criminal that he spent the majority of his career outside the top flight. We've been seriously spoilt by the quality of centre halves we've seen over the years, but for pure footballing ability, Futcher tops the lot. Surely would have played for England if he was with a more fashionable club at his peak.

 

You’ve been very kind to Stonesy there, who played about 30 mins at centre half for us.

 

Ian Evans...taught Mick everything he knew

 

I recall when he first arrived Robbo played wife left and made little impact.
It's only when he converted to his role at full back that his game seemed to improve. My reference to his
tackling occurred when we played Leicester City away one season. As the players got off the bus one of our fans
nodded towards Robinson and said to Mel Machin who was behind him, " tha' sees yon, he couldn't tackle a good
dinner." Made me smile. On reflection, it probably is a bit of a harsh assessment. He did his best. Some of my all time great Reds full backs include Joe Joyce. Gary Fleming, Darren Barnard and of course Sir Robert Hassell.

 

Mel Machin's obsession with converting every player he got his hands on into a defender got quite infuriating at times. However, Robinson definitely shone as a full back in a way that I could never have imagined when seeing him in midfield.

 

Futch was definitely the best footballing centre half but if someone had to stop a striker to save my life, I’d probably want it to be Macca. Proper ruthless defender.

 

I would rate Paul Futcher above all of the above (based only on performances whilst playing for Barnsley).