Hello, everybody, and welcome back to the Garabaldi Red podcast, a Nottingham Forest podcast. I'm Max Hayes, your host, and well, something slightly different today. You're looking ahead to the new season in the Premier League. It's remarkable to think that it will be the first season in 30 years that Nottingham Forest, Southampton, and Ipswich will all be in the top tier together, reviving those memories of a happier time in the '70s and '80s when the three teams dominated English football. And delighted to say today, Ben Dobson joins us, the author of The Too Good to be Forgotten: Three Wise Men from football's Golden Era Book, joins us. Ben, great to have you with us. Thank you very much. Hope you're well, first of all. And just give us a bit of background info to the listeners and viewers of your career, first of all.

Well, yeah, first of all, great Great to be here. Thank you, Max. Nice to come on. Garibaldi read as a slight imposter because I'll hold my hand up to start with and say that I'm actually a Saints fan of old. But I do, one of the reasons. And one of the things that comes out in the book, I think, is that I have a real affinity with clubs such as Ipswich and Forest, whose fans went through exactly the same thing we did in the time period that the book looks at. Look, I'm first and foremost a sports nut, and I was lucky enough to live my dream. But I spent 32 years in the sports industry, including 25 years with Adidas, which wasn't a football role. It was a cricket and rugby role, but through which I got to know one of my best mates in sport who will be relevant to your listenership in Stuart Broad, who, bless him, was kind enough to write the forward to my first book. So I've been in sport all my life, and I'm a terrible old nostalgist. And yes, I'm a Saints fan. I think Yeah, I'm a nostalgius for that period in which we grew up.

I guess that basically most of us are the product of the time in which we were brought up, and that's very much me. But I also have a nostalgia for that era of football in particular. And when you look at how the game has evolved, it's sad to look back and think that the things that happen between '75 and '85 for clubs like ours, aren't likely ever to happen again in quite the same way.

Yeah, I was going to say it's one of those where I wasn't around, but family members and other Forest fans just tell me about how Golden, that era really was, which is what the latest book's all about, Too Good to be Forgotten, focuses on three managers, Brian Clough, Bobby Robinson. And just remind me of the third?

Lorri McMenemy.

Yes. So just give us a bit of a background inform that and really where the motivation, I suppose, came from then to start writing it.

Yeah. Well, it really started with my first book, My First Book, Chasing Rainbows, which is the one that Stuart kindly contributed to. The subtitle to that is From Innocence to Pergatory and Redemption as a Compulsive Sports Fan. It's basically looking at why we all put ourselves through it when in 47 years of following my local teams and my England teams. I've probably had about six moments of absolute euphoria, and the rest of it has been frustration, panic, and disappointment. So that's what Chasing Rainbows was all about. And it was part memoir the Adidas years and part an element of this idea of being a sports fan and what we go through. And that took me back to my years when I grew up in Southampton. I moved to Southampton when I was four. I got my first season ticket in Christmas, 1975, for a fairly inconsequential at the time, second division club, not really going anywhere after a couple of years of Lory McManamey being in charge. Six months after I got my season ticket, we'd won the FA Cup, and everything developed from there. I had the most preposterous time being a Southampton fan Everything from winning the European Cup to beating Andalek in the Cup Winners Cup to the signing of Kevin Keegan as the European footballer of the year for my little provincial hometown club.

And so my years as a season ticket holder of Southampton basically book-ended Lorri McMenemy's time at the club, and we both left in the same summer to go off and do different things. So that's what brought me back to that era. But at the same time, I read a book by Leo Moynihan called 'The Three Kings', which was all about Bill Shankly, Sir Matt Busby, and Joc Steen, and what they achieved in the '60s and the fact that they'd all come from within 30 miles of each other in Glasgow and developed a lot of the same managerial traits. And that got me thinking. And I remember that in that period, I was at Southampton, we had the phenomenon of Ipswich, who finished in the top six, nine seasons out of 10. So this element of sustaining this success It was just incredible and wouldn't happen again now. You had Forest doing what Forest, everybody knows Forest did. And the more I looked into the three managers, suddenly I realized that there were some incredible synergies between them, not least the fact that they were all born within three years of each other, within 40 miles of each other in the northeast of England, and that completely formed them.

So what the book is really is probably a story of place and time, viewed through the prism of three really great managers and leaders of men. In terms of the place, it's the place they came from and how that formed them in the northeast of England. And I found a crazy statistic when I was working my way through the book that in the mid-period of the time that I was looking at '75 to '85. At the end of the 1980 season, seven of the clubs in the top 11 that finished in the top half of the first division were managed by managers from the northeast of England, seven out of 11. And whilst I was writing the book, there were two out of 20 in the Premier League that even came from this country. And it just showed the way things have changed. But it's all It's also a matter of time that they grew up in the same austere days of the 1930s, the days of mining industries, of very few creature comforts. And that's really what formed them. And the story is about, A, how that formed them in terms of the values it gave them and how they applied that to their methods, but also, critically, why they placed such a value in what they did, having such a positive impact on the communities of three provincial cities or towns.

I We've covered basically that there was an incredible bond between managers, players, fans, and public in these three locations with Ipswich, Nottingham, Thru Forest, and Southampton. There's still gratitude for that in these places today, which is why the book's called Too Good to be Forgotten. And there are a couple of stories that just illustrate that, which is that when I was looking to speak to some of the Ipswich players of the era, somebody set me up those interviews with four players, Brian Hamilton, Alan Hunter, John Walk, and Russell Osmond, who were Fantastic. And I said, Okay, where do I need to go to see these guys? And he said, What are you talking about? And I said, Well, do I need to go to Scotland for John Walk? No, no, they all live within 15 minutes of each other in Ipswich. And that brought it home. And I remember when I talked to Tony Woodcock about the importance of community in the story, he said, Well, look at people like Colin Barrett and Frank Clark, who were probably two one of Cluffy's earliest and most important signings, one from the northeast of England, one of Stockport lad, and I believe both still live in Nottingham today.

And that's what I love about this story, really. So it is a story about community, and it's a story about how that connection between club and its public is unfortunately forever changed now.

Yeah, and I suppose you mentioned there, Tony Woodcock, who, when we were talking before we came and recorded this, just doing some prep. You were saying that you spent quite a bit of time with him and everything like that. I mean, that must be quite a surreal feeling as an author that you're spending time with someone that's won the European Cup and someone like Tony Woodcock that's given you all these interesting stories in a way.

It is. I mean, I was very lucky that after 25 years at Adidas managing relationships with people in sport, Unfortunately, you don't get quite so star struck. And I was fortunate that the Adidas allowed me to make a load of connections which helped with this, in particular with Tony, because Tony happens to be the father-in-law of Mike Brown, the rugby player who I used to work with. Tony is an unbelievable fella. And yeah, it is surreal, but the really surreal one was to be connected with Peter Rodriguez, who's as some of the listeners may remember, partly, unfortunately, because of his time at Leicester City, but we won't mention that. But I ended up going to sit in Peter's Lounge chatting away to him still in Southampton. And there I was. I suddenly realized I was chatting away, having a cup of tea with the bloke that lifted the FA Cup for my team when I was eight years old. And that did feel a bit surreal. But But fantastic fun, because I think one of the things people might ask is, how is this book different? Because there's been an awful lot written on Cluffy.

You only have to go into Waterstones in Nottingham to have a look at the competition that you're up against, and to a degree on Bobby Robinson as well. But it's a slightly different approach. We're looking at the three of these guys as an entity, and we're looking at this element of it wasn't just about results, it was about community and why that mattered to them. But I was very conscious that to engage an audience, particularly on a subject like Brian Club, you need some fresh content. And it was fascinating talking to Tony, to John McGovern, a fantastic guy, John, certainly doesn't use 20 words where three will do, straight to the point. And you could see straight away why John McGovern was the extension of Cluffy on the field.

Yeah, for sure. And I suppose when you're writing it, you talk about the community feel there. And that is something that is forgotten about often in football, and particularly in the modern day about how it is just much more than a game. And I just wonder when you were writing it, did you always have the whole almost trying to tell the community feel at the back of your head, or was it something that came naturally when you realized, you mentioned earlier that the guys were near and lived each other. And obviously the same with spending time with Tony Woodcock, and then you get to know that community feel. Did you almost expect to almost write about the community so much as you did before you started?

Yeah, that was very much part of the thinking about the narrative in the first place. But it did definitely grow in pace as I went through it and researched it, and particularly talking to the players, because And this idea that so many of the players still live in their areas. And I mentioned Peter Rodriguez there. Peter Rodriguez played 259 games for Sheffield Wednesday. He played 50 odd for Southampton. And he says, Southampton is my club and my home to this day and still lives in the place. Tony Woodcock himself gave me an interesting line about cluffy. Because a lot of people maybe see cluffy in a certain light, reasonably abrasive, etc. Tony said one of the first things that I remember him saying to us when he came in was that he wanted us to be generous. And he didn't mean with money. He meant with our time, with the people, and we'll touch on it. But the values that these guys got from a really tough upbringing in the northeast of England, those values never left them. And And they wanted their players to understand how important it was that the working man, particularly in those days, football was a very working class game, and the working man was busting a gut all week, and his bit of pleasure was coming to watch on a Saturday.

And if you weren't turning up for them, always be generous. Russell Osmond, actually, when I spoke to Russell at Ipswich, said something similar about Bobby Robinson, who Bobby, many people might not realize, but Bobby actually went down the mines in Durham, a place called Langley Mill, at the age of 15, and that never left him. And although Bobby has this particular image of loving his players and that thing, Russell said, If you ever slapped off with Bobby, he would grab... I won't use the exact language which appears in the book, but he would grab you by the scraff of the neck, and he said, Why don't you go down to Lower soft, have a look at the trawlers, have a look at the work that people are doing on those trawlers, and realize how lucky you are, and realize why you need to put a shift in for these people that pay to come and watch you. And Cluffy and Lory were both exactly the same. And that came from the northeast and their upbringings, definitely.

And you mentioned Cluffy there. There's so many good stories. And I suppose just give us all favorite three maybe forest stories, Ben, if you'd like, throughout the book?

Well, there's the old classic Cluffy quotes, which I'm sure most of your listeners will know already when he was asked about the importance of coaching, and he said me telling Roy McFarlane to get his hair cut, that's good coaching. But there's a chapter in the book about man management, and one of the There's two things that all the players I talk to, all three clubs referenced all the time. One was a genius for man management. The other was an ability to build a togetherness and an esprit de corps. But somebody once asked Cluffy, How important is psychology in football? And he said, well, you go and ask Sigmund Freud how many European Cups he's won, which was a fairly classic Cluffy. I love that when you talk about how these guys managed, there were a couple of stories. I mean, obviously, probably when you talk about how they built teams and the fact that they didn't necessarily coach in the traditional sense, they found the right players that they could fit into the jigsaw they had in their mind. And the classic case with with Cluffy was obviously Kenny Burns or Kenneth Burns in Cluffy's language.

And Kenny came in from Birmingham, as I'm sure everyone will remember, as a very successful striker from Birmingham. And Cluffy picked him and stuck him at centre-half. And John Bogevin told me that he said in all the time, in the first 12 months that Kenny was there, Kenny was giving him strange looks and going, 'What on earth am I doing here? ' And not once, said John, did Cluffy bother to explain to him what the thinking was. But by the end of the year, he was voted footballer of the year. And John said, and that was enough justification as far as Cluffy was concerned. ' But the other one, I suppose, was Martin O'Neill, who in the book that Martin wrote and launched last year, there was an extract in the paper which made me smile. That Martin, obviously, I think, as people know, had a bit of a challenging relationship with Cluffy, shall we say. And he spent an awful lot of his career wanting to gain just one word of praise from Bryant. It was never forthcoming. And Martin was one of the players that was there in '75 when Cluffy turned up.

And he said it was the European Cup final in 1980. He'd missed the final the year before, which hit him pretty hard. A European Cup final in 1980, and at halftime, Cluffy was looking to make a bit of a tactical change. And Martin put his hand up to say, look, if you need to sacrifice me in order to do that, then please do. And Cluffy turned around and said, 'You're going nowhere. You're playing it out of your skin, etc. ' And Martin said, 'Look, I'd waited five years for one word of praise, and it suddenly comes to me in that halftime in the European Cup final. ' He said, I went back out on that pitch with energy that I never thought I was going to regain. ' And he said that was Brian, that he I would use that. Larry Lloyd, one or two other people refer to it as well, that you would strive so hard for that one word of praise.

Yeah, absolutely. Some fantastic stories. And I know you mentioned to me as well, Ben, before we came and did this, that you were doing some stuff with Viv Anderson a few weeks ago at Waterstones, and you were doing an event. Just talk to us about that and the experiences there as well.

Yeah. Well, look, I'm massively thankful to the Nottingham public in particular for showing some interest in this because I never expected to... I still have a bit of imposter syndrome about sitting in a bookstore and being asked to sign books, but to be able to do that with Tony and with Viv in tow was fantastic. Tony, I know well. Viv, I was meeting for the first time that night, and Viv was a lovely fellow. He is quoted a number of times in the book, Viv, And I was very pleasantly surprised to note the other day that the book is now number one best seller under Nottingham Forest on Amazon, which Sorry for the shameful self promotion, but to be sitting with Duncan Hamilton, one of my favorite sports writers at number two, and Cluffy himself at number three, admittedly with books that are slightly older than mine, that It was special. So no, it was fantastic to go and meet some of the people of Nottingham. Those guys were the stories they were coming up with were absolutely fantastic. And yeah, very happy experience.

No, exactly. And just quickly before we plug the book and everything like that. How do you feel about Southampton returning to the Premier League playoff final, the best way to go up? Forest did it, obviously, a few years ago. Are you confident this season because it's a tough old league?

Yeah. I mean, one of the things that comes through at the end of the book is that there's a certain melancholy that what was achieved in those 10 years, '75 to '85, can't be repeated in the way that football is now constructed. Everyone will have their view on Manchester City today, pleading discrimination and the fact they don't get a fair rub when they've won, what is it, 16 of the last 21 trophies or something like that. And the game has changed completely. What I learned when Southampton were elegated, maybe this will resonate with some of the Forest fans, because Forest Ipswich and Saints have all taken some fairly similar journeys from those glory days that we had that put our teams on the map like never before. And we've all had our down times. But I've talked to a few people about this, and maybe there's another book in this one. But when Southampton were relegated in 2005 for the first time in 27 years, I was absolutely mortified. And I bought the line from the football Cognoscente that that was a disaster and the end of the world. For a while it was in our case, because we nearly went out of business and we went down to to League One and back we came.

When we got relegated 18 months or so ago, I wasn't nearly so down in the mouth about it because the experience of setting off... When you've grown up watching a team who People forget, but Southampton in 1984 were tilting at the double and finished second. In the early '80s, I was watching Kevin Keegan, Mick Shannon, Charlie George, Frank Worthington, Alan Ball, Peter Osgood. And for someone that grew up with that, the idea now that teams like ours can be successful, but that definition of success has fundamentally changed. People will say to me, well, what about Brighton? They've gone up and done really well. The cynic in me would say that after losing their two best midfielders last year, now losing their manager, probably losing Everton Ferguson shortly. In two years time, they may very well be in the Championship because the bar of success now has been set at about that level for clubs outside the top six. Finishing eighth is deemed to be a fantastic achievement. Yes, success. There's something a little bit sad about that. And I got depressed about those years when you would set off and all you could think about was how we're going to get 38 points.

And to finish 17th was glorious. Well, why? Why do you need to maintain that status? When we got relegated, you asked Saints fans from this year. If you ask potentially Forest fans from a couple of years ago, certainly Norwich Burnley fans, etc. Which years have you enjoyed the most in the last few years? Have they been the Championship? Have they been the Premier League? I'm not stupid enough to suggest that we all want to stay in the Championship because you want your side to win every game possible. But out of sheer enjoyment, I talked about community at the beginning. The number of Saints fans have said to me that the sense of community came back to the club this year in the Championship. And once you go up, it all gets a little bit... It gets a bit more sorted, shall we say. So delighted in the end we went up, not least because it kept Leeds down in the Championship. Delighted, we went up. At one point I thought, might we be the first team ever to go up and then politely decline the invitation and stay where we are? But maybe that's taking my negativity a step far.

Yeah, I don't know if we'd ever see anything like that. Just quickly then, Ben, tell all the viewers and listeners, so for those watching on YouTube, and also then for those listening on Spotify and Apple podcast, how you can get this brilliant book.

Well, it's there on Amazon. If, like me, you occasionally like to deny Jeff Bezos some of your money and take it and spend it elsewhere, then, fortunately, it It's there in Waterstones. I think there are still some signed copies in Waterstones in Nottingham, and there may even be a couple signed by Viv and Tony. But yeah, I just hope that like minded people to someone like myself will get something out of this book because it is a bit different. It is talking about the nostalgia of an incredible time and what it still means in these three communities today. And yeah, I loved writing it. It took me back to some special times, and hopefully by writing it and getting it out there, I'll take a few other people back to those special times as well.

Yeah, for sure. Great stuff. Ben, really appreciate your time coming on today and best of luck with it all. And yes, as Ben says, we'll put the links in the description as well on YouTube and on Spotify, so you can go over and click directly to get the book. If you did enjoy this episode of Garabody Red, give us a like, share and subscribe. Follow us across Spotify and Apple podcast. Leave us a review if you did enjoy from me and Ben. Thank you very much for listening. We'll see you next time. Bye bye.