The Damned United

Brian Clough:
[to the assembled Leeds players] Well, I might as well tell you now. You lot may all be internationals and have won all the domestic honours there are to win under Don Revie. But as far as I'm concerned, the first thing you can do for me is to chuck all your medals and all your caps and all your pots and all your pans into the biggest f***ing dustbin you can find, because you've never won any of them fairly. You've done it all by bloody cheating.

Brian Clough:
Things are going to be a little different around here... without Don.

Sam Longson:
His salary's 300 quid a week? You can't pay a footballer that!

Brian Clough:
That's the way things are going, Uncle Sam...

Brian Clough:
[Arriving in Brighton. Sings] Oh, I don't like to be beside the seaside...

Brian Clough:
You know he'll be making a file on us. A dossier.

Peter Taylor:
Who?

Brian Clough:
Don Revie. Prepares a file on every game. Leaves nothing to chance. Knows every opponent's formations, strategies everything.

Peter Taylor:
I've heard he's a superstitious twat.

Brian Clough:
[Ignoring him] We grew up just a few streets apart in Middlesbrough... Close to Ayresome Park. He'll have known my street: Valley Road. Probably bought sweets from Garnett's factory where me dad worked.

Peter Taylor:
I heard he wears the same suit to every game. His lucky blue suit.

Manny Cussins:
I hired you to do this job because I think you're the best young manager in this country.

Brian Clough:
Thank you. I'm the best old one, too.

Manny Cussins:
I also did it under the assumption that you would be coming here wanting the best for this club. For the city of Leeds. So why do I get the feeling this is all about you and Don?

Brian Clough:
Of course it's just about me and Don. Always has been. But instead of putting frowns on your foreheads, all you elders of Leeds in your blazers and your brass-f***ing-buttons, it should put big white Colgate smiles on your big white faces. Because it means I won't eat, and won't sleep until I've taken whatever that man's achieved, and beaten it. Beaten it so I never have to hear the name Don f***ing Revie again. Beat it, the only name anyone sings in the Yorkshire ale houses, raising their stinking jars to their stinking mouths, is Brian Clough. Brian Clough uber-f***ing-alles! Understand?

Brian Clough:
I wouldn't say I was the best manager in the country. But I'm in the top one.

Peter Taylor:
Brighton's a small club, I'll give you that.

Brian Clough:
Bloody midgets!

Peter Taylor:
But at least we'd be together! You and me, Brian. We can build them up. Make them our own, like we did with Hartlepools, like we did with Derby...

Brian Clough:
And then what? Bottle again soon as it comes to the big time? That's always been the trouble with you, Pete. No ambition.

Peter Taylor:
That's the trouble with you, Brian. Too much ambition. Too much greed, too much everything!

Brian Clough:
Yeah, you knock it, but it's done you proud over the years, hasn't it? My ambition. Without me, you'd still be in Burton bloody Albion.

Peter Taylor:
Yes, and without you, I'd still have a job in Derby! A job and a home that I love. Oh, yes, you're the shop window, I grant you that. The razzle and the bloody dazzle. But I'm the goods in the back! Without me, without somebody to save you from yourself, Brian f***ing Clough, you're not just half. You're nothing!

Brian Clough:
I'm nothing? I'm nothing? Don't make me laugh. What does that make you then, Taylor? Something? You're half of nothing! Nothing's parasite! A big fat pilot fish that feeds on nothing. A bloody nobody! The forgotten man! History's f***ing afterthought!

Manny Cussins:
Let's be honest, Brian. It's not working, is it? The players aren't happy. We're not happy. In truth, we should probably never have hired you without Peter Taylor.

Brian Clough:
So... what do you want to do about it?

Manny Cussins:
It's not working. We have to part company.

Brian Clough:
Fine, it'll cost you twenty-five grand.

Manny Cussins:
What? For six weeks' work?

Brian Clough:
Plus three-and-a-half grand for Jimmy Gordon. And an agreement that Leeds United will pay both our income taxes for the next three years.

Manny Cussins:
That is bloody criminal!

Brian Clough:
You can throw in the Merc and all.

Manny Cussins:
What?

Brian Clough:
Might be a bit flash for a man out of a job, but the truth is, I've grown to like it.

Manny Cussins:
Who do you bloody think you are?

Brian Clough:
Brian Clough. Brian Howard Clough.

Brian Clough:
We're from the north, Pete. What do we care about Brighton? Bloody southerners. Look where we are! We're almost in France!

Journalist:
How would you define your approach to management, apart from being brilliant?

Brian Clough:
Good lad.

Michael Parkinson:
How do you react when someone says, "Boss, you're doing it wrong?"

Brian Clough:
Well, I ask him how *he* thinks it ought to be done. And then we get down to it, and we talk about it for twenty minutes, and then we decide that I was right.

Muhammed Ali:
[Clough, Taylor & their families watch Muhammed Ali on television] Some fella in London, England named, some Brian... Brian Clough. I heard all the way in America that this fella talks too much. They say he's another Mohammed Ali. There's just one Mohammed Ali. Now, Clough, I've had enough. Stop it.

Peter Taylor:
Are you gonna stop it?

Brian Clough:
No, I'm going to fight him.

Peter Taylor:
[embracing after being reunited] You're only gonna f*** it up again, aren't you?

Brian Clough:
I love you, you know.

Peter Taylor:
I know. But it won't stop you.

Brian Clough:
So would you sooner go through it all without me?

Peter Taylor:
Never.

Brian Clough:
What are you doing? You weren't supposed to *accept* our resignations!

Sam Longson:
Shouldn't bloody well offer them, then, should you?

Brian Clough:
Look, you can't get rid of us. It would be a disaster for the club. For the whole of Derby!

Sam Longson:
You can't keep shooting your mouth off the way you have been and issuing these ultimatums. With great reluctance, your resignations have been accepted.

Brian Clough:
Look, you can't do this. It's madness.

Sam Longson:
The decision stands. Car keys on the table and out.

Brian Clough:
We're gonna create a footballing dynasty here. Derby could be one of the greats. Alongside United, Liverpool, Leeds!

Sam Longson:
Now! And don't dare show your face here again.