Brian Howard Clough was born on 21 March, 1935, in Grove Hill, Middlesbrough. He was the sixth of nine children, and began his professional career with his home town club, Middlesbrough in 1952. His call up for National Service in the Royal Air Force interrupted his development and on returning to the club he struggled for a while to win a first team place but Peter Taylor the reserve team goalkeeper, spotted his potential and began to champion Clough’s cause. Eventually Clough made his debut against Barnsley on 17th September 1955, and went on to score an incredible 204 goals in just 222 appearances. He won two England caps in October 1959 against Wales (17th) & Sweden (28th), but was not selected again after failing to score in either match, before a transfer to Sunderland in July 1961 for £45,000 followed.

At Sunderland he made his debut against Walsall in August and continued to demonstrate his astonishing goalscoring prowess with a total of 63 goals in 74 games, but his career was effectively ended on Boxing Day, 1962, after a collision with the Bury goalkeeper Chris Harker caused him to tear a cruciate ligament. Despite scoring on his comeback against Leeds United 20 months later, at 29 Clough's playing career was over.

After a few months coaching the youth team at Sunderland with some success, Clough was offered in October 1965 the chance to take on the manager’s job at Fourth Division Hartlepool United. In dire straits, and desperate to avoid going out of the league and into extinction, Hartlepool’s Chairman, Ernie Ord decided to take a chance on Clough, making him the youngest manager in the football league at the age of 30, and allowed him to hire Taylor as his assistant. The pair rejuvenated the dying club, and after saving Hartlepool from extinction, headed south to Derby County in 1967.

On his arrival Derby were struggling in the Second Division and continued to do so in Clough’s first year, but things quickly changed for the better thanks to Clough’s genius and dogged determination, which was showed by the signing of the likes of Roy McFarland in 1967 and Archie Gemmill in 1970, who were at the time two relatively unknown lower league players who he signed for small fees then helped develop them into world class international footballers. In both instances Clough went to the homes of the players and refused to budge until he had the player’s signatures agreeing to play for The Rams.

In 1968 though the pair really showed their great vision, their signing of Dave Mackay from Tottenham Hotspur for £5000 not only stunned football in general but Derby in particular and even Mackay himself, who prior to meeting Clough had decided he was going back to Edinburgh, Scotland to finish his career where he started it, at Heart of Midlothian, and only agreed to meet Clough out of politeness. Clough persuaded Mackay to go to Derby instead and showed the footballing world that Derby County and especially Clough himself meant business. Within two years of Clough’s arrival at Derby the club had gained promotion to the First Division, and in 1972 Derby County were crowned League Champions for the first time.

Incredibly, within 18 months of winning the League Championship, after falling out with Chairman Sam Longson over his ever growing high profile & outspoken television career as a television pundit, Clough's reign at Derby was over. After a 1-0 victory against Manchester United at Old Trafford in October 1973 during an after match celebration in the Old Trafford boardroom, a recently appointed Derby director, Jack Kirkland, summoned Peter Taylor to a meeting the following Monday to explain exactly what his duties were. Taylor went to the meeting and concluded that some board members were trying to unsettle them for unknown purposes, and an incensed Brian Clough marched straight into the boardroom and made what he always referred to until his dying day as “The biggest mistake of my life” and resigned there and then. The town was enraged and the football world stunned, Derby County at this time were one of the very best teams in the land and Clough was arguably the best manager. Protest meetings were organized and the players threatened to go on strike to get Clough & Taylor back at the helm, but the damage was done and the board swiftly appointed former player Dave Mackay as the new manager and Clough was gone.

Clough moved on and had a brief spell with Brighton, which preceded an even briefer one as manager at Leeds United in 1974. It was to prove to be another unfathomable decision by Clough, who had for years been highly outspoken and critical of the club and especially their manager Don Revie, about the methods they employed in going about their business of playing the game of football, often suggesting that they won by dubious means. The established professionals at Leeds were not happy with his approach, and after he told them to throw away their medals because they had won them by cheating, he was destined to fail. After a demonstration of “player power” Clough was sacked after just 44 days.

A year later he returned to management with Derby County’s closest rivals, Nottingham Forest who were without a trophy to their name since the 1959 FA Cup and seemed unlikely to get one until he turned up. Taylor joined him in 1976, and again they worked their magic. In an unprecedented period of success for Forest they gained promotion to the First Division in 1977, won the League Championship and the League Cup in 1978, the League Cup again in 1979, before claiming the European Cup in both 1979 and 1980, beating Malmö FF and Hamburg respectively. Clough also whilst in charge at Forest became the first manager to spend £1,000,000 on a player when buying Trevor Francis from Birmingham City.

In November 1982 the partnership between Clough and Taylor broke up when Taylor left Forest to retire but then returned to the Baseball Ground to take charge at Derby County. Clough remained at Forest and shortly thereafter the two great friends had a bitter bust up never to speak to each other again over the signing by Taylor of John Robertson from Forest.. Nobody realized it at the time but it was effectively the end of the line for both men, although Clough admitted he was never the same after the split. Taylor only lasted 17 months at Derby before he was sacked with The Rams languishing near the foot of the 2nd Division table in April 1984. Ironically, the highlight of his managerial stint was a 2-0 F.A. Cup 3rd round victory over Nottingham Forest on 8th January 1983.

Clough continued to manage Forest without Taylor, winning the League Cup in 1989 and again in 1990, and reaching the F.A Cup final in 1991 and the League Cup final in 1992. He retired in 1992 at the end of the 1992/ 1993 season.

During his phenomenal career Clough had guided two unfashionable lower league teams - Derby County and Nottingham Forest - to the heights of English and European football. His outspoken style often got him into hot water with the footballing authorities and that appeared to be the reason why Clough was scandalously overlooked for the England manager's job in 1977, he later said "One reason I never became the England manager was because the FA thought I would take over and run the show. They were dead right"

Brian Clough died from stomach cancer in Derby City Hospital on 20 September, 2004, at the age of 69, and will be remembered as one of the greatest characters and finest managers ever to grace “The beautiful game” and the greatest manager England never had.