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Let's go! Go,

1:58

legs! Hey, legs! I'm

2:00

open and stop! I can't help

2:02

you! Ah, you know him better

2:04

than anybody, Bobby. Do you back him to score quickly, yes

2:06

or no? Yes. Oh,

2:09

no! Hello,

2:17

welcome to Quickly Kevin, will he score?

2:20

It's Brian Little, it's an Aston Villa

2:22

episode. I'm Chris Skoll, joining me as

2:24

always is Michael Marden. Hello. And

2:26

this week's intro courtesy of Michael Williams, who says,

2:29

thanks for your visit, Muzzy is it? Tom Crane

2:31

is here to co-host this week. Hi. There's

2:34

a great aspect to this

2:36

show, which is that we knew Tom was

2:38

going to be co-hosting. We said, Crane, you

2:40

can pick anyone you want from 90s football,

2:43

we'll try to get them. The first name

2:45

out of his lips, Brian

2:47

Little. Immediately. I'd say maximum three and a

2:49

half seconds before I send you that message

2:51

back on WhatsApp. Straight away. Why did you

2:53

want to speak to Brian Little? I

2:56

would not to sort of

2:59

go to Outlandersfield, but I would say he's

3:01

my favourite football manager of all time. Genuinely,

3:04

because that period of

3:07

under Aston Villa, when he was

3:09

managing Aston Villa with Dwight York,

3:11

Savo Lomolosovitch, all these names is

3:13

my happiest time as a football fan. It

3:16

really is. I loved Villa so much about

3:18

them and I loved that team. So that's

3:20

why I was just really keen to meet

3:22

the guy. And he pulled it off. It's

3:24

amazing. Here comes Brian

3:26

Little. We've done the interview. We

3:28

were just talking about what we would like to do with Brian

3:30

Little. I said I'd love to go for a pint with him.

3:32

Yeah. Crane, did you follow that up

3:35

with? I'd like to go for a Toby Carvery. Maybe

3:37

three to four hours. We'll get a table near

3:40

a fire and we'll just talk about his

3:42

time at Darlington, Leicester and Villa. I

3:45

basically won't say anything. I'll just listen and say, Brian,

3:47

speak. I'm just going to eat this lovely food and

3:49

you just speak and I'll listen to your voice. He's

3:51

such a nice calm, lovely man. He was so

3:54

great. I really want to be friends with him.

3:56

When we were doing the interview, I was thinking I'd love to

3:58

be mates with Brian Little. and then I had

4:00

a genuine worry in my head that I was going

4:03

to say that out loud that he would scream midway

4:05

through and answer about Lester and I'd go I want

4:07

to be friends with Brian Little and then the interview

4:09

would just become immediately awkward and I'd have to sign

4:11

off what would be the

4:13

reaction if I did that just out of nowhere just said

4:15

I want to be friends with Brian Little it'd

4:18

be too much of a handbrake pulled up half the interview

4:22

right, Brian Little's coming up let's kick

4:24

off with a little bit of correspondence I'm

4:29

Jim Rosencarl and this is the

4:32

Electronic Postbag You've got

4:34

mail Thank

4:37

you to Jack H on

4:39

Twitter who directed me to

4:41

Highland Paddy's Twitter feed and

4:44

an interview with Wraith

4:46

Rovers' Gordon Dalzell Have

4:48

you seen this? Nope Alright It's

4:51

one of those Q&A type deals that used

4:53

to get in shoot magazines but this one

4:55

I would say is the most astonishing Q&A

4:58

I've ever seen with a 90s

5:01

footballer Here's some of the questions What

5:04

do you hate most in the game? When I

5:06

go to the baths to get rid of an injury I

5:08

can't swim so everyone from We Kids to

5:11

OAPs laughs at me one more snigger and

5:13

I swear I'll drown one of them This

5:17

is the opening gambit This

5:19

is in a kids' football magazine Which

5:21

away grounds do you hate most? Broomfield

5:23

It could be 90 degrees in the

5:25

shade and it'd still be freezing in

5:27

that hut they called a pavilion Furlhill

5:30

is a close second but that's only because

5:32

I hate everything to do with Thistle This

5:38

guy feels like the opposite of Ryan Nittle Nothing,

5:42

no warmth whatsoever Wow Which

5:45

side do you hate playing against? Aberdeen

5:48

away By the time I'm back in Motherwell

5:51

on a Saturday night I've lost three hours

5:53

drinking time I

5:55

don't think he's taking his career seriously enough, is he? Which

6:00

player do you hate playing against? Premier

6:02

League defenders can't even get close to

6:04

me. Not unless they drag me off

6:06

the subs' pinch. So

6:08

it has to be our reserve keeper Tom Carson.

6:10

He plays outfield at fives, and he's so fat

6:12

you can't get the ball off him. Is

6:16

this establishing this Q&A? A

6:18

very angry man. What's going on

6:21

at home? Name

6:23

the player you least admire. Peter Hetheson.

6:26

He's a duff player who's had two good

6:28

games and suddenly thinks he's God. I

6:31

say, if you're the interviewer there and there's

6:34

this tone and energy in the chat,

6:36

don't introduce the question, who do you

6:38

least admire? That feels like,

6:40

come on, you're just goading the ball here, aren't

6:42

you? You've got something nice for you. What's your

6:44

favourite ice cream? Try and lighten it a bit.

6:47

Yeah, a lot of the questions are very,

6:49

very loaded to steer him in a certain

6:51

direction. Just ask him, who's your favourite player?

6:53

Who do you enjoy playing with? This

6:56

next one, this next one's just brilliant. He's

6:58

got to beat his bonnet about Parthik Thistle. Worst

7:01

moment of your career, signing

7:03

for Thistle. The fans there hated

7:05

me from day one and still do. I'd

7:08

love to sign for them again, just to score

7:10

hundreds of own goals and get them relegated. They

7:12

wouldn't let you. After about three, they'd stop. There's

7:14

no way you'd still be in the team. I

7:17

feel like you'd get to three. After like the

7:19

60th one, they're not going, I'm sure, no, it's

7:21

just he's just unlucky. Stick with

7:23

it. How many own goals over the course of

7:25

a season? If you had to do it covertly,

7:27

how many own goals do you think you could

7:30

score? What would be your technique? How

7:32

would you go about it? There'd be

7:34

one where you'd go to chip it back to your keeper,

7:36

Lee Dixon style and lob him. You could get away with

7:38

one of those, I think. Maybe

7:40

three when the corner's coming in, it deflects off

7:42

you as you're trying to defend the corner and

7:44

in. I think after that point, the management are

7:46

starting to get a little bit suspect, aren't they?

7:49

Yeah. I think you'd get six. Six.

7:51

Wasn't there a thing where over

7:54

a period of three seasons, Jamie Carragher

7:56

was the top scorer for Manchester United

7:58

against Liverpool? Oh really? There

8:01

was some sort of stat. That's a lovely stat. You'd have to

8:03

spread them out across the season I think as well. You couldn't

8:05

do them sort of games. Don't just go, I'm going to get

8:08

them under my belt, get them done. Can

8:10

you imagine if Gordon Dalzell did

8:13

sign for Partik Thistle and was just scoring

8:15

hundreds of own goals in the season? Can

8:18

you imagine what they'd be doing to the manager? Why are you picking

8:20

with Sky? It would have to

8:22

be a really convoluted thing where half of

8:24

the team got injured and they had to

8:26

play him otherwise they'd forfeit the games. So

8:28

suddenly they're playing and part of their tactics

8:31

are just you've got to mark him out of

8:33

the game as well as the other players. Because

8:35

if we don't play him we forfeit and lose

8:37

3-0. But if we do play him

8:39

he's just got to... And also he can't be offside.

8:42

So he's sort of like, he's a Trojan horse.

8:44

He's a fox in the chicken coop where you're

8:46

like, someone mark him and then suddenly you're going

8:48

all the way back and the rest of the

8:50

opposing team can push forward. Hundreds

8:53

of own goals. So how many games in the

8:55

Scottish football season? Let's say probably

8:57

36, something like that. So that's a minimum of

8:59

a hat-trick of own goals a game basically. It's

9:02

not as might be to get away with and

9:05

be kept on the pitch. One of the questions Gordon

9:08

gets next is the fans you hate the

9:10

most and he gives a top three. Can

9:12

you guess the top three? Children?

9:16

Thistle. Oh okay. Thistle obviously is

9:18

openly. Is he Scottish?

9:20

No he's Scottish. England. I'm

9:22

going to pick, I don't know where he falls on

9:24

the side of Celtic and Rangers but one of the

9:26

two of Celtic and Rangers I think he hates. Okay,

9:29

here's his top three. Fans you hate

9:32

the most. Partick Thistle followed

9:34

by those of Partick Thistle's reserve,

9:37

followed by those of Partick Thistle's boys

9:39

club. It's good business to be fair.

9:41

What happened? We need to get him

9:43

on. What

9:47

happened there Thistle? He's a striker

9:49

and he played 43 games for Partick Thistle

9:51

scoring only six goals. All-round goals. But

9:54

he went on to become a bit of

9:56

a rave rover's legend. Obviously at that time

9:58

Partick Thistle really stuck with him. He's

10:02

asked, worst referee decision you've ever seen?

10:05

He says, I don't know about the worst, but the

10:07

best I've seen was by that German

10:09

in the Holland England game. What a hero. I

10:11

presume this interview is around like 93. Yeah,

10:13

I mean this guy's just a walking

10:15

caricature. And

10:19

their final question is best and worst

10:21

scenario five years from now. He says,

10:23

best getting Jimmy Nichols job and then

10:25

dropping him and Hatterson. Guess

10:28

that's right. Yeah, the

10:30

worst case scenario for Gordon Dowzell going to

10:32

a Partick Thistle supporters. Oh, here we go

10:34

again. Come on, mate. Just choose

10:36

a different song for once. Go to

10:39

a Partick Thistle winners club do and

10:41

win the raffle for a terracing season

10:43

ticket. What

10:46

I like about that is that if he wins

10:48

it, he has to go. He

10:51

feels there's some kind of contractual obligation that

10:53

you then have to go to every game. That

10:56

is absolutely brilliant. What's

10:58

his name? Gordon Dowzell.

11:00

Gordon Dowzell. Rafe Rover's legend. If

11:02

you've got any more on Gordon

11:05

Dowzell, let us know. Hello at

11:07

quicklykevin.com. Do you want one final

11:09

bit on Alexi Lallas acting clip

11:11

that is aged like rotten milk?

11:14

Thank you to Simon Clarke who pointed out that Alexi

11:16

Lallas. We're after Alexi Lallas facts

11:18

all the time. We're going to get the jingle

11:20

made if we get enough of them. I don't

11:23

know how many people know that Alexi Lallas had

11:25

an acting career, he says, and he had a

11:27

non-speaking cameo in an Olsen twins movie back in

11:29

the day called Switching Goals. Now

11:31

it's a short clip. The thing you need

11:33

to bear in mind, firstly, I want you

11:35

to keep an eye out for totally

11:38

inappropriate dialogue between the Olsen

11:40

twins along the

11:42

lines of Alexi Lallas being a very

11:45

attractive man, which feels

11:47

a bit weird. The second most

11:49

astonishing thing about this clip, two

11:51

American dads having a

11:54

genuine discussion about whether Alexi Lallas

11:56

was better than Pele. I

12:00

don't think so. Okay, coaches. These are

12:03

the standing stoves of fire. The

12:07

hurricanes are winning. My,

12:20

my, what a surprise. I just don't get it.

12:26

How'd Jerry turn Emma into

12:29

Pele? You

12:33

mean Alexei Lawless. Pele

12:35

is the best player to play the game. Yes, but

12:37

Alexei is the best player currently. Yeah,

12:39

fuck. If Pele was playing now,

12:42

he'd be the best player playing

12:44

the game. And if Alexei was

12:46

playing then, he'd be the best

12:49

player playing the game. Who the

12:51

fuck is Pele? Who is Pele? Part

12:55

of my living

12:57

is made writing

12:59

scripted comedy. I

13:01

can tell you what's definitely happened in

13:03

the process there, which is most remarkable, is

13:05

that that script has been shown to

13:08

Alexei Lawless, and he has read the

13:10

lines that Alexei Lawless is the best

13:12

player playing today, and he's said, yes,

13:14

I'm fine with that. And

13:17

he's gone ahead with the scene, rather than going,

13:20

that bit's mad. You do need to just say I'm good

13:22

at football, and don't sound the best player in the world.

13:24

He's read that and gone, no, that seems

13:26

absolutely fine to me. That's

13:29

remarkable. I'll sign off on that. Incredible.

13:33

Why is he doing Keep Me Up, he's on his own as well. With

13:36

a bunch of kids. And how old are

13:38

the Olsen kids there? They must be what? 10?

13:41

11, yeah. And

13:43

they're saying, Alexei Lawless is cute. Why

13:46

have we let this go on telly? It's

13:48

jarring. Yeah, unsettling. There you go.

13:51

Alexei Lawless is cute and better than Pele. Two

13:53

excellent Alexei Lawless facts. If you

13:55

want to chip in with some more Alexei Lawless facts, if you've

13:57

got any more on Gordon Dalles Elle, here's how you get it.

14:00

get in touch with the show.

14:03

Get in touch with the show. Email

14:05

hello at quicklykevin.com. Follow

14:08

us on Facebook and Twitter at Quickly

14:10

Kevin and sign up to

14:12

the mailing list at quicklykevin.com. Right

14:17

here it comes, here comes Brian Little.

14:19

The Brian Little train is steaming down

14:21

the tracks heading towards us. If you

14:23

want to get this episode in full

14:25

extended and ad free plus every episode

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this series a week early plus two

14:29

bonus episodes every month plus all the

14:31

content we've been turning out bonus episodes

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for years and years including all the

14:35

Bruce books. You can sign up for

14:37

the Quickly Kevin fan club at another

14:39

slice.com/quickly Kevin where you'll get access to

14:41

pre-sale tickets when we announce the Quickly

14:43

Kevin live show and you can also

14:45

sign up for the Quickly Kevin fan

14:47

club over on Apple podcasts on the

14:50

Quickly Kevin show page. Enough

14:52

chat, here he is. You've waited

14:54

a long time for this. We all have. It's

14:57

Brian Little. Our

15:06

guest this week is synonymous with English

15:08

football management in the 90s

15:10

after rocketing a Darlington team into

15:12

the league system after two successive

15:14

promotions he went on to take

15:16

Leicester City into the Premier League

15:18

for the first time before masterminding

15:20

a villa site that was synonymous

15:22

themselves with entertainment and excitement. It's

15:24

a pleasure to welcome to quickly

15:27

Kevin Brian Little. Welcome Brian. It's

15:29

great to be here. Thank you. Thanks for asking me. I'm

15:31

looking forward to it. When we talk

15:33

about your career for me, we have to

15:36

start with the fact you sadly retired as

15:38

a player at 26 years old and

15:40

your next step was to begin working in the club

15:43

shop. I know I spent a

15:45

little bit of time a couple of months where

15:47

the club was still paying me working at a

15:49

printing company in Birmingham and there was a good

15:51

friend of mine who owned the company, massive villa

15:53

fan, gave me a great job. I

15:55

spent two months going in two days a

15:57

week and I thought I can't do this.

16:00

this is not football, you know, I know he

16:02

does the club programs, but this isn't football. Went

16:04

back to Villa Park, walked into the club shop,

16:07

there was two lads who worked there, one called

16:09

Keith and one called, I can't think the other

16:11

lads name, but I knew them quite well, and

16:13

I said, you can't give me a job,

16:15

can you? And he said, well, you could work in the club

16:17

shop, but you can't do that. I said, I can, and I

16:19

did. And I went and worked in the club shop. They

16:22

gave me a little mini metro with Aston

16:24

Villa's foundation written on it. And I drove

16:26

around in that collecting like money from the

16:28

car. And then I would serve the fans before the game like,

16:31

you know, do you want to start off yet? And they're going,

16:33

Brian, what are you doing? Telling

16:36

you to start off.

16:38

The real world outside of the world had

16:40

been brought up in working in a printing

16:42

company, which I call the real world because

16:44

as a football player in them days, you

16:47

still didn't know how to phone the doctor

16:49

to make a doctor's appointment. The club got

16:51

a doctor to come and see you or

16:53

whatever. So I was in this

16:55

outrageous world, which I had to go knock on

16:57

people's doors and things like that and say, you

16:59

know, do you need anything printing and stuff? And

17:01

it was just weird. So I just

17:04

I had to go back to Villa Park and I

17:06

didn't work there that long, because again,

17:08

I was very fortunate in how I moved up from

17:10

there. But yes, I'm proud of working in

17:12

the club shop. It didn't bother me at all. I

17:14

loved it. I loved being amongst the fans. And

17:17

I think we all enjoyed ourselves. It was good

17:19

fun. How soon after you scoring the winner in

17:21

the league final was this that you were then

17:24

giving scarves to fans in the club shop?

17:26

The reaction must have been crazy. It's

17:29

only a couple of years. I mean, so 77, I think it

17:31

was 79, 80ish when I retired.

17:35

It wasn't that far on. I mean, I

17:37

remember a couple of things that had happened

17:39

previous to that would have been Andy

17:41

and John Goodman leaving who were my best

17:44

power source. I was part of the three

17:47

sum of naughty boys, I think they thought of

17:49

us, you know, and Ron tried to move me

17:51

to Birmingham City, which thankfully I failed my medical

17:53

on to to stay at Aston Villa.

17:55

There's so many things around there. But but I

17:57

think it was probably just two and a half years. after

18:00

winning the Cup for the second time that

18:02

I was working in the shop. Incredible. It

18:04

was incredible. It was a

18:06

tough period because I think to

18:08

have just had everything taken away at the

18:11

age of 26 when I last played, 27,

18:13

stepping to a total unknown for me really,

18:15

you know, having to sort of work for

18:18

a living, so to speak. In

18:20

general, there wasn't much protection around players when that

18:22

happened, was there, at that time. Was it different

18:24

to now? Yeah, I mean, I

18:26

remember they sent me down to Harley Street the

18:29

same day as Mike Pedrick, who was at Villa

18:31

and Stoke, and we both went to see a

18:33

surgeon down there who was sort of opting that

18:35

he could give us some sort of operation. But

18:38

when he looked at my knee, he said to

18:40

me, well, we might have to look

18:43

at ligaments from animals and things like that and try

18:45

and join them into you. And I'm going, what's

18:47

this? He said, well, it is an experiment. I said, well,

18:50

you're not experimenting on me. So that really made me think,

18:52

well, if that's what they're going to try and do to

18:54

me, I better just pack in because I don't really

18:56

want to have a knee like

18:58

that. It was a really crazy pill. But and

19:00

obviously, the people were experimenting outside of the

19:03

game. And basically, when you did your cruciates back

19:05

in that era, you were finished, basically, you know,

19:07

that was it. But where I'm sitting

19:09

here today, the fact that I've still been

19:12

involved 50 odd years in professional football, I've

19:14

been very, very lucky and some things happen

19:16

for a reason, you know, and you go

19:18

off on a different path. So

19:21

it certainly happened to me. It was a weird

19:23

period, a weird period to be

19:25

suddenly playing in the first division, playing

19:28

with massive crowds behind you, playing in

19:30

cup finals, then to be in

19:33

a club shop selling shirts and things like that

19:35

was quite crazy. 16

19:37

years, I think it was, well, less than that

19:39

after you were working in the club shop, you

19:41

become Aston Villa manager. And I wondered, like, did

19:43

working in the club shop give you a completely

19:45

different perspective around the club and maybe even on

19:47

life, like when you became the big boss? Well,

19:49

it did. It obviously changed me. I mean, you

19:51

know, I had my hair cut short and

19:54

put a tie on and things like that

19:56

and pretended to be not a rebel, you

19:58

know. managing

20:00

the club shop? Was that the first management? No,

20:02

no. I worked in the club shop. I, you

20:04

know, I mean, some of the people who I

20:06

know who worked in the club shop, they still

20:08

work at the club now, you know, they worked

20:10

at the club all their lives. And whenever I

20:12

go to the ground, I always make sure that

20:15

I just pop in and say hello to them.

20:17

And there's a massive family feel around Aston Villa,

20:19

you know, I mean, obviously, when you have management

20:22

changes and owner changes, it does change a

20:24

lot. And, and I think in the last

20:26

two or three years with our new owners,

20:28

it's changed an awful lot more than it

20:30

would have changed in the past, you know, the

20:32

club are hoping to go very global now, which

20:34

is the right thing for them to do. But

20:36

yeah, there's still a family, there's still people who

20:38

have worked at Aston Villa, 50 odd years I've

20:41

been around it, who work in hospitality or they

20:43

work behind the scenes in the offices. So

20:45

that's still there, you know, but and is it strange

20:47

for me? I'm a club ambassador now,

20:49

but I still feel every time I walk into Villa

20:51

Park, I'm going to work and I get up early and

20:54

I'm first out the house and my wife thinks what's

20:56

up with them today? I'm

20:58

so focused on going to work as it

21:00

is, but it's not work. I just, you know,

21:03

entertain people and look after them and see if

21:05

everybody's okay and go and see my mates who

21:07

used to play for the club at different periods.

21:09

But I still, every time I

21:11

go into Villa Park, I'm dressed as tidy

21:13

as I can be, you know, shaven and

21:16

everything and it's work. And a

21:18

lot of people can't quite understand that. But

21:20

that's just the way it's formed itself on

21:22

me, really. This

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22:54

wanted to ask about the start of your managerial

22:56

career. I've got so much respect for managers because

22:58

I think it's one of the hardest jobs in

23:00

the world and I think one of

23:03

the hardest managerial jobs you can have is

23:05

non-league and basically you took over Darlington and

23:07

they went down into the conference and you

23:09

went on this incredible run, two successive promotions.

23:12

So straight away almost in the very start of your

23:14

managerial career you had great success and I wondered what

23:16

was the secret? What did you bring to the table

23:18

at Darlington to do that? I think

23:21

the three years prior to that I'd worked

23:23

with Bruce Riok and Colin Todd at Middlesbrough

23:25

and they'd taken Middlesbrough from the third

23:28

division to the second division to the

23:30

first division despite being in administration for

23:32

quite a long period of that. Bruce

23:34

Riok was an incredible mentor for me

23:36

and as was Colin Todd and

23:38

at Middlesbrough we had this unbelievable thing

23:40

about work ethic, about being out and

23:42

about. In those days I went

23:45

with Bruce Riok on so many occasions on a Friday

23:47

night over to Stockport and I'd say to him why

23:49

are we going to Stockport? He said because it's the

23:51

only game on football tonight, I mean it's the only

23:53

game we've got to be there and watch it. You

23:55

know and we'd drive across the M62 in the fog

23:57

and the snow and everything and he's worked

24:00

ethic was incredible. Obviously we gifted in

24:02

so much as we had the likes

24:04

of Pallister and Cooper and Mulberry and

24:06

Bernie Slavin and his team, but it

24:08

was all about team spirit and working

24:10

together. We used to go up to

24:13

Scotland scouting, watching games. We used to

24:15

coach the youngsters because there wasn't enough

24:17

staff there. So on a

24:19

Tuesday night and a Thursday night we trained the

24:21

young players, the school boys, and

24:23

his knowledge on watching games and looking at

24:25

the types of players he wanted in

24:28

those days was what managers had to do. You

24:30

know, we don't have the stuff that you have

24:32

these days. So it was a full-on work

24:35

hard and the rewards would come your

24:37

way. I think when I left Middlesbrough

24:39

to go to Darlington, I

24:41

had a catalogue of players in my head

24:44

that I thought, well, given the chance, if

24:46

I can get this right, I know the

24:48

type of player I'm looking for. You know,

24:50

like I remember when I was at

24:52

Middlesbrough as the youth coach, I saw a lad called

24:54

Simon Grayson playing for Leeds and

24:57

Gary Speed, God bless him, and all these type

24:59

of players who went on and became real stars

25:01

were there, but the lad Grayson just stuck out

25:03

at me. And I remember thinking, whoa, if I

25:05

ever become a manager, that's the type of player.

25:08

And I actually signed him at Leicester three years

25:10

later. And I remember going to Stockport, I signed

25:12

a lad called Paul Fitzpatrick from Stockport at Leicester

25:14

because I'd been to them and watched them play

25:17

that many times. And so that

25:19

education and the hard work which Bruce

25:21

taught me was a massive influence

25:23

on me. And it was great. Obviously,

25:26

it worked. I went to Darlington and they

25:28

were bottom of the league. I didn't keep

25:30

them up. And the great part

25:32

about this little story, I'll tell you,

25:34

is the chairman of Darlington resigned the

25:36

weekend before we were going to get

25:38

relegated. And a new man

25:40

came in charge. And his first game,

25:43

we went to Scuntor, lost five nil

25:45

and were relegated. I got

25:47

a message, the new chairman's on

25:49

the pitch and he wants to talk to you.

25:51

And I thought, oh, well, I've got the sack.

25:54

The new chairman coming in. I'm finished. My first

25:56

chance of management and I'm finished. I went on

25:58

the pitch and his name was Richard C And

26:00

he said to me, Brian, if

26:03

you go, I'm going. I

26:05

said, you what? I said, it's your first

26:07

game as a chairman. He said, I know. He said,

26:09

but if you go, I'm going. I'm packing in as

26:12

well. So what a thing. So what a sentence. You

26:14

know what? A piece of faith in somebody who didn't

26:16

really know. And he gave me a two-year contract and

26:18

said to me, right, if we're not

26:20

back in the football league in two years, neither of

26:23

us will be here. And darling, till we'll be finished.

26:25

You know what I mean? So we won two championships

26:27

and we worked hard together. And

26:29

there was that togetherness and team spirit and all the

26:31

things that Bruce had told me. But the sentence, like,

26:34

if you go, I'll go, we'll stay with me forever. You

26:36

know, God bless him. It was

26:38

his first game in charge as a chairman. We

26:40

get replicated. It's a crazy, crazy thing.

26:43

I have a question about basically, I was

26:45

addicted to football manager when I was younger.

26:47

I don't know. Have you ever played the

26:49

computer game football manager? No.

26:51

You can't be spending your spare time on

26:54

that. You're Brian. You've

26:56

done the real thing, which some people play harder, arguably. But

27:00

in my mind, I'm one of the lost talent

27:02

of European football management. But never. But what I'm

27:04

interested in is when you're managing

27:07

it somewhere like Darlington, you're talking about scouting these

27:09

players, going to see players. Are you looking for

27:11

a different type of player? Are there different traits

27:13

that you are looking for in those lower leagues

27:16

to, let's say, when you're a villa? How

27:18

is that experience different? I would say it's not

27:20

a different trait. It's a different degree of talent.

27:23

It's the same trait. Again, another

27:26

massive influence on my management thing

27:28

was Ron Saunders at Aston Villa, who

27:30

rebuilt Aston Villa four times, is

27:32

to get them promoted from the second division, the first

27:34

division, which I was part of, being to see to

27:36

win two league cup finals in 75 and

27:39

77, and then to put

27:41

a team together to win the first division

27:43

of English football. He changed teams and certain

27:45

players he changed, but he changed for the

27:47

same sort of player, but with

27:50

a better talent, but the same

27:52

characteristics. So, Ron Saunders, I

27:54

used to say, wherever I went, I'm

27:56

going to build a Ron Saunders team, but

27:58

accepting that... If it's a Division

28:01

4, it's a 4th Division

28:03

player with the characteristics of what Ron

28:05

Saunders had taught me, he needed how

28:07

to build a team. So there was

28:09

a holding midfield player, a ball playing

28:11

midfield player and a box-to-box midfield player.

28:13

That's the simple way to describe it.

28:15

But even my Darlington team, I

28:18

still call it a Ron Saunders type

28:20

of team. My team at Aston

28:22

Villa, when I went back there, I tried

28:24

to build a Ron Saunders Aston Villa team.

28:26

And when you look at Gordon Cowans, Dennis

28:29

Mortimer and Des Bremner, I had

28:31

Andy Townsend, Ian Taylor and Mark Draper,

28:33

who I thought matched them in

28:35

their characteristics. Saunders was the biggest influence me

28:38

on building a team. Bruce was my biggest

28:40

influence on how I should work and my

28:42

work ethic and treating people in a good

28:44

way and getting the rewards back off people

28:47

by treating them well and they treat you

28:49

well with the same regard. So

28:51

those are the things that influenced me so

28:54

much it was untrue. But I would genuinely

28:56

say to answer your question, I

28:58

had a player called Gary Gill at Darlington who

29:00

was every bit as important to me as Ian

29:03

Taylor was. That's correct. Because he

29:05

did exactly the same job, perhaps not

29:07

as talented as Ian, but the same

29:09

job. So I built a team with

29:11

the characteristics of the players who, and

29:13

irrespective of whether they're better or worse,

29:16

it's the level that you're at that you have to try

29:19

and accept in many ways. So that's how

29:21

I built my teams all the time to

29:23

be honest. And what do

29:25

you think about the fact that I won the

29:27

Champions League with Steven? Are you impressed with that?

29:29

Even was your mentor, you must have had a

29:31

mentor So

29:35

after the double promotion with Darlington, the footballing

29:37

world has got its eyes on you and

29:39

eventually you end up at Leicester City. And

29:42

again you do the same thing where you

29:44

take a struggling team, Leicester relegation fodder in

29:46

the second tier and straight away you kind

29:49

of turn them into promotion contenders. How

29:51

did you find that jump from kind of the lower

29:53

league up to that level? Did you notice

29:55

it much? Yeah I felt I was ready, I

29:58

mean again to go to Richard Court. Throughout

30:00

that two years of winning the two championships, he'd often

30:02

come into the office and say, I need to talk

30:04

to you. And I'd say, what's

30:06

up? He said, someone's interested in you. I don't

30:09

want you to go, but someone's interested. And there

30:11

was never anything that would make me think, well,

30:13

I'm going to leave. I've got to talk to

30:15

them. But when we'd won the second championship, we

30:17

had a night out where we were at the

30:19

town hall and everything. And he rang me in

30:22

the afternoon and said, I need to speak to

30:24

you. He said, I've got another one. And of course,

30:26

I said, it's all right. It doesn't matter. He said, it's

30:28

left the city. And I think I'm not talking

30:30

funny, but you should talk to them. He said, that's the

30:32

sort of move you should have, which

30:34

again was brilliant. This is the

30:36

night as we were celebrating the second championship. So

30:39

I had a number to call and I called Martin

30:41

George, who was the chairman. And I said, right, I've

30:43

got a function tonight. He said, I'll come up and

30:46

see you now. I said, well, you won't get up

30:48

the motorway. It's absolutely packed. He said, no, I'm going

30:50

to fly up in my helicopter. He

30:55

flew his own helicopter up to Teeside

30:57

Airport. And I'm telling them not

30:59

to come on the motorway because you'll get stuck

31:01

for hours. So I think stupidly typical. But

31:05

he flew up and we had an hours meeting

31:07

before I went to the celebration. And

31:09

in that hour, he convinced me that that job was

31:11

right for me. And I accepted the

31:13

job there and then I knew what

31:16

was in store. I asked straight

31:18

away in those days, you had

31:20

a yearly video of all the games.

31:22

So I studied the video of the

31:24

season. The gold conceding was

31:26

terrible. So again, the fact that I

31:28

played with three center backs and things

31:31

like that was massively important. But

31:33

again, I went about building the

31:35

sort of team that I done at other places,

31:37

you know, with the three center backs to wing

31:39

backs who were all more wingers, a combination

31:42

of midfield players and two strikers on top

31:44

of it. So I was I

31:47

was supported not financially, but

31:49

I took people like Fitzpatrick

31:51

from Stockport County. Jimmy

31:53

Willis, who was a fourth division

31:56

and conference player at Darlington because

31:58

of his characteristics, not perhaps. the

32:00

talent but the characteristics were

32:02

there to put a foundation down. Simon

32:04

Grace who came a little bit later

32:06

on. So it was all about

32:08

building at that team again. It had to

32:10

be a Darlington team with a little bit

32:13

more talent in all those areas. So I

32:15

felt totally confident that I was going to

32:17

do something there. But you soon found out

32:19

how difficult it can be when you lost

32:21

a game or two because obviously the fans

32:23

at times could be pretty harsh.

32:26

I remember we lost to Cambridge 5-0 very

32:29

early in the season who we eventually

32:31

beat in the playoffs 5-1 and I got

32:33

dog's abuse. You know it was like I

32:36

was thinking this is terrible. It was the

32:38

first time I'd ever had abuse as a

32:40

manager really on losing a game

32:42

so to speak. And you just have to

32:44

learn how to live with that really. You

32:47

had to knuckle down and believe in what

32:49

you were doing. So again it didn't seem

32:51

such a big step and having played at

32:54

Leicester, having been around the city itself not

32:56

too far away. You knew it

32:58

was a good sport town. I mean the

33:00

time football, cricket and rugby were bubbling

33:02

in Leicester. It was a

33:05

very in sporty type of area to be

33:07

in. I wasn't worried. I think at that

33:09

period of my life I was totally

33:12

convinced that the way I built the

33:14

team would at least give it a

33:16

chance. I remember the local

33:19

reporter when I had my first

33:21

interview said to me what is it like being sixth

33:23

choice to be the left manager which

33:25

I thought was oh great lovely thank you

33:27

very much that's a nice welcome. I said

33:29

well it's better than being 66th choice. I

33:32

said and to be honest with you at

33:34

Darlington we trained on the local pitches the

33:36

council pitches and I had to take a

33:38

poo scooper with me every day to take

33:40

it off the... I said so to be

33:42

honest this is like heavenly coming here you

33:44

know. We had to go to

33:46

the council grounds and with all those poo scoopers

33:48

and pick them off the pitch before we trained

33:50

and things like that. So I was

33:52

moving in the direction that I wanted to move in

33:55

you know and and I felt very ready for it

33:57

really. I had a quick question which was

33:59

just about you may... you mention watching that video

34:01

and going, oh, they're conceding loads of goals,

34:03

this is a problem. Have you

34:05

ever had a situation where you join a new

34:07

team, it's your first day training with the players,

34:10

have you ever felt that any of the players

34:12

are genuinely not good at football? Is

34:14

that something you ever come across in the

34:16

professional level? I think, again, Bruce told me

34:18

about the mentality of things and leading from

34:20

the front and not being frightened to lead

34:22

from the front and not being frightened to

34:24

say what you think and you get at

34:27

the same time treat people well. And again,

34:29

I always opened up with that sentence. If

34:31

I don't pick you for the team, it's not because I

34:33

don't like you, I just have to pick a team. There

34:35

will never be any animosity. I will treat

34:38

everybody as best I can, as close to

34:40

being as the same as I can. The

34:42

only thing that you will hold against me

34:44

is if I don't pick you in

34:46

the team. And that's not my problem, that's your problem.

34:48

So you have to be as honest as that. I

34:51

mean, I've never tried to cause a

34:53

problem for any player. My mentality was always

34:55

to treat people who I like to be

34:57

treated myself. And as a person, as an

34:59

individual, even though I was reasonably

35:02

quiet as a youngster, I guess, when

35:04

I saw people wanting to move somewhere, I was like,

35:06

well, just let him go if he wants to move.

35:09

So I always said to people, hey, I'll let you

35:11

go if you want to move. B, if somebody comes

35:13

in for you, like Lester have come in for me

35:15

or like when Villa came in for

35:18

me, if you want to go, I will talk about

35:20

it. We'll sort it out. There's never going to be

35:22

a falling out. So I've always been

35:24

quite open and quite easy going in that

35:26

respect, but worked hard. And I

35:28

think that's shown through Lester,

35:31

people like myself, Alan Evans and

35:33

John Gregory, who all work together,

35:35

tried to do as much of the training with the

35:37

players as we possibly could. We were all still, I had

35:39

bad knees, so I couldn't do as much as Alan and

35:41

John. But Alan and John, I encourage

35:44

them every day to be involved in the training

35:46

as much as they could to be talking to

35:48

the players. Alan with his

35:50

experience across the back, you know, Scottish

35:52

international won the European Cup and John,

35:55

who'd gone on to be a really

35:57

successful player at Queens Park Rangers and

35:59

Bright. And I talked more

36:01

than showing them forwards, I talked to the

36:03

forward players. So I tried to fill in

36:05

the boxes. We were unbelievably well together as

36:08

well. I'd like to think,

36:10

I can't believe for one minute that the

36:12

players of those days weren't happy to have

36:14

three people who were working their socks off

36:16

to help them. And I think it shone

36:18

through really. It's definitely shone

36:20

through onto the pitch because every season

36:22

for your first three seasons at Leicester

36:24

City ended in a playoff final at

36:27

Wembley. And I often think

36:29

as a fan, I'm a West Ham fan and

36:31

I've experienced losing in a playoff final and I

36:33

think it's the worst thing I've ever experienced as

36:35

a fan. I can't imagine what

36:37

it must be like as a manager. Your

36:39

first two playoff finals at Leicester City end

36:41

in heartbreak. How on

36:43

earth do you cope with that as a manager? A two

36:45

in a row like that? You know, when

36:48

we lost the first one, they couldn't believe

36:50

we'd got to Wembley. I mean, like the

36:52

season before, I think the survived on goal

36:54

difference it was the last game of the

36:56

season and we took them to sixth off

36:58

top. And I think when we

37:00

went to Wembley, everybody was just like, we're going

37:02

to Wembley. I mean, I remember the Leicester fans,

37:05

all of the bridges down to Wembley were like

37:07

covered in blue and white scarves and all sorts

37:09

of things. It was almost like a

37:11

day out. Although we weren't treating it as that,

37:13

it was a massive sort of step in the

37:16

right direction. And we were a little

37:18

bit unlucky not to, I mean, David Speedy

37:20

went down and he got penalty, wasn't it? That

37:23

was the first one, wasn't it? That it was a close game.

37:25

We didn't really deserve to lose. We

37:28

didn't really deserve to win, but we made

37:30

a massive step. The most important thing after

37:32

the game, and it was straight after the

37:34

game, we sat down with the players, we

37:36

sat down and talked and we between the three

37:38

of us had decided that we would whatever happened,

37:41

we had to sit down and talk straight away.

37:43

We weren't going to jump up and down for

37:45

two hours. We're going to settle everybody down. And

37:48

our conversation was what we've

37:50

done this season was all about hard work

37:52

was about team spirit and everything. We

37:54

are not going to fall into the trap of

37:57

giving you an extra two weeks off because

37:59

you've been. little bit unlucky. You're coming

38:01

back exactly the same date as we would

38:03

have come back if the season had finished

38:05

three weeks ago. We're coming back on exactly

38:07

the same date. Everybody was aware of the

38:09

fact that that was going to happen and

38:11

we were going to do exactly the same

38:13

again. We were going to prepare in

38:15

the same way and we made

38:18

no changes and I felt sometimes looking

38:20

back over the years sometimes

38:22

people think because you played three weeks

38:24

earlier and I get it you

38:26

know it's sports science and everything is taken

38:28

over and probably would disagree with 100% with

38:30

me but at that time and in that

38:32

era and the mentality of football was in

38:35

my opinion was to get them back on the

38:37

training pitch as quick as you possibly could which

38:40

was not going to hurt them. The modern people

38:42

would change that 100% and I fully accept that

38:44

but we didn't train the same way the train

38:46

today and all those sort of things. Football players

38:48

aren't as physically trained and high tuned

38:50

as they are so we did exactly the thing that

38:53

we would have done it if we'd not got to

38:55

the playoffs. We brought them back in three I think

38:57

they had three weeks holiday we brought

38:59

them back we gently get

39:02

them ready for the next season and after

39:04

we'd done that the first time it wasn't a problem

39:07

the second time it was a little bit more difficult

39:09

when we'd lost because we were

39:11

three-nailed down we got back to 3-3 and then

39:13

they went and scored with the last kick of the ball

39:15

sort of thing and that was a hard

39:18

one to take but again we we sat down

39:20

afterwards and said look we'll just do

39:22

the same again fellas we just come back early we'll

39:24

just come back and play we

39:26

tried to maintain a belief in ourselves

39:28

we tried to take away any feeling

39:31

sorry for yourselves and letting that fester for

39:33

very long we wanted to come back and

39:35

we wanted to show the people that we

39:37

wanted to work and we wanted them to

39:39

work it was all about positive

39:41

mentality really than anything else you know so and

39:44

the third one the third one is worth saying

39:46

Lester had lost their previous six games at Wembley

39:48

heading into that third one you've lost two player

39:50

finals in a row I'll say this now and

39:53

I've said it a million times to people afterwards

39:55

if I'd lost that game I think I'd have

39:57

got the sack really even though it

39:59

took them to three playoff finals because of the

40:01

team that I picked. If you want

40:03

to study the team that I picked, I think I had

40:05

six centre-halves in the team. You

40:08

know, my friend Darby County, who

40:10

technically were ahead of us by

40:12

a country mile, technically, I

40:14

mean, I bought Tommy Johnson and Gary Charles off

40:16

Darby because I was even then I was looking

40:18

at them thinking, oh, like, Craig, I want these

40:20

two lads. So I think if I could assign

40:23

the Cambridge in midfield, I'd assigned him as well.

40:25

They were miles ahead of us. I picked a

40:27

team of centre-halves and I said to the lads,

40:29

look, I'm sorry, we've lost here

40:32

twice. We're not going to lose today. If we

40:34

have to hit the ball into their box, I'm

40:36

sorry, but we'll have to play a long ball

40:38

football, whatever we have to do today, we have

40:40

to do it to win a game of football.

40:42

We played Walshy centre forward, big Steve

40:44

Walsh, centre-half centre forward, Craig Ormond,

40:47

we had Ewan Roberts, we

40:49

had big lads, we had three centre-backs, we had

40:51

a right centre-back at right back. And

40:55

I reckon if I'd lost

40:57

that game, my chairman and

40:59

people would have looked and said, I think

41:01

he's gone now. I think he's lost the

41:03

plot. I honestly think he's lost the plot.

41:05

And it was that brave a decision. I

41:07

played Colin Gibson, who hadn't played in

41:10

the team for four or five weeks. Now I played

41:12

with Gibbo at Aston Voorhees when he was a young

41:14

boy. And he was a little

41:16

Tasmanian devil. Honestly, he was really determined

41:18

and a real competitor. And

41:20

I played him, I call him Colin Hotshot Gibson, you

41:23

know, and I'd say, you're playing today. He's looking at

41:25

me going, hey, I'm playing.

41:27

And I went, yeah, you're playing, you're playing

41:29

midfield. He got right in amongst them. So

41:32

I picked a team that I

41:34

call them defining moments in football. And

41:37

that was my defining moment at Leicester City.

41:39

If I'd lost that game, I genuinely think

41:41

I'd have got the sack because the

41:43

chairman and other people in the fans would have forgotten

41:45

it. They would have

41:48

remembered what the teams he picked,

41:50

why we got six centre after him. Why have

41:52

we got Colin Gibson in midfield? Why?

41:54

You look at

41:56

football over the years, you'll see defining moments

41:58

when you see a manager. make

42:00

a bit of an outrageous statement or pick

42:03

somebody or drops their best player and you

42:05

think uh-oh defining moment. And

42:07

I often see them, I see them in football and I

42:09

look and people assert me I'll say oh have you seen

42:11

what Sonja was done today and they'll look at me and

42:13

go well go yeah I said you

42:15

just wear it to Monday see what happens

42:17

if he loses that game I'm telling you he's

42:20

under pressure. So my most defining moment in

42:22

football was that team I picked for the third

42:24

final. It was voting on madness. I

42:27

very seldom played against three centre backs but when I

42:29

did I used to hate it. That

42:31

was another influence on me like I look back at

42:33

teams who perhaps weren't as good as

42:35

us we've come to the villa and play with three

42:37

centre backs and I think oh oh

42:40

not that again. They're virtually man marked and stuff like

42:42

that. I adopted that as being

42:44

something that I didn't like playing it against

42:47

and you have to play it a certain way

42:49

you know again people often have somebody who's free

42:51

all the time but we didn't play that way.

42:53

We always pass people across to each

42:55

other and things like that and never played with

42:58

a sweeper, always played with what I

43:00

called three centre backs. So there's a

43:02

philosophy behind that as well you know which we

43:04

talked about on the pitch and off the pitch.

43:06

So you get the glory at Wembley Stadium Leicester City

43:09

promoted to the Premier League for the first time and

43:11

then in November 1994

43:13

Ron Atkinson leaves Aston Villa. Oh Brian

43:15

like do you remember reading the paper

43:17

like seeing oh the villa job might

43:19

be up here. Your heart must have

43:21

been pulling you to Villa Park so

43:23

strongly. You know Ron got the sack

43:26

and I was actually having a mid-season

43:28

break in my orca. My

43:30

phone just kept going and I kept ignoring and

43:32

I kept saying I'm not answering the phone I'm trying to

43:34

have three or four days away here and

43:36

in the end I answered it and you

43:39

know it was about Ron sort of leaving.

43:41

Then tried to just dismiss it anyway so

43:43

I think but came back and then

43:45

it just all went crazy and to be

43:48

honest with you I at first

43:50

was not 100% convinced that I

43:52

should do it because I loved

43:54

Leicester. I had a great time at Leicester you know I

43:56

mean I know it ended up in tears all round but

43:58

at the time I first thought were, look, it's

44:01

just the wrong time. And then I remember

44:03

sitting down with John and Alan like I

44:05

always did do. And the general conversation was,

44:07

if you don't do it

44:09

now, you might not ever get asked again. And

44:12

that was the big point. And that was

44:14

probably the most important sentence that we said

44:16

out of all the conversations we had about

44:19

leaving, about what we'd done in three years, about

44:21

what we're trying to do. The

44:23

big line was, you might

44:25

not ever get asked again, this might be the only time

44:27

you're ever going to be asked to be the villa manager.

44:30

That was the deciding point. That was, for

44:32

me, that was the most important sentence that

44:34

was said again. I have those moments where

44:37

people say something that you go, yes, you're

44:39

right, you know. So I made it known

44:41

to the board that at least

44:43

of that, I wanted an opportunity to speak to Villa.

44:46

They weren't happy, they were totally against it. But

44:48

in the end, they agreed that I should be

44:50

able to go there. But, you know,

44:52

when you look today, how a manager has a

44:54

contract and they have a fee if they get

44:56

rid of them, they have a fee if somebody

44:58

wants to buy them, all those things are in

45:01

place now. I look at that and

45:03

I think my example, I mean, Leicester threatened to take

45:05

me to court and everything. I've got a letter upstairs,

45:07

which I keep, you know, of going to court, but

45:09

they never did it in the end. You know, I've

45:11

been summoned to court and I'm like, well, what have

45:14

I done here? You know, just tried to

45:16

do something that I would never stop anybody

45:18

else doing. If a player had come to

45:20

me and said, oh, my club want me,

45:23

the club that I've supported, the club that I've played for,

45:25

I would say, I understand. I totally

45:28

would. I told the Leicester

45:30

people aboard, if they stopped me going

45:32

to Aston Villa, I would pack in. I'd not even be

45:34

a football manager. I'd just pack it in. I won't do

45:36

it. If that's how you're going to treat me, then I'd

45:39

rather not be in this business, you know. So, and I

45:41

meant it. I meant it 100%. I

45:44

think I'm strong enough to my word to have stuck

45:46

to that. If they, for whatever reason, blocked me and

45:48

I had been blocked by a court, I

45:51

wouldn't have gone back to Leicester and worked. I'd have

45:53

probably gone back to the club shop somewhere. I'm

45:56

imagining some younger Villa fans going, wait a second,

45:58

that guy, I'm sure that guy is still there.

46:00

I just felt that it was

46:02

something and when the three of us had sat down,

46:05

John, Alan and myself, that was the decision. The

46:08

crazy thing about it was they let John

46:10

come with me and stopped Alan going. Alan

46:13

Evans, I don't know whether you know this fact or

46:15

not, was the manager for Leicester City and

46:18

he's the only Leicester City manager with 100% win

46:21

record because he beat Arsenal he did in his

46:23

winning game. So,

46:26

Evo is so proud even to this day.

46:28

He's like, he says, I better record at Leicester

46:31

than you had mate, I'm telling you. That's amazing.

46:33

After he beat Arsenal they let him come to

46:35

me, so I think, but I'm sure that's a

46:37

stat that will never be broken, so I think

46:39

that he's got 100% record. Yeah,

46:42

so it was, again, John and I

46:44

went over to Villa and did all

46:46

the interviews and everything and Evo

46:48

was stuck behind thinking, what am I going

46:50

to do? But he was let go after

46:53

a few days, so it was another crazy

46:55

little period. Before we discuss

46:57

your time at Villa, it's worth mentioning actually

46:59

that I really followed Villa

47:01

as a teenager and your time as

47:03

the Villa manager is absolutely my

47:06

happiest time as a football manager those

47:08

two years. Football fan or a football manager?

47:11

Sorry, John. You're not a football manager. Absolutely,

47:13

yes, sorry. I've got ahead, once

47:15

again I'm back on football manager. No, absolutely

47:17

my happiest time as a football fan. Those

47:19

years were just fantastic, that team,

47:22

the lead cup final, just such a

47:24

period of joy for me and there

47:26

was so much fun in that team,

47:28

I just loved it so much. Did

47:30

you feel excited when you first

47:32

joined looking at that squad, that potential was

47:34

there or did you feel a big overhaul

47:36

was needed? Because they were in a sort

47:38

of relegation area, weren't they, when you first

47:41

joined? There was, I mean, there was a

47:43

massive exodus of players. I think in that

47:45

first 12 months, I think I moved 12

47:47

players out. You're looking at people

47:49

like Earl Barrett, Dean Saunders, Dillian Atkinson,

47:51

God bless Kevin Richardson,

47:54

Ray Houghton, Gary Parker, players

47:58

who were well established. But

48:00

I'd made a pact with the chairman, Doug Ellis,

48:02

that I was, like I mentioned,

48:04

Tommy Johnson and Gary Charles, these young lads

48:07

who'd made an influence on me. And

48:10

Dwight York was very important to

48:12

me because probably everybody knows Dean

48:14

Sony, a great, absolutely incredible footballer,

48:17

great person, wonderful player. I

48:19

felt that if I tried to play Dwight

48:21

and Dean together, Dwight would always have been

48:24

the number two, the second,

48:26

because Dean is such a great person, great

48:28

personality, a leader. When

48:30

I'd seen little bits in Yokey, I wanted Yokey to feel

48:32

he was the best player. Now, I had off

48:35

Dean and Dillian's agent, who was the same

48:37

man, a conversation that Fenebache

48:39

and Galatasaray were after them. So

48:42

I knew that I could move those two on. And

48:45

I needed to promote Dwight York to a

48:47

number one main striker. That was one

48:49

of the things which would have brought the

48:51

man out of a young lad, really. But I

48:54

hung on to the likes of Townsend, McGrath,

48:56

Staunton, Bosnitch, and

48:58

then added people like Tommy Johnson, Mark

49:01

Draper, Ian Taylor, Savo Milosevic, which was

49:03

the biggest gamble, but the right one,

49:05

Alan Wright, and Dallas Outgate, of course.

49:07

And let's not forget with Dine Gareth

49:10

in that period as well. So

49:12

there was this nucleus of the Ron Atkinson team,

49:14

which was a great team, then

49:16

added with all the components that

49:19

Ron Saunders had taught me to bring in, into

49:21

teams. It was a

49:23

million in the way of Gelled. I mean, that

49:26

first game of that next season is very famous

49:28

to Aston Villa people. I'm not so famous to

49:30

Mr. Fergish, I know, who always reminds me of

49:32

it, that we beat them 3-1 the first game

49:35

of the season. I was

49:37

with Sir Alex the other day up at

49:39

Bobby Charlton's funeral. It's worth saying this is

49:41

the famous you can't win anything with kids

49:43

game. That is. That's the game where all

49:45

the pundits were going, you can't win anything.

49:47

But Sir Alex and I, I mean, he's

49:49

always been great to me because

49:51

I beat him once and he didn't get

49:53

3-5 very many people. He's

49:56

so wonderful to me. I had a great chat with him

49:58

the other day. and very appreciative

50:00

of how my teams played. You know, that season

50:02

we took the four points off them, but

50:05

that team just gelled. The biggest gamble

50:07

was going out to Belgrade to sign

50:09

Milosevic, but again, I look

50:12

at Ron Saunders, and I'll remind you now,

50:14

Ron Saunders' best teams had a right-footed center

50:16

forward and a left-footed center forward. Andy Graham

50:18

Brown, a little great combination, me and Andy,

50:20

with that, Peter Withers and Gary Shaw, great

50:23

combination. So I was looking for

50:25

a young, strong, left-footed center

50:27

forward, and Milosevic was thrown at

50:29

me, again, just looked at videos

50:31

of him, you know, and watched and watched, and then

50:33

spoke to, I think it was Terry Venables I had

50:35

a good chat to, because he, I know he'd been

50:37

out there or played against them, and he just said,

50:39

oh, I tell you what, I thought he was really

50:41

decent. So I'd only asked one professional

50:43

advice on it, but when I said

50:45

to Doug Ellis, look, there's a lad

50:48

out in Belgrade, I want to sign Golden Milosevic.

50:50

Doug went great, I've never been to Belgrade before,

50:52

so now he was more excited about going to

50:54

Belgrade than signing Milosevic. He'd

50:57

be like, oh, I've never been there, let's get on the

50:59

plane and go, that sort of thing, you know? I

51:01

don't know if you agree, Chris, but for me as a

51:04

football fan, it was so much more

51:06

exciting, the overseas signing in the 90s, because there

51:08

was complete enough a mystery around who these people

51:10

were, which I imagine also reflects the way scouting

51:12

was for you as a manager as well, was

51:14

there more of an element of a slight shot

51:16

in the dark, fingers crossed here? Yeah, but to

51:18

be honest again, if you look back in that

51:21

era where it was the whole of Yugoslavia, it

51:23

was Yugoslavia, I looked at the Yugoslavians

51:25

that were playing in the top teams around the world,

51:27

and my God, there was a lot of good players.

51:30

And I felt if this lad's playing in the

51:32

national team of Yugoslavia, he's got to be

51:34

a heck of a player, he's got to be. So

51:36

the gamble was worth taking for me, but

51:39

they've always produced really talented players from that

51:41

area. Yeah, it was a gamble, but he

51:43

was a gamble of a young lad who

51:45

was scoring goals at an international level and

51:47

team level, and it was that combination again,

51:49

and you know, what you could see about

51:51

his work ethic, and he was just the

51:53

perfect sort of match for Dwight, and

51:56

I felt that would work really well for us, and

51:58

it did, it was great. You

52:00

know, the one thing was with Savo, when he

52:02

came to the club, there was no real

52:04

assistance for him. We dropped him

52:07

off in a little house in Sutton Caulfield, even

52:09

though he didn't really speak English properly at the time. He

52:11

had a friend who did speak a bit. We just said,

52:13

right, you'll be at the training ground on Monday for 10

52:16

o'clock. And he was there. We

52:18

didn't have anybody looking after him.

52:21

Nobody at all. He was

52:23

just left in a three bedroom detached house in

52:25

Sutton Caulfield, given a club car to get around

52:27

in. I'm told to be at the training

52:29

ground for 10 o'clock on Monday morning. And he got there.

52:31

He was there. And it worked. And

52:33

it worked. You still sound amazed. Was

52:35

he quite as one-footed as the press

52:37

used to make out all the time? He used

52:39

to get so much grief for this idea he

52:41

was so solely left-footed. Is that true? Or did

52:44

you discredit him? Well, he was very left-footed. That

52:48

isn't a problem as far as I can see it.

52:51

I mean, Peter with his right footer in the European

52:53

Cup Final wasn't as clear as it was in all

52:55

fairness. He'll kill me for saying

52:57

that though, whether he will. He'll absolutely

52:59

hammer me. But no,

53:01

he was very much right left-footed, very much

53:03

so strong. But I know

53:05

that team. If you speak to any

53:07

member of that team, what about Sabo?

53:10

They'll go up a little bit. He

53:12

trained better than anybody else. He could

53:14

run further than anybody else. His ability

53:16

to run and run and run was

53:18

like unbelievable. And the work

53:20

rate he did, which is not really

53:22

appreciated by anyone other than football, was

53:24

more than anything else. He was perfect

53:26

for us. And that season, him and

53:28

Dwight were great. The whole team sort

53:30

of knitted so quickly it was untrue.

53:32

Did you think that Dwight York would

53:34

go on to have quite

53:36

the career? How good was he when

53:38

you first got there? What did you think about this guy? I've

53:41

said it a few times now. Something hits you

53:43

when you see somebody. And I remember

53:45

we played at Leeds United and we lost the game 2-1.

53:48

And Dwight played up front. He hadn't been playing up front

53:50

all the time. He played up with Dean Saunders. I

53:53

remember at the end of the game falling to my

53:55

knees because we'd lost 2-1 and we shouldn't have knocked

53:57

us back down to Leeds. But I remember that day.

54:00

and Dwight and I'm going, I've got

54:02

to make him the number one striker. I remember

54:04

he just did so much that one game again.

54:06

I'm like that mate. Certain things hit

54:08

me and it stays with you. And I knew

54:11

then that I wanted him to be the number

54:13

one striker. Football was different then

54:15

because your transfer market was open till the

54:17

third Thursday in March. So I

54:19

was always continually having conversations, me with

54:21

the agents. That's what it was like

54:24

in those days. There wasn't chief executives

54:26

who dealt with it. There wasn't directors

54:28

of football. Basically I met all the

54:30

agents and all the agents rang me.

54:32

I'd known that there was some interest

54:34

in Dean. And because of that, I

54:37

knew that I had an opportunity to make

54:39

Dwight the number one striker. So I had

54:41

no doubt whatsoever how brilliant he was. I

54:44

mean, he used to put little shoes on in the

54:47

dressing room where he'd stand in the dustbin in the

54:49

middle of the train and keep it up without, and

54:51

he never fell out and he'll never drop the ball.

54:53

He used to do things that everybody used to say,

54:55

I'm not going to do that. And again, he was

54:58

unbelievably fit, could run all day. So I was

55:01

100% convinced that I had to give Dwight

55:03

that opportunity. And I was a million percent

55:05

convinced that he would make a massive mark

55:07

on it. He just was so good.

55:09

He just had never found his right

55:11

position. His character came out once he was

55:14

given the license to be the number one striker.

55:16

I love Dean Sohn. He's a brilliant lad. I've

55:18

speak to Dean every now and again. And he's

55:20

a great player, but it was his

55:22

right time to move for him as well. You

55:24

know, he got a great opportunity to go and

55:26

play and earn some money and do well for

55:29

himself. And it was Dwight's time to be the

55:31

number one striker. And he just took that with

55:33

both hands and became so confident in

55:35

himself. It was untrue. It was great to see

55:37

the transformation of this young lad

55:40

who genuinely now became a man's

55:42

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turkey or spice it up and make

56:39

turkey tacos. Serve up a go-to

56:42

shrimp cocktail or use Simple Truth

56:44

Wild-Caught Shrimp. risotto.

56:47

Make creamy mac and cheese or

56:49

a spinach artichoke fondue from our selection

56:51

of Murray's cheese. No matter how you

56:53

shop Kroger has all the freshest ingredients

56:55

to embrace all your traditions. Kroger

56:58

fresh for everyone. I used

57:00

to play with my collar up at school

57:03

because of Dwight York that was my thing.

57:05

The similarities ended there it's worth saying. That

57:07

was the beginning of some great parallel. Brian

57:11

you've mentioned your chairman at Aston Villa

57:13

a couple of times. For me there's

57:15

two big infamous chairman in the 90s.

57:18

You got Ken Bates and deadly Doug

57:20

Ellis. You worked hand in hand with Doug

57:22

Ellis and it sounded like just a couple of stories you've told

57:24

so far it sounds like you might have got on. I

57:26

got on great with Doug. It was hard work. My

57:29

mentality again when you I like looking back over

57:31

things and see what goes on and then building

57:33

your own thoughts on things. I always felt if

57:36

I got through the first year with Doug I

57:38

would last three years because three years

57:40

if you've had three years of Doug you wanted to

57:42

pack in because he was hard work. Those

57:45

who got sacked after 12 months just hadn't

57:48

done well enough for Doug to keep you

57:50

there. Again I study things like

57:52

that all the time you know. If you look

57:54

at Doug's reign there that one year or three

57:56

years. Ron Atkinson three years. John Gregory after me

57:58

three years. you've got the one

58:00

year things as well, you know. So he

58:03

helped me an awful lot because he

58:05

recognized that I was very quiet at that

58:08

era. And my younger brother Alan was

58:10

a stronger personality. And

58:12

he said to my mum and my brother was

58:15

a good footballer in all fairness. Well, if Brian

58:17

comes to Aston Villa, we'll sign out in the

58:19

year after. And he did say that.

58:21

My response to that is, yeah, but he did sign

58:24

it because Alan was a decent player. We played in

58:26

the first team three or four times together. He's never

58:28

quite that standard. God bless him. But he

58:30

was important for me. And

58:32

I always remember Doug doing that for us for

58:34

the family. And no one behold in fairness to

58:36

my brother, he got to the first team. We

58:39

played together three, four times together in the first

58:41

team. And he always had that. He

58:43

was always good to me like that. And I was one of

58:45

those people who could put up with Doug in

58:47

a way that some other people couldn't. I mean,

58:49

he used to say things that were so infuriating.

58:52

You know, I mean, I remember one

58:54

day going into the boardroom and he said, Brian, I

58:56

need to speak to you. And he's got an entourage

58:58

of people around him. And then he

59:00

says to everybody, oh, do you like

59:02

my tie? And they're all going, oh,

59:04

yeah, nice, nice. He said, this tie cost

59:07

me a million pounds. And they're all going, what,

59:09

what a million pounds? He said, yes, it's the

59:11

Helsingborg tie. They knocked us out of Europe, didn't

59:13

they, Brian? And it cost me a million pounds.

59:17

So he's like, houndered me. He's like,

59:19

destroyed me in front of these people. And

59:22

I just looked at him and I just laughed at him

59:24

and going, oh, you never stopped it. I

59:26

took that with the people. Most people would

59:28

have hit them in all fairness. Yeah, but

59:30

that was him. And then he's got his

59:32

smug little face going. I can still see him now. I

59:34

mean, I got on great with him

59:37

in many ways. But after three years of working with

59:39

him, I had a home in Mallorca. And

59:41

unfortunately, he had a home in Mallorca. So whenever

59:43

I tried to get away, he would turn up,

59:45

you know, and he's like, I'm just on holiday.

59:47

Well, I need you to come and see me.

59:49

We need to talk about football. And

59:51

you never got a break from him. I got

59:53

a lot of time for Doug. He was great to me. And

59:56

I remember saying to John when I left and

59:58

I knew John was going to come in after me. I said,

1:00:00

well, I'll see you in three years time

1:00:02

somewhere. And it was pretty

1:00:04

much three years on. There's

1:00:07

John looking for another job. But in

1:00:09

fairness, he could be really infuriating.

1:00:11

But at the same time, I

1:00:13

just took him with a pinch of salt. I just loved

1:00:16

him. I thought he was a decent bloke. I

1:00:18

had a big heart. Wanted to do well. Always

1:00:20

used to say to me, don't forget Brian, be humble.

1:00:22

And I just look him and say, no, Doug. Humility

1:00:26

wasn't perhaps the top of his things.

1:00:28

He just said things that he thought

1:00:30

were funny, but they were actually quite

1:00:32

demoralising and men's language. You know, listen,

1:00:35

you just speak as you find

1:00:37

out, got on all right with them, you know. How

1:00:39

stressful is it and how does it affect relationships

1:00:41

between you as a manager and a chairman when

1:00:43

a signing doesn't work out? So one name that

1:00:46

might spring to mind, you made it to great,

1:00:48

Sasa Kurchik is one that didn't quite work out,

1:00:50

would you agree? That was like four million pounds

1:00:52

or something. What is that like when there's quite

1:00:54

an investment or someone there's a risk and it

1:00:56

doesn't work out? So

1:00:59

pre signing Sasha, I've got a

1:01:01

player called Tommy Johnson, who is probably one of

1:01:03

my favourite people I've ever met in football. I

1:01:05

love Tommy DeBitz. He was

1:01:07

always sub for my team, more

1:01:09

often than not sub, but didn't

1:01:12

deserve to be sub. Super player,

1:01:14

great lad, brilliant in the dressing

1:01:16

room, great person. And I

1:01:18

remember speaking to Tommy and Tommy would ask me

1:01:20

a lot of times, he said, Gaffer, I'm not

1:01:22

playing. I need to play football. And

1:01:24

I got a phone call one night from the

1:01:26

manager of Celtic, must have been midnight. And

1:01:29

he said to me, I want to sign

1:01:31

Tommy Johnson. And I knew straight away that

1:01:33

that was something I couldn't stop for Tommy.

1:01:36

So I immediately started looking around for a

1:01:39

talented, like number 10 type

1:01:41

of figure who were doing well. And

1:01:43

in fairness to church, it had Bolton,

1:01:45

he genuinely looked the part. Really

1:01:47

massively talented player, again, from that

1:01:49

Yugoslav area and all that sort

1:01:52

of as it was then. So

1:01:54

I remember Lincoln, the two

1:01:56

situations think in the world of

1:01:58

Tommy Johnson still do to this day. still speak

1:02:00

to Tommy now and I remember

1:02:04

calling him in the next day and said, look, I've had a

1:02:06

conversation with the Celtic manager and

1:02:09

he's looked at me, said, I've got to go, I've got to

1:02:11

go. I said, I know you have. So

1:02:13

I think it was about 2.7 million. I

1:02:15

can't remember what it was, 2.7 or 3.7, I can't

1:02:17

remember. So

1:02:20

I was moving Tommy out, who was

1:02:22

basically on the fringe of the team most

1:02:24

of the time. Everybody at the club

1:02:26

loved Tommy and then I replaced him

1:02:29

with Sasha. Now, the difference

1:02:31

between the two of them in

1:02:33

terms of their mentality around the club

1:02:35

was a million miles apart. I

1:02:38

replaced probably the most popular lad in the

1:02:40

club with somebody who had

1:02:42

to come in and instantly become popular,

1:02:44

but he didn't. And that's just putting it

1:02:46

in a nutshell. He didn't. It was the

1:02:49

complete opposite. You can ask any of the

1:02:51

lads, who was your favourite player in 96

1:02:53

at the auto? Oh, Tommy. Tommy's

1:02:55

great, Tommy Johnson. He was like, Tommy

1:02:57

Johnson, Mark Draper, Ian Taylor were

1:03:00

the hub of absolute enjoyment

1:03:02

in the dressing room all the time.

1:03:05

You can have a laugh and a joke in the

1:03:07

dressing room and they know when it has to be

1:03:09

serious. But those three are special. And Tommy, Tommy

1:03:12

was just so important to me,

1:03:15

but I knew as a young football player and

1:03:18

that era, you were still

1:03:20

at the period where you needed to be

1:03:22

in the first inning to earn extra money.

1:03:24

Everybody was on appearance money in those days.

1:03:26

So I replaced Tommy with Sasha. I don't

1:03:28

really like to knock Sasha, but we didn't

1:03:30

get on overly well. There was no popularity

1:03:32

about them whatsoever in the dressing room. And

1:03:34

it began to sort of sink into it

1:03:37

a little bit. So that was a big

1:03:39

wrong move, but it was influenced by me

1:03:42

trying to help somebody who I had the most

1:03:44

respect for. Like I've said, I

1:03:46

wanted to go to Asseldillah and I went because, and

1:03:49

I same situation with Tommy. I

1:03:51

wanted him to be happy. He's a great person.

1:03:53

He deserved to play for Celtic. I couldn't put

1:03:56

him in Asseldillah team as often as I could.

1:03:58

And I beat him. I

1:04:00

hope he would have done for me at some

1:04:02

stage, but I didn't find the right person to replace

1:04:04

him and Sasha just never, it never

1:04:07

worked. He was talented. There's

1:04:09

no doubt about that. He had a

1:04:11

massive talent, but I've lost that personality,

1:04:14

which was very much part of the group, you know,

1:04:16

and it was a big thing that went wrong

1:04:18

for us. I wanted to ask

1:04:20

about Stoke City. After

1:04:23

you leave Aston Villa, you joined Stoke City

1:04:25

in the second tier and there was a

1:04:27

match against Millwall, I think it was, where

1:04:29

you lost 2-0 to a Millwall team that

1:04:31

finished with nine men and you were after

1:04:33

the match, you say that is the worst

1:04:35

result you've seen in all your years of

1:04:37

football management. Now you've had 24 years to

1:04:39

think about it. Do

1:04:41

you stick with that? Do you think now the dust has settled?

1:04:44

There were so many things went wrong. There was a

1:04:46

period in the game where we played with 10

1:04:48

men. We played

1:04:50

with 10 men for a period of the game. I

1:04:52

think it was 15 minutes. It might have been 10

1:04:55

or 15 minutes. I remember the

1:04:57

linesmen come and pass and we said, why did he

1:04:59

send our lad off? He said, he hasn't sent one

1:05:01

of your lads off. What? We

1:05:03

had a young lad called, I think it was Neil Lewis. We

1:05:06

had a young lad playing for us who,

1:05:08

when he was sending the Millwall players off,

1:05:11

thought he was sent off and he'd walked

1:05:13

into the dressing room. It

1:05:16

took us 10 minutes to work out that we were

1:05:18

playing with 10 men and we didn't need to. That's

1:05:21

how bad that day was. I was all over

1:05:23

the place. Everybody was like, it was the worst

1:05:25

day ever. We couldn't focus on the game at

1:05:27

all. It was ridiculous. We

1:05:29

played so poorly it was untrue. And

1:05:32

honestly, we had to send someone back

1:05:34

in the dressing room to fetch him out to put him

1:05:36

back on the pitch. I swear to God. Running out of

1:05:38

his towel. Honestly, it was

1:05:41

the silliest, stupidest, least professional thing

1:05:43

you could ever do at sea.

1:05:46

And I was part of it. And I'm like,

1:05:48

what on earth am I doing here? It

1:05:51

was absolute rubbish. I blame myself as well, but

1:05:53

we had a young lad who thought he was

1:05:55

sent off and wasn't and we were looking thinking,

1:05:57

well, we're going to get out of here. Where

1:06:00

is he? He's

1:06:04

in the bath. I think that influenced me

1:06:06

more than anything else to say that particular

1:06:08

sentence, but we were hopeless and it was,

1:06:10

I just wasn't used to losing. I'd

1:06:13

had so many good years. I'd had three years

1:06:15

of Darlington where I had to lost. I

1:06:17

just got into a groove of doing well

1:06:20

in football matches. And even when I lost,

1:06:22

I wasn't disappointed with how we'd done very

1:06:24

rarely. So that game was just a real

1:06:26

massive blip, anything. And I'm sure it was

1:06:28

a lad called Neil Lewis. I'm sure it

1:06:31

was Neil. Are you sitting in the dressing

1:06:33

room with his boots off and we had

1:06:35

to go and fetch him back on the boot? That

1:06:39

was just one of many sort of catastrophes that

1:06:41

day, I guess. By

1:06:43

comparison, the lead cup win over Leeds with

1:06:46

Villa. That was a day of absolute glory.

1:06:48

Is that on the other side of the

1:06:50

coin, one of your happiest moments as a

1:06:52

football Totally. I think we, you

1:06:54

know, in all the years I've managed and

1:06:57

I've managed over, I think I managed 900

1:06:59

and odd games and in 60 visions of

1:07:01

football. I've never ever felt

1:07:03

the way I did going to that game. We

1:07:05

all, we just knew we were going to win. We

1:07:07

felt we were going to win. There

1:07:10

wasn't an ounce of anyone being overly

1:07:12

nervous or anything. It was incredible.

1:07:14

I remember we stayed out. I'm

1:07:17

not going to advertise here, but we stayed out of a

1:07:19

Croydon way at a hotel that I liked

1:07:22

because I, when I was a young

1:07:24

player, we used to go to that hotel at

1:07:26

the mid season break and play golf and play

1:07:28

snooker. And I remember thinking after the games that

1:07:30

I'd witnessed at Wembley and things like that, got

1:07:32

to do something that suits me. I needed to

1:07:34

be happy. It brought the best out in me

1:07:36

with the team. So I

1:07:39

decided to stay at Croydon. I remember

1:07:41

telling me that we're going to have to

1:07:43

have three police motorcyclists. Well, I'm a motorbike.

1:07:45

I ride, I can't ride bikes now. I'm

1:07:47

too old, but I've always been a motorbiker. I

1:07:49

love motorbikes and things like that. And I've always

1:07:51

wanted to ride a police motorbike in disguise sort

1:07:53

of thing, you know, and they got to Croydon.

1:07:56

I remember telling me, what are you staying here

1:07:58

for? What are you doing? I wanted

1:08:00

to have a police escort in, I said, I wanted some

1:08:03

motorbikes and they were laughing but I was true. So

1:08:05

I had this incredible run to Wembley, which really

1:08:08

made me feel a million dollars, like, you know,

1:08:10

watching the policemen and the fly passed on these

1:08:12

bikes. They're incredible the way they get you through

1:08:14

crap. This is very sweet, Brian. This

1:08:16

is like an eight year old describing the day. I wanted

1:08:19

motorbikes, I could see other policemen. Not in joys, General Lester

1:08:21

always used to say to me, are you all right today?

1:08:23

And I'd say, yeah, I'm all right. He said, good. Cause

1:08:25

if you're all right, we're going to be all right. He

1:08:27

said, if you're in a bad mood, I

1:08:30

can tell we're not going to do so well. So I always felt that

1:08:32

was important as well. You know, that the manager has

1:08:34

to be in the right frame of mind on a

1:08:36

daily basis and has to be able

1:08:38

to, to let people know that he's ready for it

1:08:40

and everything. You know, unfortunately, when things

1:08:43

aren't going well for you, that's probably one of

1:08:45

the most difficult things for a manager to get

1:08:47

across to his team, how he's feeling and yes,

1:08:49

I'm ready for it. And I'm not sure whether

1:08:51

the, when you're struggling, whether you really can sometimes.

1:08:54

Being happy for me and me being

1:08:56

comfortable was always important to me. On

1:08:59

that particular day, that was the start of

1:09:01

the day where everything went great, but we

1:09:03

were just super ready. And then John Gregory

1:09:06

tells a story to me. John Gregory said

1:09:08

that Howard had sent somebody to watch us

1:09:10

train the day before. And

1:09:13

I said, John was in charge of the training that day.

1:09:15

And John said to me, you said, I've been told that

1:09:17

they're watching us train and we didn't care. So

1:09:20

we put Jim Paul, the kit man in go. So

1:09:25

we've got the kit man in go. We said to

1:09:27

Paul McGrath, right Paul, you're just sitting on their side

1:09:29

there. You just, yeah, have a couple of apples. We

1:09:31

gave him a couple of apples to sit on the

1:09:34

sidelines and sit there doing it. We just totally messed

1:09:36

around the whole time. And it was a, John had

1:09:38

a sort of man thing, but I'm watching John and

1:09:40

think, what's he doing? He's the lad to just, and

1:09:42

he told them all just to mess around, don't do

1:09:44

anything serious. So he really, we

1:09:46

just tried to show everybody that we didn't care.

1:09:49

So now what I don't know whether there was anybody

1:09:51

there or anything, I don't know, it's a problem to

1:09:53

me. It's the last thing in the world we worry about. But yeah,

1:09:56

that was supposedly something that John brought to

1:09:58

hand the did grocery We never

1:10:01

for one minute thought we were going to lose

1:10:03

the game and we didn't care if whoever

1:10:05

was watching us could watch us. It's just one

1:10:07

of those things that I opened the

1:10:09

gates happily to our fans watching us train

1:10:12

in those days. So you know

1:10:14

there were people watching it. It could have been anybody

1:10:16

and now I'm not sure there was anybody there to

1:10:18

be honest but if there was there was and we

1:10:20

weren't prepared to show them anything that we needed to.

1:10:23

A quick question which is a bit of an unusual one very

1:10:25

briefly which is in terms of players

1:10:27

being relaxed and stuff. For me one

1:10:30

of the best shirts of all time is the Villa

1:10:32

shirt with the Muller logo on the front. It's

1:10:35

like my favourite shirt of all time. Do

1:10:38

players care about the shirt

1:10:40

they're wearing? Is there a reaction

1:10:42

when the new shirt comes out at the beginning of

1:10:44

the season? Are players bothered about what they're going to

1:10:47

look like and does that affect their play? I don't

1:10:49

think so no not in one bit. I

1:10:51

don't think that's anything that they worry about. Certainly

1:10:53

not in this modern day. I mean in the

1:10:55

olden days we had a shirt that had to

1:10:57

last us all season otherwise we had to buy

1:11:00

one to be honest. You

1:11:03

got a reduction in the club shop so you were alright. Yeah

1:11:06

I would have done. People

1:11:09

often say to people of my era have you got

1:11:11

your shirt and I'm going we couldn't keep a shirt.

1:11:13

In fact my shirt went missed and the kit man

1:11:15

would have come and got money off us to buy

1:11:17

a new one. We never gave anything away in those

1:11:19

days so I think it's a very modern thing the

1:11:22

old swapping of the shirts over and all that sort

1:11:24

of thing. And again

1:11:26

it would have been nice I think for

1:11:28

people of our era. I think towards the

1:11:30

end of the 70s that's when people did

1:11:32

start collecting a little bit but I'm pretty

1:11:34

much retired by then. So I don't have

1:11:37

any sort of memorabilia shirt wise around or

1:11:39

anything like that which is a little bit sad

1:11:41

but when you think of how they are today

1:11:43

they are great for people to keep and collect.

1:11:46

Brian what a career. I could sit and listen

1:11:48

to you all day but we have to draw

1:11:50

it to a close sadly. So you always end

1:11:53

on one final question. I'm

1:11:55

going to let you time travel back to February

1:11:57

1989 and you can go back. the

1:12:00

first day managing Darlington and then you can

1:12:02

relive the 90s and do it all again.

1:12:05

If I gave you that option, would you take it? Without

1:12:07

a doubt. Well, obviously, yeah, it's great.

1:12:10

I mean, it was an incredible period. It

1:12:12

was hard work. I sacrificed a

1:12:14

lot of things. I was first in every

1:12:17

morning, first in last away. I

1:12:19

remember travelling down to Yovo from

1:12:21

Darlington to watch 45 minutes

1:12:24

of football to drive back and things like

1:12:26

that. I remember going to Tokyo from Darlington

1:12:28

and we lost 5-0 and coming back straight

1:12:30

after the game. You couldn't afford to stay

1:12:32

overnight. We travel on the Friday, play it

1:12:34

Friday night and drive back and get in

1:12:37

at five o'clock in the morning at home,

1:12:39

being work within two days. All of those

1:12:41

things, I remember my back

1:12:43

collapsing when I was manager of Leicester and

1:12:45

yet still trying to train with them and

1:12:47

things like that. It's so great. I know,

1:12:49

I wouldn't swap one thing for being

1:12:53

in it today. I love it

1:12:55

today. I go to every single game, Aston

1:12:57

Villa play. I drove to Scotland two or

1:12:59

three weeks or four weeks back, five hours

1:13:01

there, five hours back after the game. Loved

1:13:03

it. That was brilliant on my own. People say,

1:13:06

you've watched, you've done watched. Everybody

1:13:08

says, well, why don't you stay overnight? I said, I

1:13:10

don't need to stay overnight. I like getting home. I

1:13:12

like to be home. I like to be back at

1:13:14

home. So what I was taught by the likes of

1:13:16

Bruce Rieock and Ron Saunders, who I didn't get on

1:13:18

with very well, but I totally respected, stood

1:13:21

me in good stead for many, many years. I

1:13:23

was very fortunate. To say, you

1:13:26

know, 1969, I left home as a

1:13:28

15 year old boy for

1:13:30

me to be almost 70 year old now and

1:13:33

still be in football. It's just incredible.

1:13:35

And I've had an incredible journey really.

1:13:37

So I've been blessed, very lucky. And

1:13:39

I love every minute of it. We've

1:13:42

loved hearing about it. Thanks for your time.

1:13:44

Brian Little. Oh, it's a pleasure. Thanks very much

1:13:46

indeed. There

1:13:54

we go. That was Brian Little. Oh, crane.

1:13:57

I tell you what, you know, people say

1:13:59

certain people are a real football man

1:14:01

and I've always thought that expression is

1:14:03

a load of rubbish but Brian

1:14:05

Little is a real football man isn't he

1:14:07

I know what that means now absolutely and

1:14:09

he's sort of like summation of his career

1:14:11

I found sort of genuinely touching at the

1:14:13

end there the idea of gratitude and how

1:14:15

lucky he is and all these amazing things

1:14:17

he wouldn't change it's beautiful really

1:14:19

well enough well if I

1:14:21

wasn't such a hard man I'd be well

1:14:23

enough because I'm a classic bloke I'm not

1:14:25

there's nothing also

1:14:28

we're sat here I don't know I mean this

1:14:30

podcast is all about nostalgia but we're sat here

1:14:32

Christmas is around the corner it's an autumn day

1:14:34

listen to Brian Little and I was like I

1:14:36

just got so much nostalgia so much even the

1:14:38

character someone like Brian Little who you don't necessarily

1:14:41

associate with really fond memories as a not

1:14:43

being an Aston Villa fan myself but the way

1:14:45

he talks his passion his story how much he

1:14:48

just wanted a career in the game and just

1:14:50

a figure like that he's got such a romantic

1:14:52

story and before this I wouldn't even known that

1:14:54

absolutely I did have a question about whether he

1:14:56

was worried about the fact that Alan Wright was

1:14:58

five foot four and playing in the pens but

1:15:01

we never got around to that it was quite

1:15:03

a key question I forgot to ask I'm a

1:15:05

bit annoyed about but apart from that lovely chat

1:15:08

such an amazing squad of players like when

1:15:10

he was reeling off those list of names

1:15:12

you're like fuck that was a great team

1:15:14

that they built there it was a brilliant

1:15:16

team Ian Taylor was just one of my

1:15:18

favorite players well back then just a fantastic

1:15:21

underrated midfielder the whole thing Steve Staunton McGrath

1:15:23

just amazing team Boznic what a

1:15:25

team he's finishing fourth as well

1:15:27

like he would have been champions league these

1:15:29

days and also his achievements before Villa that

1:15:31

you kind of forget about like the double

1:15:33

promotion of Darlington and getting Leicester into the

1:15:35

Premier League he had a great CV before

1:15:37

he even got to Villa and the last

1:15:39

man to win a major honour for Aston

1:15:42

Villa wow what a man fair play if

1:15:44

you want even more of that interview you

1:15:46

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1:15:49

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1:15:51

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1:15:53

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1:15:55

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1:15:58

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1:16:00

show page and you can subscribe there

1:16:02

and next week's episode is there already

1:16:04

so feel free to Alright

1:16:07

shall we end on a

1:16:09

Brian little themed quiz would you like me to

1:16:11

be quiz master Michael? Do you have one really go

1:16:13

on ready? I've got one ready. It's not

1:16:16

actually guess why it's gonna be Is

1:16:18

it the League Cup is the League Cup final 24th

1:16:21

of March 1996 Aston Villa

1:16:23

versus Legion I did I think there's a lot

1:16:25

of names that you can get here So it

1:16:28

will be sudden death if you

1:16:30

name a sub unusual. Otherwise you

1:16:32

are eliminated same Absolutely

1:16:36

fair I'd expect you to go as to pop

1:16:38

some big numbers for this game Okay,

1:16:40

let's start with Chris as the non Aston

1:16:42

Villa fan during that era. It's

1:16:44

95 is 95 March 96. Oh 96 Alright

1:16:52

gotta go Nigel Martin and go Oh

1:16:56

No, it's not John Lukic. Oh

1:16:58

my god, it's been lovely playing with you

1:17:00

skull So

1:17:04

this is the easiest game in the world right? Yeah, is

1:17:06

that what this bit is It's

1:17:10

done leakage in the spirit of sport we

1:17:12

should give you a second choice But I don't want to

1:17:14

it's funnier that you went out first go great You just

1:17:16

have to pick one name that played

1:17:18

in that game go to win. Oh

1:17:21

my god Okay, come on. You got

1:17:23

a show a bit of play here. Don't just tap it

1:17:25

on Luke it Am

1:17:30

I right Michael Lovely

1:17:35

play with you credible what song would you like

1:17:37

to play out the show? Can I just say

1:17:39

this is exactly why you shouldn't be playing it

1:17:41

out from the back? What

1:17:46

song I get to choose the atro song do I

1:17:48

you get to pick the song to play the episode

1:17:50

while you're having a Think I'll just run you through

1:17:52

both starting 11s So for Aston

1:17:55

Villa, you could have had mark

1:17:57

Bosnich you go if you're poor

1:17:59

McGrath Gareth Southgate, Gary Charles,

1:18:01

Alan Wright, Ian Taylor, Andy Townsend,

1:18:03

Mark Draper, Dwight York and Savo

1:18:06

Milosevic. And for Leeds United

1:18:08

you could have had John Lukic,

1:18:10

John Pemberton, David Wetherill, Lucas Radeby,

1:18:12

Gary Kelly, Gary Speed, Mark Ford,

1:18:14

Colton Palmer, Gary McAllister, Tony Yboa

1:18:16

and Andy Gray. I

1:18:18

mean honestly every single one of

1:18:20

those is gettable. That's mad. Right,

1:18:26

so you want the song? Yes please. You

1:18:29

feeling a bit sad Chris after that? Yes.

1:18:32

Let's go with the saddest song I know, Nothing

1:18:34

Compares to You by Sinead O'Connor. Just

1:18:38

to make you feel extra bad about what just

1:18:40

happened. Thanks very much.

1:18:42

We'll be back next week and don't

1:18:44

forget if you subscribe to the Quickly

1:18:47

Kevin fan club on another slice you

1:18:49

will get access to pre-sale tickets when

1:18:51

a live show is announced and we

1:18:53

are on the cusp of doing so.

1:18:55

Make sure you go over to anotherslice.com/quickly

1:18:57

kevin to sign up for the quickly

1:18:59

kevin fan club and get pre-sale ticket

1:19:02

access. Thank you so much Tom. Pleasure.

1:19:04

And this week's outro comes courtesy

1:19:07

of Martin Murphy who says farewell

1:19:09

Jason Duzell. But

1:20:00

there ain't a fun thing to

1:20:02

do I love you,

1:20:05

but nothing I said nothing

1:20:07

till you say you're in

1:20:09

the wrong place I

1:20:12

love you, but nothing

1:20:16

I just can't

1:20:19

I can't control I

1:20:32

love you Nothing,

1:20:48

nothing, lonely, beautiful

1:20:50

boy Love

1:20:55

me, sweetest

1:20:57

girl I

1:21:03

love you, but nothing I

1:21:05

never gave up I

1:21:08

never gave up I

1:21:11

never gave up I

1:21:15

never gave up Drove away You're

1:21:20

not dead You're

1:21:26

all alone

1:21:30

You all alone

1:21:36

All alone Thanks

1:21:39

for watching!

1:21:46

Like and subscribe! You

1:22:30

You You

1:23:30

You