Peter Taylor

Football manager | 1928 - 1990

Coach who found the footballing talent for Brian Clough’s legendary teams

Peter Taylor, who died in Spain aged 62, on 4 October, 1990, was most famous for his successful football managerial partnership with Brian Clough .

Peter was a scouting genius, rarely surpassed in the art of talent-spotting and buying the right players; Clough's skill was then in shaping them and motivating the team. It was a winning combination.

They had their first massive success at Derby County where they re-built a struggling side from scratch, awakened the football ambitions of the Midlands town, won promotion to the top flight in 1969, and then took the League Championship from under Leeds United's noses in 1972.

After an acrimonious split with the Derby County Board, the duo went on to manage Brighton but split when Clough took the manager's job at Leeds United while Taylor stayed on with the south coast side.

The two re-united at Nottingham Forest in 1976 with spectacular success. Within a year Forest were promoted to the First Division and emphatically won the Championship in their first season there. Forest also won both the League Cup and the European Cup twice.

Taylor and Clough fell out irrevocably after Taylor came out of retirement in the 1980s to manage Derby County. The two were never to speak again.

Peter John Taylor was born on 2 July, 1928, in Nottingham. He was signed as a goalkeeper by Nottingham Forest in 1945, played for Coventry City between 1950 and 1955 and then moved to Middlesbrough where, as a reserve goalkeeper, he first encountered a young striker called Brian Clough. It was perhaps one of his first, great, pieces of talent-spotting as he sang the praises of Clough who went on to become a prolific goal-scorer until injury in 1962 ended his playing career.

After 140 appearances for Middlesbrough over six years, Taylor moved to Port Vale in 1961. In October 1962 he was offered the manager's job at Burton Albion and led them to triumph in the Southern League Cup in 1964.

A year later, he became Clough's assistant at Hartlepool. The two gradually turned the club's fortunes around and their success caught the eye of struggling Derby County. In May 1967 the duo were offered contracts there.

Taylor was instrumental in signing players like Dave Mackay and Roy McFarland who were lynchpins in Derby's rejuvenated side.

The 1972 First Division win they masterminded was the first in Derby's history and the team was paraded through the streets as heroes.

The following season there was more glory as Derby reached the semi-finals of the European Cup - losing controversially to Juventus. It later emerged that the West German referee had received gifts from the Italian side before the match.

Then, the mood at Derby turned sour. Clough was frequently in trouble with Derby Chairman Sam Longson for his outspoken, controversial views and the way in which, the Board felt, he courted publicity and controversy. There were numerous other gripes including disagreements over Taylor's role in the management set-up. It all came to a head in 1973 when Taylor and Clough resigned. Fans protested but to no avail.

The duo took jobs at Third Division Brighton, but in July 1974 Clough left for the job at Leeds United - as successor to Don Revie - but his reign lasted just 44 days.

Taylor stayed on at Brighton for two more seasons, steering them to a fourth place finish in 1975-76.

On July 16, 1976, Taylor resigned to pair up again with Clough who by this time was manager at Nottingham Forest.

Together they made Nottingham Forest a major power in European football. They won the European Cup in 1979 with victory over Malmo FF and retained it a year later against Kevin Keegan's Hamburg SV.

Taylor retired in May 1982, but the feud with Clough - which was to last until Taylor's death - started in earnest after Taylor was lured out of retirement to take up the reins at Derby County again. The two former friends were now separated by just a short stretch of dual carriagemway between Nottingham and Derby but were a million miles apart in understanding.

It seems that the first cracks in their once solid relationship came in 1980 when Taylor published an autobiography called "With Clough by Taylor", apparently without consulting his colleague.

Things worsened considerably after Taylor became manager of Derby County in November 1982. After the way he had parted company with Derby, Clough saw this as a betrayal, and the final straw was a dispute between the two over the transfer of John Robertson from Forest to Derby in May 1983. This came after Taylor had revelled in Derby's victory over Clough's Forest in the third round of the FA Cup in January that year.

Taylor resigned in April 1984 with Derby third from the bottom of the Second Division and no money to spend on players.

A year before his death Taylor wrote a newspaper article urging Clough to retire before his health forced him into premature retirement or another chairman forced him out. Clough angrily rejected the suggestions.

Peter Taylor died suddenly while he was on holiday in Majorca. Clough was said to be distraught. He attended the funeral of his once-close friend and dedicated his 1994 autobiography to Taylor with the inscription: "To Peter. Still miss you badly. You once said: 'When you get shot of me there won't be as much laughter in your life'. You were right".

Peter Taylor in 1983

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