Tackle Interview #5: Frank Clark

In October of this year Frank Clark walked back into Nottingham Forest for the third time. Following successful stints as both player and manager, he completed a rare hat trick by becoming chairman of the club. Before all this, in the summer of 2010, Tackle spoke at length with Clark, then still at the League Managers Association, for what turned out to be a fascinating couple of hours:

Dazed and confused from an insipid world cup campaign, Tackle retreated to Nottingham back in early July for a low-key final weekend. With the opportunity to toast the Spanish and condemn the Dutch looming, we first spent the afternoon in the company of former Forest and Manchester City boss, Frank Clark. Now working at the League Managers Association, Clark’s unassuming demeanour belies the work he does at the forefront of key discrimination issues in football. While another North East native’s bizarre visit to an old friend is making headlines elsewhere, ours is a more pedestrian couple of hours with Clark both warm and revealing on Clough, Oasis and Justin. “We tried to persuade him to come out,” he explains.

What do you remember of the atmosphere around football from your playing days back in the seventies?

Racism was quite overt and nasty in those days. I played with Viv Anderson at Forest. When I was playing at Newcastle there weren’t many black players in the football league, one or two – Clive Best, John Charlton at West Ham. Then, as more began to come in to the game, the racism became more overt. People remember the banana thing from John Barnes’ time. So it was pretty nasty. Homophobia? I never really came across it but obviously it was there. It was never something that I was aware of in the dressing room or from the terraces because…

It was so off radar?

Yeah, racism was the big problem

So in that era, how difficult was it to be different in football full stop?

I got tagged with this intellectual, well-educated thing. It never became an issue because I didn’t push it.

You dumbed yourself down?!

No, but racism was the worst without a doubt. People like Viv were pioneers and role models. Viv never sort to be a role model. He was a great lad, smashing, easy going. Then it got worse after that on the terraces. It got less and less in the dressing room as more black lads came through but it got worse on the terraces.

So it was sorted internally first? That’s interesting because a lot of people I speak to about homophobia suggest the players are totally fine with it?

I think today you’re absolutely right, I don’t see it as a problem within the dressing room. Well, I haven’t been in a dressing room for a while! I don’t see it as a problem among the players. It’s now at the stage where racism was probably before Kick It Out. I think homophobia is there, it’s still on the terraces. Perhaps not as widespread but it’s only because being gay is as not as visible as being black. I don’t know of any. Sol’s had a lot of stick from the crowd but I don’t think he’s gay, its just homophobic abuse. So it’s not as obvious but its there.

The Gareth Thomas thing is interesting. He got a lot of abuse but I didn’t see it in the newspaper at the time it happened. Had it been a premier league footballer there would have been headlines, that’s the different emphasis and spotlight that footballers live under. I think the RFL dealt with it very positively.

It’s interesting in the case of Thomas. He now acts as a target so it’s drawn out and can be dealt with it?

Yes you can deal with it, that’s right. There are two prongs to any campaign I think. Education is the key to anything but that takes time. Then you’ve got to have sanctions for the here and now to deal with what’s going on. You hope by educating the next generation it will quietly disappear. Which is to a certain degree what’s happened with racism. Don’t get me wrong I don’t think its disappeared but as far as football’s concerned there’s no comparison.

The homophobic thing, the only gay issue has been Justin. I can talk about that because I was involved with him.

At Leyton Orient?

At Leyton Orient and Forest to a certain degree. I left Forest and went to Sunderland for two years then got the sack and was out of work for about four months. Cloughie offered me the job of reserve team coach - on absolute peanuts I’ve got to tell you - but I was desperate. So I came back and I did it for three months and it was during that spell that they signed Justin. He never fitted in there, not because he was gay. It wasn’t that evident then. It was the wrong football club for him to go to.

Why?

Well, he was the sort of lad who needed to be at a football club who played with the ball a lot in training and worked hard because he was very basic. His strength was his physicality. When people say you were gay and couldn’t be a footballer because you were too soft well look at Justin! Take it from me he wasn’t soft. I’ve played against him when he was at Norwich and he knocked Burnsy and Larry Lloyd all over the place, and you’ve got to be very tough to do that. That’s why Forest bought him, Taylor especially remembered the chasing he gave Larry and Kenny. So he was tough but not a great footballer. He needed to be at a club where he was regularly working with the ball you know? Forest weren’t like that…very often (laughs). Plus Brian was very autocratic and Justin was a bit of a maverick.

I remember Clough saying he regretted the way it turned out. Was that dynamic unique to them or would Justin have had that run in with Peter Taylor also or any other manger at that time?

Partly the era, but partly Brian’s style you know? Dictatorial, autocratic. He was a dictator. I happen to think that’s the best way to run a football club, or run the country! (laughs) Have a benign dictator. Problem is benign dictators are few on the ground. They tend to be not very benign if they are dictators! Brian was a dictator and he had run-ins with lots of players most of whom eventually bowed the knee to him or left, it had to be one or the other. People like Larry, Kenny Burns, Archie Gemmil – they were rebels.

…..who were tamed?

I don’t know if they were tamed but they accepted the straight jacket of what he said. I think Justin was so powerful an individual that he found that very difficult. I’m sure that was genuine from Brian. We’d all with hindsight do it differently. It was partly the era but it was mainly Brian.

So I came back and I could see it wasn’t going to work. He’d just come and was in the team but he didn’t look a Nottingham Forest player. I left, and it all got really sour after that. I’m sure Brian regretted calling the police and that.

Because I travelled with the first team I got to know Justin quite well. When he came back from America the first time after the operation he got himself an agent, a man called Ambrose Mendy. A very strange man! He was a boxing promoter, used to be Nigel Benn’s manager and thought he’d get into football agency as well. He approached me about bringing Justin to Leyton Orient - this time I was running the whole football club - we were short of players and I though his fitness was ok and he would create some interest for us. He might put a few on the gate. Me being foolish really, I’m not casting aspersions on Justin, that’s just the sort of club it was. You could have Lionel Messi there and you wouldn’t put any money on the gate. So I paid him quite a lot of money by Orient’s standards but it didn’t work out. Nothing to with him being gay, he hadn’t come out by then, but it was pretty obvious. Myself and the physio - Billy Saunders - were very close to Justin and we tried to persuade him…

To come out?

To come out but he was terrified. He was scared to do it. And I could understand. He just wouldn’t do it but the problem we had was Justin wasn’t a footballer. He was a battering ram, he was powerful and a good footballer in that sense but he didn’t have a lot of skill. He’d had this knee injury and that’s what finished him initially and he went to America and had an operation. It helped but he was never the same. He was older for a start. He wanted to play standing still but he wasn’t good enough and we weren’t good enough as a team. We didn’t get one extra through the gate.

You spoke to him about coming out because you thought it was affecting him?

Yes because he was not only afraid of coming out but of it leaking out. So we thought, Bill and I – my confidant really - it would be better for him that was all. We knew initially there would be headlines but thought that would disappear. It definitely wouldn’t be a problem in the dressing room we knew that for sure. The lads thought the world of him. In fact that’s one of the reasons we let him go! He was having too much influence with the other players about how we were going to play the game. It was a shame. Then he went back to America and the real tragedy for him was he got caught with the boy. The boy panicked (the charges were later dropped) and Justin fled, and I think that was the whole episode that finished him as a person. I think that was the real tragedy more than going out of the game, I know there was a myth going round that he got pushed out of the game because of his homosexuality but I don’t think that was true, he just couldn’t play anymore.

And if it hadn’t been for that incident in America he could’ve seen it through?

It made him very suspicious, me and Billy tried to contact him when he was back. That’s really my only experience in the game of homosexuality or homophobia. I do think its now at the stage that racism was along time ago. I know there are some activists in the gay community who want a gay footballer to come out and be a role model. That’s a big ask especially of a top player.

Where is it stalling? Do the football authorities get it?

The FA, to be fair, has embraced the concept, which is why they have set up this homophobia advisory group. You have the football people and the LGBT. At the moment we are exploring each other. What can we do to help each other?

You heard the Gordon Taylor interview earlier this year?

Gordon’s a bit of a dinosaur really. I think he regrets saying that to be fair to him. I think he was caught on the hop, which he isn’t very often.  He’s a very shrewd guy. Comes from the North West - they are a bit behind the times up there - but to be fair that’s probably a perception quite widespread that the fans aren’t quite ready for it. That was my feeling two or three years ago, the more I’ve got involved I think it would surprise people. The media would be the problem. A large percentage of football journalists they’re dinosaurs as well! But it will happen and it will be dealt with.

You had fifteen years between your spells at Forest as a player then a manager did you notice any difference coming back in 1993? Had anything changed in attitudes towards homosexuality?

I don’t think anything had changed at all. The only thing that had changed was there were more black players in the dressing room. In terms of the gay thing, that hadn’t changed at all.

You had to deal with racism, mental health, around players?

I remember an incident at Manchester city around race. One of our players was accused of making a racist comment

What about players confiding in a manager? Was there a support structure for players coming out?

Not at clubs or the PFA, not for homosexuality

Mental health was new too?

That’s even more recent. That’s even less down the road.

You worked with Stan Collymore?

Well that attitude - I don’t want to criticise John Gregory - was the prevailing attitude in the game. ‘Pull yourself together!’ It’s only in very recent times that that has changed, I was probably the same, might have been a bit more understanding than John but most managers would have said the same thing. One of the things that helped me realize was a good friend of mine that had terrible depression. Through helping her and talking to her it’s helped me appreciate how horrendous it can be, but the classic response in football was ‘pull yourself together!’

The recent case of German goalkeeper Robert Enke brought mental health to the fore? There are parallels between homophobia and mental health as far as taboos in football go?

At the LMA we now have a confidential help line for our members. Managers have used it 12 times this year. People are beginning to realize that mental health is an all-encompassing thing really. It’s about addiction gambling, drinking, womanising. It’s taken a long time for that to seep through and change attitudes, so mental health and homophobia are two fairly similar problems. Mental heath is further down the radar. Its not something the game has been good at getting rid of this macho thing, this unnecessary macho thing.

How do these issues sit in the dressing room alongside players you managed like Stuart Pearce who cultivated that macho image, does it make openness difficult?

Probably doesn’t help. But you only get one or two Stuart Pearces in a dressing room. They’re not all like that! You can imagine like any group of men, they start from him then the whole spectrum all the way down you know?! Any individual who had those kinds of issues in the past has tended to hide it and deal with it in their own way. But Stuart didn’t expect everybody to be like him. When we played Bayern Munich in the quarter finals over there we were all lined up ready to come out and you’ve got two Norwegian, an Irishman, a Dutchman, a Welshman, and Pearcy was “Come on now were all fucking English!!” I was thinking ‘Oh Stuart behave yourself!’ But it had its place and it made him feel better. He was a great leader to be fair. No doubt. The best captain I came across, either played with or managed.

Do you see him now?

Don’t see a lot of him no. He’s ok he’s learning his trade. He’s had a couple of setbacks which wont do him any harm. He’ll have learned from them. I think he’s learning he has to temper this macho image; you can’t be like that anymore as a manger, the players have changed. They’re all millionaires now you can’t threaten them.

Your signing of Bryan Roy was quite a pioneering move. Has the influx of foreign players since helped to broaden the mind of English footballers?

I think certainly at the top level now the influx of foreign players has altered the dynamic in the dressing room and that coupled with the advances in sport science as well. When I played we all thought having a beer after the game was good for you and a cup of tea at half time. I suppose Bryan was one of the first I never really looked at it that way.

None of those players that came over were openly gay but it must have helped slowly change attitudes?

We had Bryan and Stan playing together. Stan was a character.

How was that period? He was troubled?

He wasn’t troubled but he was difficult, Stan had an incredibly difficult upbringing, his father was run out of town in Cannock. It was the seventies so that was very difficult. His mother was fantastic. We met her a few times.

He was so gifted.

The most talented player I ever worked with but he had a problem you know. We tried very hard, Brian tried to sign him a year before, that would have been a disaster.

You say that but Forest might have stayed up with those goals?!

Yeah but Brian was gone by then.

The story of Stan, for me, was when he played in that summer England tournament. Terry was the manger, Stan, Colin, Stoney and Pearcy all played in the England squad and Terry rang me half way through the tournament. He said “Frank, it’s Collymore… he looks as though he doesn’t want to be here?” I said, “He’s like that all the time here Terry but I thought he might be a bit different with you!” (laughs)

He would tell you that he wanted to be a footballer but he didn’t want it badly enough. Stan was always missing when he knew there was hard graft. He was very difficult to get close to for the other players, very suspicious. Crazy excuses for not coming to training! One day his grandma had died and he was at the funeral so Al (assistant manager Alan Hill) being Al sent his mother a bouquet of flowers. His mother rang up “What were the flowers for?” Well Stan was saying your mothers died “No she hasn’t!” What a player, what a talent. He suffered with depression and it changed my whole outlook.

One of the things Tackle is trying to do is get high profile fans to talk about homophobia in the game. You were at Manchester City. People like the Gallagher brothers, could they influence football fans on this issue?

I think it’s probably the right idea. I’m not sure the Gallaghers would be a good example! I mean I never met them when I was there. The only experience I had of them was when the chairman invited them to a game at a private box and Liam nearly caused a riot! He walked round the pitch before the game and was goading the opposition fans. We got reported to the FA and premier league so he wasn’t very helpful that day! But I know what you mean if you could get some people from the music industry yes.

Current players are starting to speak out at last Clark Carlisle, David James for example. Can the LMA influence managers to speak?

We have a system where we have delegates, for want of a better word, who speak to all managers twice a year on a one to one level. They talk about issues and see if we can help them and that is something we have asked them to bring up in the last 18 months or so. It used to be racism.

Trying to convince some of them that what was acceptable twenty years ago is not acceptable anymore is difficult. One - who shall be nameless - said “I don’t take offence if someone calls me ginger why should I, etc, etc….” We’re in the 21^st century! If you do that you’ll be in trouble. Kevin Radcliffe made a throwaway comment to an apprentice who was black and then three months later the boy was released because he wasn’t good enough. His mother reported Kevin and it cost him about £15k and in a way it was good for us because we could use that. Even if we can’t convince you of the ethical aspect of it we can convince you of the practical. I mean, Cloughie! Forest lost Andy Cole. He was in their system and they invited him to the ground. He was standing in the corridor one day and Cloughie said ‘Hello Chalkie!” and that was it, he never came back.

When do you think a player will come out? Tomorrow? 5 years? 10 years?

I don’t know. I certainly think it will be within 5 years, probably less than that.  Hopefully it will be voluntary but I worry it might be the other way. Lets hope not.

With that, Clark is on his feet to pay the drinks bill. As he leaves I ask him how his guitar playing is going (he famously used to perform on the team bus following Forest European cup victories). He returns to his seat and enthuses for several more minutes about gigs and re-unions he’s been playing at. A rock ‘n roll image is not something often associated with Clark, ever since he attempted the impossible by following Clough in the nineties. However, his understated charm and intelligence suggest it is he who may yet play an integral role in football’s much needed revolution in the head.