276°
Posted 20 hours ago

Be Good, Love Brian: Growing up with Brian Clough

£9.9£99Clearance
ZTS2023's avatar
Shared by
ZTS2023
Joined in 2023
82
63

About this deal

Oh, but most of all, you will fall in love with the family behind the man you all thought you knew. It's a love letter, an IOU for emotional kindness given and an apology all in one.

He is doing so by using the proceeds to raise money for boys like he was. He has already given much of the book advance to charities supporting the teenage homeless and victims of domestic abuse. "Some good is going to come out of it which is very nice," he says. But it is clear that forgiveness must come from himself not the Clough family or anyone else. "They have told me on numerous occasions whenever I have met them that I need to forgive myself, let it go and move on. It is not them stopping me moving on, it is me. Or maybe it will come when he can see how the money raised from this book is helping others. Children just like him whose lives were transformed with an act of kindness. It is easy to see why Clough would feel empathy with the waifs who turned up that day in Seaburn but it does not explain everything that followed. Why did he do it? In simple terms, it seems that Clough, a North East native, just enjoyed their company.The Clough's did nothing wrong and nothing to deserve what I did. But what rhey did for me should be known. An amazingly told true story about the amazing life of Craig Bromfield, a scally from Sunderland who is given a better life by the worlds best ever manager, Brian Clough following a chance encounter as Craig raises money through ‘penny for the guy’ This story is incredible. As a younger forest fan I only hear of Brian in stories told to me and this is by far the best one. What a lovely man he was and what a brilliant way to tell it from Craig, you can hear the regret he lives with in the way parts of the story are told but I’m sure Brian knows you were sorry and he’d have loved this story being told by you. Thank you for sharing this brilliant story. Knowing you were likely to read it, I did think carefully about writing my post. I'm sure you have loads of stories in the book which are fascinating and the ending makes for a great climax for the reader. However, given how it did end, I can't help but feel the family won't want their story told by someone they will feel betrayed them.

Craig Bromfield was just 13 years old when Brian Clough, on a whim, took him and his older brother Aaron in. I love Brian Clough, he was the Forest manager when I was growing up. I might romanticise my childhood memories but he was one of the best things to happen to the club.Even now, I struggle with what happened. There are days when it hits me more. Days when I just sit there and wonder who I am. Am I the person I have grown into, who I think is predominantly good, or is that a mask? Underneath it all, am I still that scruffy little kid?"

I don't know if it selfish but that might help me if I am able to contribute to one or two kids having a better life. The 2nd reason I wrote it (maybe selfishly because of guilt but also because it's my true charachter) is because I would love to somehow be able to help a kid or two who is in the kind of situation I was as a child, have a better life. I'm replying to this one to say, no I don'think you are being harsh at all. It was unforgivable, they did handle it with class and perhaps I should have avoided this particular topic. There are many books out there about this great man, including his own which I read many years ago but Be Good, Love Brian shows a different side to Old Big ‘Ead. This gives an insight to the man he was at home, at the City Ground, out walking his dog by someone who he welcomed into his home after a chance meeting. I do hope the humour of the book comes across as well. It is dark but it is funny. I don't want the negative side to be the overriding side. I want it to be the beautiful act that they did. Just because I am negative about it, does not mean that the story is."

It was a tough upbringing. "I never felt safe in my own home." His father, technically his stepfather, would beat his mother and had been a somewhat notorious figure. "He did not exactly make it easy on himself or us by becoming a drug dealer," says Craig. If I come out of it badly I deserve that as well. The book isn't a tribute to me. It's a tribute to Brian, Mrs Clough and their kids.

I think he wanted to show us that life had more potential than where we were and just give us a nicer life. I don't think he planned for it to last as long as it did. Maybe it was the fact that we got on so well with the family that it turned into a regular occurrence." Working for Simon in his shop, Craig found out that money was being taken by his colleague and friend. Instead of reporting it to Simon, he was persuaded not only to remain silent but take a cut, trying to justify it to himself on the basis that they were being underpaid. Craig Bromfield was just 13 years old when Brian Clough, on a whim, took him and his older brother, Aaron, in. Life with the Cloughs in the Derbyshire village of Quarndon was idyllic with occasional reminders of the fame that once saw Clough called out by Muhammad Ali. "Underneath it all he was normal. He travelled normally, he cooked for us. He treated us like sons." A really interesting read. Terms like 'a journey' or 'a rollercoaster' are used too often but Craig's story really does take you on a trip. Not just the AtoZ of the the timeline, but if you are of a certain vintage (I'm 40) and have certain interests (football, Forest, Brian Clough) it is a time machine to a world that now seems so long ago but also related to what we all are now as adults.

If I had not met Brian Clough, my life would have been over before it had even begun," Craig Bromfield tells Sky Sports. We are all ushered into the dressing rooms. Somebody says there has been a death. Later, we are told five people have been killed and that the club gymnasium is being turned into a morgue. Brian was at the front of the Forest bus, slumped in his seat. The deaths had left him distraught

Asda Great Deal

Free UK shipping. 15 day free returns.
Community Updates
*So you can easily identify outgoing links on our site, we've marked them with an "*" symbol. Links on our site are monetised, but this never affects which deals get posted. Find more info in our FAQs and About Us page.
New Comment