I always have a little laugh when I get told I support "Dirty Leeds", and our great Revie team kicked their way to trophies. Ha ha ha!! Firstly, let's put to bed the kicking jibe. As has been proved by the likes of Blackburn, Wolves, Stoke and others you can't become a great team by simply trying to outmuscle teams. You do need a lot of class as well. Now to the dirty tag. The Revie team came to prominence at exactly the time when Busby's United were set to dominate English and European football with the likes of Best, Charlton, Kidd, Law etc. The media darlings looked destined for great things, except they hadn't banked on two things - their top player and talisman was a drunk and there was the emergence of a "provincial" team playing in all White that helped to derail their ambitions. The media resented the fact that their favourite club could not build on their European Cup success, and so they sought to demonise a great team by labelling them as dirty and ignoring the fact that they could actually play brilliant football. The Revie team was sensational, and their rise definitely added to the negative effect the Irish drunk was beginning to have on his own dressing room. So in an effort to disguise the fact that Man U were falling apart and Busby had lost control of Best they felt it more appropriate to label Leeds as dirty and rather focus on players like Bremner and Hunter for tough tackling. In that era every team had tough tacklers, some only playing because they were genuine hatchet men whose job it was to intimidate. Tommy Smith at Liverpool, Ron "Chopper" Harris at Chelsea, and so on. In fact, Harris to this day still claims he believes that Chelsea would not have won the 1970 FA Cup had it not been for him kicking Eddie Gray off the park, under instruction from his manager!! Funny how the press never labelled Chelsea as dirty. All I can say is for all those so-called football fans who come out with the "Dirty Leeds" rubbish go and look at some footage of that awesome Leeds team and then decide. Watch the genius of Giles and Bremner in midfield, the silky skills of Gray, the power of Lorimer, the quality of Clarke and the brilliance of the defending. That Leeds team was easily one of the greatest to have graced English football in an era before money and when you had twenty teams being competitive, much like today's Championship. It was also before the ridiculous Champions League where the European Cup was played in a straight knock-out over two legs with an unseeded FA Cup style draw, so to even reach the Final took some doing. The bottom line is that an unfancied club came from nowhere and for a decade they upset the apple cart and mixed it with the big boys, and in the process gave other clubs the belief that they could follow suit. Cue titles for clubs such as Derby and Forest, led by a manager who had been inspired by that Leeds team and who wanted to be the next Revie, only it took him failure at Elland Road to realise he only needed to be the first Brian Clough to succeed. Yes, Clough saw and understood that great Leeds team, and from that he learnt how to build a team. Then again, you wouldn't expect a hack to share Cloughie's vision and insight would you?
Clough used to slag off Leeds for being "dirty" every chance he got. My dad remembers it as an "obsession"
Having to raise funds of 90K through the public for Don Revie's statue, both Leeds City Council and LUFC Board of ****ers should be ashamed, and all resign.
You have only to read John Giles' autobiography (page 153) to understand where the tag "dirty Leeds" came from. It was a season when Leeds had the most sendings off as reported in the FA News in 1964. The only trouble was, it included the reserves and junior teams. The first team, in fact, had no sendings off. Our friends across the Pennines had 5 sent off in that season. No mention of that---surprise surprise.
I think the dirty Leeds tag came from the players signed & the style of play. Glasgow street fighter Booby Collins, Norman (bite your legs) Hunter, Jack Charlton, Billy Bremner etc (all extremely good players, but all liked a scrap). Before I was born, but remember seeing a game on ESPN classic of Leeds v Sunderland from the early 60s and if that game took place today there would have been 12 red cards issued. Players throwing punches, Bremner getting hacked down 3 times and then elbowing someone in retalliation. I'd love football to be like this again
It is disgraceful, but it only looks so bad because the Club wastes so much money (i.e. hidden admin costs of £5m, £500k-a-year lawyer wages, £1.5m lawsuits and £750k radio station failures). I don't think the fans coming together to raise money in this way is a bad thing. In a way, it makes it more special, although the club could quite easily have ringfenced money that came in directly from supporters (home games, club merchandise etc.) and done the same. When it's built, we can always remember that it is a tribute from both the fans and the club of Leeds United to commemorate the man who put us on the map and made us the massive club we are today. As for the Council, I hate them anyway, but I don't think it should be their role to subsidize sport. Not that I'd complain if they made a statue of Johnny Giles or Big Jack on Briggate. The City definitely needs 'Leedsing up' a lot more. I'm one who embraces the 'Dirty Leeds' label, by the way, and I think the key point is not that we've necessarily had more hardmen than other clubs (although Bowyer was in the top three Premiership foulers three years in a row, and there's the obvious ones like Bremner, Giles, Vinnie Jones, Judas Smith etc.), it's that we cherish them more than anyone else. Most other fans would complain about someome who puts themself about "aww bloody hell, he's getting sent off in a second," but we relish it. Long may it continue. The only time I'm uncomfortable with it is the Clough sense where it's used at the expense of recognizing our great teams for how much footballing quality they had. But that's pure envy and can be laughed off quite easily. Just like to add my voice to those saying thanks to BillysStatue for what a great read that was. Certainly the Man U angle is an important one in understanding why we're so demonized around the country. I've read about the time around the 60s when we emerged, and obviously that was just after the Munich Crash in '58 where Man U lost many of their upcoming stars. Clubs around the country flocked to lend them players - as ridiculous in my eyes as how West Brom were helping to bail out Pompey recently when they were in trouble, and how the countries of continental Europe ended up paying off Greece's failed politicians. We replaced the media's lovable top-dog-turned-underdog at the summit of English football, and ruffled a lot of feathers with our innovative and professional style which blew the cute Manc victims out of the water and led to their relegation in the 70s and stagnation until they started buying their way to success when football stopped being truly competitive in the 90s.
THANK YOU! Nice to see someone else express that! Not everyone is having the wool pulled over their eyes by the blatant lie that "we operate in the black now." Agreed that this is a well written article - well done!
I think almost everyone agrees that papa is ripping us off Jonny, but most of us don't want to "express" it everyday. nice to see you joining us on here more often though, you ain't fallen out with Jonty on Ja606 have you?
Well, you just sort of answered your own question there. I am spending more time contributing to this board as I have run out of patience with those on JA606 who blindly follow Bates, challenge one to state what the issue is with Bates and then don't respond when one does so or post meaningless drivel. Then they pop up on other threads having a go at those that are critical of him but without offering any meaningful contribution. No, Jonty and I are still mates.
On the bright side, apart from Middlesbrough's Jason Steele saving an Ipswich Penalty, results seem to be going our way again. A win against Watford could see our Playoff chances fire through the roof.
TBH i think we seem like a softer team these days, i would probably welcome a few hard players to stop other teams from playing their games
