How title-winning reign ended as Mackay asked for vote of confidence
TIME flies. Can it really be 45 years this weekend since Derby County beat Sunderland 1-0 at the Baseball Ground with a goal from the Rams’ first £300,000 player, Leighton James?
More to the point, can it really be 45 years to the day since the Rams unceremoniously dumped manager Dave Mackay 18 months after he had steered them to only the second Football League championship in what was then the club’s 92-year history?
Mackay had led Derby to the League title, Charity Shield, FA Cup semi-final and twice to a place in the UEFA Cup.
He had been in charge for three years and one month when he asked the Rams directors for a vote of confidence. That is never a good career move.
They looked at the ceiling; they looked at their feet. They didn’t look at Dave Mackay and in November 1976 he left the Baseball Ground, along with his assistant, Des Anderson.
Mackay had gone to the board after rumours began to circulate in the town that the players were not training properly and that a lack of discipline was the problem. Derby, despite earlier successes under Mackay, were 19th in Division One.
It certainly had been a disappointing season at that point.
Charlie George had been sent off on the opening day of 1976-77 and there were ugly scenes when Manchester United came to the Baseball Ground on the second Saturday of the season.
More than 30 fans were injured in pitched battles between rival supporters, three policemen were taken to hospital, and it was small wonder that, later in the season, local residents sought a court injunction to try to prevent football at the Baseball Ground.
When the Rams did win their first match, they did so in style, beating Tottenham Hotspur 8-2 with four goals from makeshift centre-forward Bruce Rioch.
Derby’s European season soon came to an end. After a farcical 12-0 win over Irish side Finn Harps, Kevin Hector scoring five in this record Rams win, they went out to AEK Athens.
Derby lost both in Greece and at the Baseball Ground, where goalkeeper Graham Moseley had an unhappy evening as the Rams surrendered their unbeaten home record in European competition.
In October, too, Colin Todd had added to the general unrest by seeking a transfer and, although he was later placated with a long-term contract, Derby’s tale of woe was far from complete.
Roy McFarland was playing well enough to earn an England recall but was then injured; and David Nish was out for the rest of the season with a knee injury.
All the time the Rams dived deeper into trouble and, in November, Mackay was criticised by shareholders. At the end of that month, he asked for a show of hands supporting him, failed to get it and was on his way.
On November 25, 1976, Mackay and Anderson were shown the door.
As he left the Baseball Ground, he told club secretary Stuart Webb: “Some of those directors are deluded. They’ve been spoilt rotten. They seriously expect a trophy every season now.”
Reserve team coach Colin Murphy was given the post and there were many in the game who were surprised that Murphy, inexperienced in both playing and managerial terms, should be offered what was still one of football’s top jobs.
It was Mackay who had signed James, a year earlier, from Burnley.
The outside-left was already a regular in the Wales team and he would be capped 13 more times while with the Rams.
He seemed to possess everything you could wish for in a footballer: two good feet; blistering pace; an eye for goal (he scored 21 times in 90 appearances for Derby); and a teasing centre that provided plenty of chances for others such as George and Hector.
Unfortunately, James was an early casualty of Tommy Docherty’s illfated reign as manager of the Rams.
Docherty was appointed in September 1977 – Murphy had to take charge of the team one more time, knowing that he was about to be sacked – and a month later James was on his way to QPR.
What a poor piece of business that turned out to be: James was exchanged for Don Masson, with both players now valued at £180,000.
But Masson was 33 years old; James was 24. Within a year, Masson had gone to Notts County for free, so, in effect, the Rams had written off £300,000.
James, by the way, made only 33 appearances for QPR before moving back to Burnley.
He then helped Swansea City to reach the First Division for the first time.
By then, the Rams were heading towards the Third Division.