Keegan was box office - Bernstein
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Ex-City chairman David Bernstein has spoken glowingly of Kevin Keegan’s ‘box office’ exploits in leading the Blues to promotion at the first time of asking in that memorable and magical 2001/02 campaign.
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City Vault: The Keegan era begins in winning style
It was 25 years ago today that Keegan took charge of his first game for the club, a 3-0 defeat of Watford managed by fellow football icon Gianluca Vialli.
That victory was the prelude to a season that saw a Keegan team dubbed ‘The Entertainers’ make an emphatic and exciting return to the Premier League after relegation the previous campaign under departing boss Joe Royle.
Despite recommendations to pursue David Moyes from Preston, Gary Megson from West Brom, Alex McLeish from Hibernian and Mick McCarthy who was managing the Republic of Ireland, Bernstein admits Keegan was the standout candidate for the Board.
“We had the period of Joe Royle as manager, where had these two fantastic back-to-back promotions, which I have to say was the highlight of my time at City, but then there was the disappointing season when we were relegated and the view of the board was that we had to make a change,” said Bernstein.
“It was unfortunate as I enjoyed working with Joe enormously. Vitally, the change really had to be impactful.
“We couldn’t stay in the First Division for any period of time. So you had to have someone making an impact and we felt that Kevin certainly was capable of making a serious impact and getting people really excited.
“So, when I, Dennis Tueart and John Wardle discussed this, he was the obvious candidate.
“We knew he was a very strong character and there was a little bit of holding the tiger by the tail, so to speak, but nevertheless, we believed he could make that impression to really drive a club forward that hadn’t had much in the way of glamour for some time.
“We had to try and get back immediately. After the momentum of the promotions and then the relegation, we simply couldn’t wallow away again in the lower divisions. Kevin brought us back up and also provided the wow factor, no question.
“Some of the football that season was as good as I have seen, too. To have been relegated and then, so soon afterwards, watch this fabulous football with so much excitement and see us winning matches easily, not having to sit on the edge of your seat until the last minute, it was fantastic.
“We were winning by handsome scorelines which was absolutely super and it was a real pleasure to be part of it.”
City pulled off quite the coup in bringing in the man dubbed King Kev in the summer of 2001 ahead of that promotion campaign.
There were three key factors behind the signature.
First, he was available after famously resigning as manager of England the previous year after defeat to Germany in the final game at the Old Wembley.
Second, the exhilarating and electrifying way he’d turned around the fortunes of Newcastle appealed to the Board at City and they hoped he’d be able to do the same in Manchester after dropping out of the top-flight the previous season.
Third, Keegan’s larger-than-life persona - built through a stunning career as a genuine superstar of the 1970s and 1980s - also appealed to Bernstein and Co as they looked to show the fans their beloved Blues meant business.
“Timing is everything. If he’d been in a big job somewhere, we would not have got him, but he was available and I know he saw City as a very big club. But a club also on a bit of a downer after the relegation. He knew this was a club where he could have an impact and he most certainly did.
“I keep coming back to that word impact - but it was so apt with Kevin. He also created excitement and interest, and the same way, I think, with Newcastle, he gave them belief and made them appreciate again what a big club they were.
“I think the same thing applied to us. It wasn’t long before, remember, we’d been playing Lincoln and Macclesfield.
“We had got the promotions but then got relegated and we didn’t want that feeling of ‘here we go again’. We needed that boost and feeling that we did have the potential and we the Board were really thinking about the big time.
“And he definitely had the box office element. We felt he was a really good fit to put us back on the map.”
No sooner had Keegan put pen to paper on his five-year deal than he was being unveiled alongside Bernstein at a press conference that attracted intense interest within the football fraternity.
Thousands of fans queued to meet their new Messiah and when he spoke to the media, journalists were spellbound as he gave them the sort of soundbites to make even the most hardened sports editor drool.
Those supporters put their money where their mouths were too.
With less than a month to go until the opening fixture of the season against Watford, City had sold 22,851 season tickets, which had brought in £6.7m, a king’s ransom in these more modest economic times of the early 2000s.
“They were very impressive numbers as were our crowds all the way through our dark days in the third level of English football,” continued Bernstein, whose excellent book ‘We Were Really There: The Rebirth of Manchester City’ tells the story of his time in charge.
“So, the fans were absolutely fantastic, but, of course, they were buoyed by the excitement of Kevin’s arrival and the signings and so on and a new dawn for the football club. They were very excited for the journey ahead.
“I loved that period as well. It was a win, win.
“The fans were happy, the fans were excited and Kevin’s arrival came with great potential and that’s what any chairman would want – the fans excited and thinking there’s a real upside here.”
With the new manager now in situ, Bernstein turned his attention to the business of strengthening the squad for Keegan with Stuart Peace, Eyal Berkovic and a little later, Ali Benarbia, key additions in the promotion push.
Pearce was a household name after a classy career that had taken in the likes of Nottingham Forest, Newcastle and West Ham as well as starring roles for England in Italia 90 and Euro 96.
Berkovic and Benarbia were less heralded at the time but all three made colossal impacts on the pitch as City went up as champions, 10 points ahead of runners-up West Brom and with an eye-watering 108 goals, still a record in English football!
“Stuart was very important,” added the ex-chairman.
“He, too, like Kevin was a unique figure - professional, tough, he wanted success. Having him around, I thought it was a clever signing.
“He was a player of real significance, and a real star name - and still a very effective player as well. I was very happy with that signing.
“The signings of Benarbia and Berkovic was a little bit of genius, which really worked.
“People said you couldn’t have two creative players like that in the same team. But how wrong they were.
“And also, the fact they came from such diverse backgrounds and played together so well, was wonderful to see really.
“On the pitch, Eyal was sublime as was Ali and they fitted in wonderfully with the rest of the team.
“And, the attacking football we played in that first year was wonderful to watch.”
That never-to-be-forgotten season was the stuff of dreams for the dutiful and dedicated chairman Bernstein, who had grown up a City fan since the age of 11 and watched black-and-white television pictures of his beloved City winning the 1956 FA Cup.
But eventually chairman and manager fell out.
Bernstein wanted the Blues to establish themselves in the Premier League prudently, judiciously and, above all else, sensibly while Keegan, he felt, wanted to fasttack the fortunes of the team beyond what could be reasonably expected of a newly-promoted club.
Bernstein eventually resigned as chairman in March 2003.
Despite the breakup, Bernstein still remembers the Keegan Era with much affection and was deeply saddened by news of his premature death this past month from cancer at the age of just 75.
“Bringing Kevin in was the right thing to do. He made a huge impact! It was a fantastic season and he got us promoted.
“I just think it’s a shame that we didn’t continue on with Kevin in a balanced way, matching his ambitions with my desire to do things in a long-term way that kept us strong and solvent.
“I think if we had done that, we could have been continued longer together.
“When I heard the news of his passing, it was very, very sad.
“He was a unique character. He inspired love everywhere he went among so many people.
“He was special, a tremendous figure in football and brought huge entertainment value to the game.
“Of course, we are talking of his time as a manager but he was a fine, fine player, we will never forget that. He could really play.
“So, his passing relatively young is extremely sad. I was very, very sorry to see it.
“For City, obviously Franny Lee has now gone and Colin Bell left us even earlier, then there were characters like Bernard Halford. It’s all so awfully sad. I think about it quite a lot.
“These were such vivid characters, strong characters, and it brings tears to your eyes knowing they are not around anymore. But Kevin will never be forgotten.”