Sunderland born Nigel Clough was seen by the football purists as a stylish player of great vision and awareness with superb passing ability, being equally at home whether he was playing in midfield or up-front as a striker. Having had a hard act to follow as the son of the famous Brian, he spent a successful nine seasons under his dad's management at Nottingham Forest, where he had been a consistent goalscorer and had won 14 England international caps whilst also representing his country at Under-21 and 'B' team level. After being transferred to Liverpool in 1993 he arrived at Manchester City in January 1996 in a deal worth £1.5 million - being signed by manager Alan Ball after having made only a handful of first-team appearances in the previous two years at Anfield as he struggled to hold down a first-team place - and he joined a club which was languishing in the lower reaches of the Premiership.
The 29-year old made his debut in a 1-1 away draw at Southampton on January 31st 1996, and just four days later scored his first goal for the Blues when he opened the scoring in a 2-0 victory over QPR at Maine Road. Despite an obvious lack of match fitness he had made a promising start to life at City, finding the mark once again ten days later in a 2-1 FA Cup fourth round replay victory over Coventry City. Although a 2-1 defeat the following Saturday to Manchester United at Old Trafford ended any cup hopes, another Clough goal in a 1-1 draw at Chelsea in March was enough to keep the team just above the relegation zone, but a poor sequence of results saw them go into the last game against Liverpool at home needing a win to have any chance of staying up. In the event a 2-2 draw was not enough and they were subsequently relegated to the First Division, with Nigel having to play his football out of the top-flight for the first time in his career after only 15 league appearances with his new club.
The 1996/97 season turned out to be one of the most turbulent in the club's history, with Clough being a regular choice in the side over the first three months as a succession of managers came and went. After only three games of the new term Alan Ball resigned and was replaced by caretaker boss Asa Hartford, who in turn was replaced six weeks later by Steve Coppell. Despite the team being closer to the bottom of the table than the top Nigel had been in decent form, getting goals against both Barnsley (1-2) and Norwich City (2-1), but after only thirty-three days Coppell himself resigned his position on medical grounds and was replaced by assistant Phil Neal. A succession of poor performances followed and Nigel lost his place in the team after a 2-1 defeat at Portsmouth in mid-November, being relegated to the substitute's bench for the next few games. It was then decided just before Christmas that he would be allowed to move back to the Premiership on loan to his old club Nottingham Forest, who had just installed Stuart Pearce as caretaker manager after the resignation of Frank Clark. Amazingly the revolving door in the manager's office at Maine Road was in operation once again ten days later when Neal left the club and was replaced by Clark, who became the fifth man in charge since the start of the season.
After 13 appearances and 1 goal for Forest Nigel returned to City in March and saw out the remainder of the campaign before playing his last game in a sky-blue shirt in a 3-2 home win over Reading on the final day of the season. He had played a total of 43 league and cup games (including 5 as a substitute) in his time with the Blues and had scored 5 goals.
He had a brief spell on loan with Sheffield Wednesday at the start of the 1997/98 season before deciding to retire from the professional game at the age of 32, as he had suffered for some time with a heel injury that had got progressively worse. In October 1998 he was appointed player-manager of Burton Albion, leading them into the Conference in 2002 and the brink of promotion to the Football League in the 2008/09 campaign, before going on to manage one of his father's old clubs, Derby County, in January 2009. (David Redshaw)