THERE is no doubt that ruddy-faced former manager Brian Clough is a footballing legend.

On the national stage he is best known for bringing European glory to Nottingham Forest and a career which ended in relegation, coupled with years of heavy drinking.

But Clough, well remembered for his cantankerous nature and acid tongue, is also a hero at three clubs in his native North-East - as a player at Middlesbrough and Sunderland and as manager at Hartlepool.

The stories surrounding him are famous. He used to chase unwelcome reporters from outside his home with a tennis racket and could reduce prima donna players to tears.

In a glittering managerial career, Clough won two European Cups, two league championships, four League Cups, one European Super Cup and a Second Division title.

Until the arrival of Kevin Phillips on Wearside, he was Sunderland's leading post-war goal scorer.

He was also top scorer for three seasons in succession at Middlesbrough and is fondly remembered in Hartlepool United as the man who built the club's first promotion-winning side.

Tributes poured in last night as the 67-year-old recovered from his life-saving liver transplant in Newcastle.

Middlesbrough club spokesman Graham Bell said: "We join the rest of the football world in wishing Brian a speedy recovery from his operation and a swift return to full health."

Former Sunderland captain Charlie Hurley said of Clough, who signed from Middlesbrough for £45,000 in 1961: "His whole aim was to score goals. He was the best striker of his day in the Second Division and most of the First."

A Hartlepool United spokesman said: "The fans old enough to remember him do so with great fondness, for the way he turned the team around and effectively set up the club's first promotion in 1968."

He was born in Middlesbrough in 1935, to working class parents, who lived in Valley Road.

He began his career as a centre forward with Great Broughton in the Cleveland League, while working as a messenger boy at ICI.

He signed for Middlesbrough, aged 17, in 1952 and left Ayresome Park with a record 204 goals from 213 games.

A move to Sunderland followed, but his career was cut short after he broke his leg.

He ended his playing days with 251 goals from 274 matches. He was capped twice for England.

Management followed, when, aged only 30, he took over at Hartlepool, then in the old Fourth Division.

As part of his trademark approach, Clough wrung every ounce of ability out of his players, through a mixture of reverse psychology, tough training and, in some cases, little short of bullying.

Pool won promotion at the end of the 1967-68 season. But by that time, the man responsible for the club's rise had left Victoria Park.

He went on to enjoy success with Derby County and Nottingham Forest.

He transformed Derby from also-rans in the old Second Division to league champions and European Cup semi-finalists.

After brief spells at Brighton and Leeds United, he joined Forest.

The club won promotion to the First Division in 1976-77 and a year later, were champions of England and League Cup winners.

He went on to win the European Cup in 1979 and 1980.

In 1994, Clough resigned after 18 years in charge at Forest, the year the club finished bottom of the then-new Premiership and was relegated.

By then, his battle with alcohol was football's worst-kept secret.

Despite the sad end to his career as a manager, he remains a hugely popular figure with fans and players.

Anxious wait after transplant

BRIAN CLOUGH faces an anxious two-month wait before Newcastle surgeons can be sure that his liver transplant has been a success.

The Middlesbrough-born former manager and TV pundit underwent an eight-hour transplant as an NHS patient at Newcastle's Freeman Hospital on January 13.

The first 100 days after the operation are considered crucial, in case the patient's body rejects the new organ.

Yesterday, consultant Derek Manas said: "Brian said he felt very privileged about being considered for a transplant, because of the amount of alcohol he had consumed in the past, and I respect that.

"The lifestyle that many footballers lead, they have to realise how much damage they are doing to themselves."

Clough had been a patient at the Freeman for four months. When a liver became available from a donor in Northern Ireland, he was driven from his Derby home.

Mr Manas also revealed that Clough had heeded warnings about his health.

"It is a stipulation for anyone to be considered for a transplant must have been free from alcohol for six months and undergoing a rehabilitation programme," he said.

"This was the case with Mr Clough and a biopsy taken while he was waiting for the operation showed he was very definitely not drinking.

Clough underwent chemotherapy after cancer was discovered in his liver. Experts at the Freeman said there was no remaining trace of cancer, following the removal of the damaged organ.

"He has been a model patient," said Mr Manas.