As Burton Albion contemplate the possibility of derbies against Aston Villa and Derby County next season, perhaps it is not surprising that a club whose main rivals used to be Gresley Rovers and Tamworth have been suffering from nerves in recent weeks. It is 14 years since the Brewers clambered out of the sixth tier of English football and now they are on the threshold of the Championship for the first time in their slow-burn history. Yet it has been a crawl rather than a sprint towards the finish line.
Before last weekend’s 3-0 win over Colchester, Burton had given the chasing pack hope after a run of four draws and two defeats. They sit second to Wigan Athletic, with Walsall three points behind in third and Millwall six points behind in fourth, both poised to capitalise on any more slips.
John Mousinho, Burton’s captain, prefers to think positively. “To be in this position now, considering the size of the club and the expectations at the start of the season, everybody would definitely have taken it,” he says. After all, it is still in Burton’s hands. Not only will four points from their final two matches be enough, Nigel Clough’s side will be promoted by the time they visit struggling Doncaster Rovers next weekend if they achieve a better result against seventh-placed Gillingham on Saturday than Walsall do against Fleetwood Town on Monday.
It would be a remarkable achievement given that Burton, whose ground holds just under 7,000, have been in the Football League for seven years and were promoted as League Two champions under Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink last year. They set their sights no higher than the play-offs and a more realistic target was a place in the top 10. Five of their seven signings last summer were free transfers; another player joined on loan. The astute chairman, Ben Robinson, ensures that Burton live within their means.
Yet Mousinho noticed a shift in mentality after a 2-1 defeat by Coventry City in September. “It was interesting because we’d all of a sudden gone from being such a small side, in terms of the stadium, the budget, the fanbase and experience at this level, to a side that was really disappointed losing narrowly to a massive club like Coventry,” he says.
Burton have punched above their weight for a while. Before moving into the £7.2m Pirelli Stadium in 2005, they played at the rough and ready Eton Park, where a waterlogged pitch was never going to be a problem. “Because it took the rain so well, we used to have to get a fire engine to come and water the pitch with a hose,” says Aaron Webster, who played for Burton for 17 years.
Formed in 1950, after previous doomed incarnations as Swifts, United and Wanderers, everything fell into place for the club when Clough became manager in 1998. “I came into the first team as a teenager before Nigel got the job,” Webster says. “My eyes lit up. Others must have had the same feeling. He got Burton Albion on the map; we had great cup runs. It was professionalism. There were a few red cards and bookings for dissent, disciplinary stuff, but that all went out of the window when he came in.
“He knew how to get the best out of players. He wanted his teams to play good football but in the right areas. We played attractive stuff but we had to be solid as well.”
Burton reached the Conference in 2002 and Webster recalls tears in the dressing room when Clough announced that he was joining Derby midway through the 2008-09 season. Roy McFarland took over as caretaker and Burton went up after almost blowing a 19-point lead.
Now, with Clough back, after stints with Derby and Sheffield United ended in disappointment, it is 2009 in reverse. One of Burton’s strengths has been recovering from losing managers to bigger clubs. Gary Rowett joined Birmingham City last season and Hasselbaink left for Queens Park Rangers in December. This time, Clough was the replacement.
“It was definitely a difficult one to deal with,” Mousinho says. “Any manager coming in is going to have different ideas. It was a difficult job for the manager and his staff. From that point of view, he’s done very well to keep the run going and the lads performing. The mantra was not to change much. That was Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink’s mantra as well.”
Burton turned to a club legend and although Clough has been under pressure because of the recent sticky run, he is ready to finish what he started 18 years ago. “If he leads them into the Championship, it’s the most perfect scenario,” Webster says. “It would be fitting. I pray all the time he does it.”
