Garry Birtles INTERVIEW: I'd swap my success for my wife to be healthy

‘I lived the dream… but I’d swap it all for my wife to be healthy’: Nottingham Forest hero Garry Birtles opens up on his wife’s battle with pancreatic cancer, Brian Clough and winning two European Cups

• Garry Birtles won the European Cup with Nottingham Forest in 1979 and 1980
• Birtles says he would swap that success for his wife Samantha to be healthy
• Samantha is dying from pancreatic cancer after being diagnosed two years ago 
• Birtles is fundraising for the Treetops Hospice and has received much support

Once a week on a Thursday, four of the great men of Nottingham would meet for drinks and talk about great days.

Garry Birtles, John Robertson, Frank Clark and Colin Barrett have six European Cup medals between them from their days at Brian Clough’s Nottingham Forest. But it is friendship, not glory, that sustains them.

Birtles, in particular, needs his mates right now. His wife Samantha is dying from pancreatic cancer.

Garry Birtles experienced European Cup glory with Nottingham Forest in 1979 and 1980

Birtles stated that he would swap that success for his wife Samantha (pictured) to be healthy

The Covid pandemic has placed those weekly gatherings on hold but the sport that gave Birtles a career he never dreamed of has held him close.

‘You hear people talk about the football family but you don’t really know it’s there until you need it,’ Birtles tells Sportsmail. ‘My phone rings constantly and it will be one of my old team-mates or someone from another club or the PFA.

‘It can be a couple of minutes or half an hour. It lifts you. It makes you realise the love is out there.’

Birtles has been married to Samantha — his second wife — since 2008 and they have one daughter, Elyshia. He has three children — Natalie, James and Nina — from his first marriage. 

Birtles’ wife Samantha is dying from pancreatic cancer having been diagnosed two years ago

Birtles is now hoping to raise as much money as possible for the Treetops Hospice

Until Samantha’s diagnosis at the age of 54 two years ago, life was good. Birtles was enjoying a burgeoning career in the broadcast media until his phone rang as he left a game at Burnley.

‘She had received the prognosis,’ he recalls. ‘Bang. Your world collapses in an instant.’

Samantha has already confounded predictions. She was initially given until last March to live. Nevertheless, her condition is terminal.

Birtles has paused his work to become her 24-hour carer and the couple are hoping to at least enjoy some summer days in the garden while at the same time raising as much money as possible for the Treetops Hospice close to the border between Nottingham and Derby where they live.

Gareth Southgate is amongst those to have donated a signed shirt to the Treetops Hospice

Again, football has not failed them. Since his fundraising became known, Birtles has received a stream of signed shirts from, among many others, Gareth Southgate, Manchester United and City, Everton, John Terry, Gareth Bale, Harry Kane, Jack Grealish and, of course, Forest.

On June 29 at Basford United in Nottingham, a charity game will take place between Forest old boys and a team of celebrities.

Nigel Clough will manage a team while Robertson will kick the match off. Kevin Keegan plans to attend, as does singer Jake Bugg and Line of Duty star Vicky McClure, both Notts County fans.

‘Forest have been tremendous but so have all the clubs that have heard,’ says Birtles. ‘My kids have done wonders for me and the PFA have been incredible, too. Gordon Taylor was straight on the phone. Samantha and I would have struggled financially without them as neither of us are earning.

‘All the money we raise from auctioning the shirts will go straight to Treetops. Samantha’s friend Sally has started a JustGiving page for them.

‘They have been there to support us and need £4.3million a year just to keep going.

‘I try to keep strong. Brian Clough taught me how to do that. But there are dark moments — normally at night when I am trying to do a crossword or read a book — when the tears do come. That’s when you need people and you realise how lucky you are to have been part of this profession.’

Birtles was in Nottingham’s Palais nightclub in 1975 when a petition calling for Clough to become Forest’s next manager was passed around.

Birtles was a carpet-fitter at the time and playing non-league football for Long Eaton. Four years later, he won the European Cup.

‘It was a massive long sheet of paper that went right across the dancefloor,’ he recalls.

‘I signed it, obviously — and a year and a half later, I was signing for Brian which still feels bizarre.

‘He had come to watch me and later said the half-time Oxo was better than my performance. But he must have seen something.

‘To go from laying carpets and floors on building sites to representing your country in four years is something you just don’t expect. I was voted young European Player of the Year, played for England, won two European Cups, a Super Cup, a League Cup. It’s just ridiculous.’

Across the 1978-79 and 1979-80 campaigns, Birtles played an extraordinary 136 matches

Clough turned many careers around at Forest but few stars rose as quickly as Birtles’ did. Having said that, he almost left for Mansfield before he had won a thing.

‘I was in the Forest reserves, on £60 a week and Mansfield offered me £100,’ he says. ‘I thought maybe I should go but Frank (Clark) saw me sitting there absolutely down on myself on the reserve team bus and came to talk to me. He advised me to stay and I am forever grateful. You don’t forget things like that.’

Forest won both their European Cup finals 1-0 in 1979 and 1980, against Malmo and Hamburg. The second one was a defensive effort, Birtles running his legs to water up front as his team defended Robertson’s early goal.

Birtles played an extraordinary 136 games over the course of those two season. On returning from the Hamburg final in Madrid, he was treated for exhaustion.

‘Brian Clough treated every game like you were playing Manchester United,’ explains Birtles. ‘We played a testimonial at Plymouth once. The weather was atrocious, the pitch was atrocious.

‘We were late and 3-0 down at half-time. The gaffer went mad and said he would fine us all for every goal we conceded after that point. He was obsessed. So that night against Hamburg tipped me over the edge. Cloughie told me afterwards I covered more miles than the runner Emil Zatopek.

‘That was how it felt but it was my job and I wanted to do it for him. I loved it.’

There are few better men in football than Birtles. He doesn’t want sympathy and nor does Samantha. But they do want people to get worrying medical symptoms checked out.

Birtles has fond memories of working under Brian Clough, who turned many careers around

‘Don’t be fobbed off, keep knocking on doors,’ he says. ‘Samantha was told she had IBS five years ago. But was that the start of this cancer? We will never know — but we wonder.

‘The NHS have been wonderful, though. It makes you realise how lucky we all are to have it.’

For now Birtles’ commentary work with Sky, IMG and Gravity Media is on hold but he hopes to return to it one day. ‘They have all been brilliant with me,’ he says.

The couple know where Samantha’s journey is heading but try not to look too far ahead.

Birtles merely carries with him lessons dispensed by his father and indeed from Clough. They are about respect and good manners and doing what is right. Birtles has always been that way.

‘My dad took me in the Trent End as a kid,’ says Birtles.

‘Who would have thought I would play for that amazing club?

‘I was the luckiest bloke alive but I would give all that away for things to change for Samantha.

‘You would change the world for it, you know.’

For donations go to https://treetops.org.uk/footballauction or www.justgiving.com/fundraising/sally-pembleton

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