If I Believe in Miracles, and the subsequent film documentary, told the story of Nottingham Forest under Brian Clough in the late-1970s then David McVay's Steak, Diana Ross: the diary of a football nobody tells the tale of the Black and White half of Nottingham at Notts County.
The book, and its sequel Steak, Diana Ross 2, is based on diaries kept by McVay himself while he was a young professional at Meadow Lane, takes a nostalgic look at his career during the 1970s. Amongst the characters brought to life in the book are the then Magpies manager Jimmy Sirrell, former Scotland midfielder Don Masson and Brian Kilcine, who famously lifted the FA Cup for Coventry City as captain of the Sky Blues in 1987.
In addition to this, he also had a seven-match loan spell with Torquay United in the 1977-78 season under Mike Green. McVay spent his time at Plainmoor lodging with former United midfielder Geoff Cox and his wife Madge, whose son Maurice was an amateur player with the club, later a professional, and harbouring hopes of studying at Cambridge University.
Away from the match action, McVay spent much of his time watching TV and the occasional night outs with his teammates, which included the likes of Ian Twitchin, Clint Boulton, Les Lawrence, Willie Brown and Colin Lee. Then there was the small matters of the football matches, which at that particularly point in time featured trips to far flung locations such as Huddersfield Town and Barnsley - not to mention the necessities of overnight stays and long coach journeys home, which often saw them arrive home in the early hours of the morning.
McVay would return to Notts County and later had spells with Peterborough United and Lincoln City as well as Cumberland FC. After retiring from playing, he became a journalist with Nottingham Evening Post and later the Daily Telegraph. Besides Steak, Diana Ross, he also wrote a complete history of Notts County, a biography of former England striker Tommy Lawton and Forest's Cult Heroes, which details the career of 20 Nottingham Forest heroes.
