After playing Tony Blair and David Frost with distinction, Michael Sheen scores again with a riveting performance as legendary football coach Brian Clough in this winning dramatisation of Clough’s disastrous 44-day tenure as manager of Leeds United in 1974. While never selling the beautiful game short, screenwriter Peter Morgan’s adaptation of David Peace’s best-selling novel concentrates on the interplay of key characters, centred on the overly self-confident Clough’s bitter rivalry with his Leeds predecessor, Don Revie (splendidly played by Colm Meany).

The vividly dramatised and often shifting relationships between Clough and Revie and Clough and his lieutenant, Peter Taylor (perfectly-cast Timothy Spall), make for fascinating storytelling laced with acid humour. Director Tom Hooper referees skilfully.