Little Book of Manchester United (3 page)

*Buchan during a Division One match against Leicester City at Old Trafford, September 1980.

Aberdeen decided to sell their young captain and Buchan chose United over the more successful Liverpool and Leeds clubs of the time. Frank O’Farrell paid £135,000 for Buchan who wasted no time in justifying the fee. Six months later, Tommy Docherty took over as manager, but despite relegation in 1974, once Buchan took over as captain of the team, United bounced back by winning the Second Division Championship in 1975. Then, in 1976, United reached the FA Cup Final but were bitterly disappointed when Southampton won by a single goal.

The following year saw United back in the Final with Liverpool. Despite the opposing side boasting Kevin Keegan, United won a memorable 2-1 victory. Buchan was the first postwar player to captain both a Scottish and an English Cup-winning side. Persistent injuries led him to hang up his boots in 1983, and he went on to work for a sportswear company promoting football boots.

Busby

The stadium at Old Trafford was a bombed-out wreck when Matt Busby arrived in October 1945. Initially offered a three-year contract by Chairman James Gibson, Busby argued for a term of five years. He wanted to realise his vision which he knew would take time and patience. He also demanded to be given the authority to appoint his own staff and act on his own judgement, asking for both power and responsibility.

The first thing Busby did was to put Jimmy Murphy in charge of the reserve team and heavily involve him with the youth project. Their working partnership was to last for almost 30 years. One by one, the United players returned from the war, most of whom had not seen more than one season of first-team action. All were keen to learn from Busby, who set about preparing his team with a number of positional changes, the results of which were to prove invaluable.

*Sir Matt Busby, 1991.

Johnny Carey found his niche at full-back, while John Aston Senior discovered his forte as a defender. Henry Cockburn became a wing-half and Jimmy Delaney transferred from Celtic to form the ‘famous five’ in the forwards alongside Pearson, Rowley, Mitten and Morris. United ended the 1946-47 season as runners-up in the League. In 1948 they won the FA Cup, beating Blackpool 4-2 to become the first of three great teams.

Busby, who was knighted in 1968 and given the freedom of the City of Manchester, died in 1994. His statue stands outside Old Trafford in Sir Matt Busby Way.

Busby Babes

Matt Busby assumed managerial control of United mid-season in October 1945. His vision was to use the youth development programme to produce the club’s own players and it was in November 1951, after journalist Tom Jackson of the Manchester Evening News watched Jackie Blanchflower and Roger Byrne, aged 18 and 21, make their debut against Liverpool at Anfield, that he nicknamed them the ‘United Babes’. Not long after, Busby was joined to the name and the ‘Busby Babes’ were born.

The Busby Babes roll-call included Johnny Berry, Jackie Blanchflower, Roger Byrne, Bobby Charlton, Eddie Colman, Duncan Edwards, Mark Jones, Wilf McGuinness, David Pegg, Albert Scanlon, Tommy Taylor, Dennis Viollet, Liam Whelan and Ray Wood. Although not all the Babes had grown up through the youth programme, they were part of the phenomenon that hit English football during the 1950s.

*Matt Busby and his ‘Babes’ (l-r) Albert Scanion, Colin Webster, John Doherty, Tony Hawesworth, Alec Dawson and Paddy Kennedy.

The reign of the Busby Babes was only brought to an end by the Munich air disaster in which eight members of the team were killed. Busby strove to create a youth scheme that included four or five teams on each tier of the programme. The foundations were already in place with the Manchester United Junior Athletic Club having been formed in 1938 by the then secretary Walter Crickmer and chairman James Gibson.

The MUJAC, which had encouraged the likes of John Aston Senior, set the model that Busby was to develop and it was with the experience of chief scouts Louis Rocca and his successor Joe Armstrong that helped the programme achieve success. The aim was to seek out talented young players and enhance their abilities by giving them the chance to train with professional trainers and coaches.

Armstrong was particularly adept at persuading anxious parents that their talented young sons would do well at United. It was his foresight to see the potential in schoolboy players, such as Charlton and Edwards, that gave the club the young talent it needed. Attendances began to grow at youth games as word about the success and talent of the team spread and, in 1953, Matt Busby took his young team to Zurich to compete in the International Youth Cup. Despite the youth of the team they were incredibly mature players and Matt Busby is said to have disliked the nickname.

*Duncan Edwards throwing in the ball, 1957.

The Babes were primed to take over the first team but the transition was gradual and it was not until the mid-1950s that all elements Busby thought were necessary were in place. The team beat the League Champions Chelsea in November 1955 and it was from then on that the team made its ascent, going on to win the League Cup in 1957, the FA Cup in 1956 and 1957 and the Charity Shield. The last time the Busby Babes lined up together on the pitch was 5 February 1958 in Belgrade.

Byrne

Roger Byrne, born 8 February 1929, was possibly one of Matt Busby’s most astute signings for United. Part of the youth programme, Byrne played at wing-half, inside-forward and then wing again in both the ‘A’ team and the Reserves, but on his first-team debut in November 1951 he played at left-back. He made 24 appearances in his first season, making a reputation for himself during the latter half going back to his familiar role as left-wing, scoring seven times and helping United to their first Championship in 41 seasons.

In October 1952 Byrne asked for a transfer, unhappy with his place on the wing. Busby immediately reinstated him to the position of left-back and he played for the remainder of the season in his favoured position. When Johnny Carey decided to retire in May 1953 aged 34, Allenby Chilton stood in as captain, but the real potential lay with Byrne, who assumed the role in February 1954. Busby had decided by this time it was necessary to bring more young blood into the side and Byrne became mentor to the young Busby Babes.

*Roger Byrne clears the ball.

Despite his tendency to tell his manager when he did not like something, Busby and Byrne held each other in high regard and Busby liked his captain’s leadership qualities. In 1954 he was picked to play for England against Scotland and it turned out to be the first of 33 consecutive caps for his country, despite never scoring and even missing two penalties against Brazil and Yugoslavia. Roger Byrne won three Championship winner’s medals with United before his death in Munich.

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Cantona

Alex Ferguson described Eric Cantona as “…the catalyst for the Championships. He brought a vision that we did not have before. Although I thought we were getting there, Cantona certainly accelerated it. He was an absolutely phenomenal player.”

In just over four years at United, Cantona was an essential part of the club winning the League Championship four times. This was exceptional considering that the club had not won it for 26 years. Cantona, like George Best, was worshipped by the fans who called him ‘the King’, or ‘God’. Cantona, however, remained a man of mystery. He had a love of poetry, art and philosophy that didn’t somehow fit with the perception of a Premiership footballer. He was also an unconventional striker who preferred to drop off deep and play just behind the forward line. He had the rare talent of being able to create space and time for himself.