In the Beginning

Earliest memories are tricky things. I have vague recollections of my grandfather driving a green GPO van past the house when I was tiny, and of bathtime and the joy of toy boats and rubber ducks.

It’s not until later on that things become clearer, and one of the earliest clear memories I have is from an event I can even put the date on. May 23rd 1968 – for it was then that Manchester United beat Benfica 4-1 at Wembley, to fulfil Sir Matt Busby’s dream of becoming champions of Europe.

To this day I can still remember my father watching the match on our British Relay rented black and white television, sitting on his knee for part of it. I was only four years old at the time, but from that day forward if anyone asked me what football team I supported, the answer was “Manchester United” – which was unusual for a kid back then – especially a kid who lived just outside Glasgow.

My dad however was happy with this choice –he was a Clyde FC supporter and wasn’t particularly keen on the sectarian connotations supporting Rangers or Celtic brought – and the fact that he too had a sneaking admiration for the “Red Devils” probably helped.

Over the years my awareness of the team grew – at age 8 I had a poster of George Best on my bedroom wall, enthusiastically and carefully removed from “Jackie” magazine, at ten I learned the meaning of the word “relegation”, and at the age of 13 savoured United winning silverware again when they lifted the FA Cup.

1978 found my father working in Manchester and I will never forget he brought home a souvenir edition of the Manchester Evening News for me, commemorating the 20th anniversary of the 1958 Munich Air disaster. This was a new part of my education regarding Manchester United – I had never heard of this terrible event before and reading about it strengthened the feelings I had for the club, and took my admiration of the team, and of Sir Matt Busby and Sir Bobby Charlton in particular to new levels. There was also the incredible feeling of sadness for the players lost that day – in particular the prodigious talent that was Duncan Edwards.

I had always dreamed of going to see Manchester United play at Old Trafford, and I remember my father saying he would take me, but the logistics were never quite right, and it is to my eternal regret that we never did this. In fact I only ever went to the football with my dad once – to see QPR play Newcastle at Loftus Road, with my QPR supporting husband in tow.

But You’ve Never Been to Manchester

By the start of the nineties, Manchester United were coming out of the doldrums. The eighties had produced a handful of cups but United hadn’t been able to reclaim the Championship since 1967, despite the best efforts of Alex Ferguson, who had become manager of the club in 1986 after achieving great success at Aberdeen. Ferguson had almost been sacked at the end of 1989 – only a third round FA cup win against Nottingham Forest saved him – and he continued to play the long game by developing and nurturing talent, culminating in United finally lifting the inaugural Premier League trophy in 1993.

By then I was an adult living in London, and as United’s success grew I frequently was asked why I supported a team from a city I had never even visited, and endured ribbing – both gentle and vicious – about this.

I never had any cause to visit the city however, and as the nineties moved on I found myself a mother, and visits to the football and even visits to the pub to watch the football became a thing of the past, and time moved on, as did the family, to Edinburgh.

It was only last year, after the death of my husband, when someone asked me about football that it dawned on me – why not go to Manchester? And why not go to Old Trafford too?

Watching a match was out of the question – tickets are ridiculously hard to come by for starters – but also I was visiting in July – however I discovered Old Trafford is an attraction worth visiting whether there is a match on or not, and I will now, after this lengthy preamble, tell you why.

Old Trafford

When I booked my trip to Manchester, I was travelling with my daughter and my sister. Neither like football but I made it clear from the start that if I was going to Manchester, I was going to Old Trafford. Much to my amazement, my sister expressed an interest in going too, so that gave my daughter no choice – she was going too. She complained a little but a promise of a visit to the Trafford Centre after we had been to Old Trafford cheered her up.

Getting There

We took the Metrolink tram from Piccadilly Gardens, taking the Altrincham line and alighting at the Old Trafford stop. From here it is a ten minute walk to the stadium, passing Old Trafford cricket ground as you go.

It is possible of course to drive and pay to park nearby – Old Trafford is situated just off the A56 on Sir Matt Busby Way. There is also a train station at the stadium but this is only open on match days. Buses are available too, but I suspect the Metrolink is a marginally more pleasant way to do things on match days – if only to avoid the traffic jams!

The Stadium Tour

Stadium tours operate most days except on match days or the day before a European match. You do have to book, but this is easy to do either online or by phone. We chose to book by phone, the number being 0161 868 8000. You are then given a time when your tour will begin and advised to arrive at least 15 minutes before this time.

It cost £12 for an adult and £8 for a child, with this fee also including entrance to the club’s museum.

We were a little late for the start of our tour as I got a little confused as to where I should be going, but the staff were incredibly helpful and found our group within five minutes.

The tour guides are all United fans, and on the day we went all the guides we saw were semi-retired men. Our guide was very, very good – his enthusiasm for the club shone through and he told us how he had been coming to see United play at Old Trafford since he was a tiny boy. His experience was a great help too – he had memories of teams from the late 1940s to the present day and really knew his stuff about players, managers, matches and trophies.

We were able to sit on the stand and savour the view of the pitch. We were given some of the best seats at Old Trafford to sit on, with our tour guide solemnly informing us that a seat there on match day would cost over ten times what we had paid for our stadium tour. We then got to visit the changing rooms, the tunnel, the dugout and got to stand right beside the pitch.

Our tour guide had informed us that it was a tactile tour and we could get up close and personal to everything, but there was one golden rule we must follow and that was not to touch the turf on the pitch. You would think anyone with a brain could grasp this and understand why it might not be a good idea to have several hundred people every day putting their hands on the grass, but sadly there was one member of our party who clearly wasn’t listening and made an attempt to make off with part of the hallowed turf. That our sharp eyed tour guide spotted him was impressive, but even more impressive was how he turned this young man’s face a deep shade of beetroot with just the tone of his voice as he chastised him.

All the while we were doing the tour, our guide answered questions and explained the history of the club and the stadium to us in a manner that kept even my daughter captivated.

Just a few months before our visit, the 50th anniversary of the Munich Disaster had been marked. There have been two memorials at Old Trafford for many years – the famous Munich clock, which marks the date, and a memorial plaque. In February 2008, The Munich Tunnel was opened underneath the South Stand and this is a quite superb memorial and one that will remain with me forever.

It features an eternal flame and is a tribute to all the Busby Babes and the hopes and dreams they represented to the club. Like the best of memorials, it’s power lies in its simplicity and walking down the Munich Tunnel made me so grateful that everyone who was affected that day, whether attached to the club or not, has a permanent memorial.

The tour ended, a little cynically I thought, at the club shop, but if you want to visit the museum too, it’s relatively nearby.

The Museum

The museum isn’t particularly huge, but it does cover the history of the club very well. Clearly Munich is a huge event and as a result has it’s own dedicated area, but there are a huge array of items on display within the museum including shirts, photographs, artefacts and displays featuring every period of the club’s history – whether that be times of great success or more fallow periods – such as the infamous 1974 relegation.

What I particularly enjoyed about the museum was the way so many players I remembered from my youth were featured – now some of these players, such as Steve Coppell or Bryan Robson have remained in the public eye, others, such as Martin Buchan or Gordon Hill have returned to a life of relative obscurity.

Sir Matt Busby is a huge presence in the museum too, with the great man’s career well documented. It’s worth remembering Sir Matt nearly died after Munich – he received the last rites in hospital afterwards – and the club’s appreciation for this great man is evident here.

The Trophies

So at the end of the 2008 season United won a famous “double” of the Premier League and the Champions’ League. For a not unreasonable £14.99, you could have your picture taken with these trophies, and realising this was a once in a lifetime opportunity, I paid the money and dragged my daughter to join the queue.

We were reminded at all times that the trophies were the original ones – the club do have replicas they keep in their trophy room – and we were allowed to touch the trophies, but not to lift them, which seemed reasonable enough to me.

It was quite an experience standing right beside two of the most famous trophies in football, and I felt myself go back 40 years as I stood beside the “European Cup” as I still call it – a remnant from childhood that simply will not leave me I suppose.

The photographer was very good and took several shots, giving us the option of choosing the best one, which he printed off there and then for us.

The Statues

At the front of Old Trafford, looking down onto the street which bears his name, is a quite wonderful statue of Sir Matt Busby. You would be hard pushed to find anyone else who represented the club in the way Sir Matt did, and certainly for anyone of my generation, he was a man who was universally revered, and I believe to this day he probably still is.

Sir Matt was born in Bellshill, where I too was born, and whilst the town has a sports centre which bears his name, he will forever be associated with Manchester and the club have ensured this softly spoken but determined and talented manager will never be forgotten.

Across from Sir Matt Busby Way is a more recent addition, “The United Trinity” which features three of United’s greatest players – George Best, Denis Law and Sir Bobby Charlton. This is a real statue for the fans and the three players are unmistakeably sculpted.

My Final Thoughts

So I have come to accept it’s unlikely I will ever get the opportunity to savour Old Trafford on a match day – and that’s okay. Now I have visited the stadium Sir Matt christened “the theatre of dreams” I feel fine – I have paid homage and that is all that matters.

I would say however, that Old Trafford should be a must see for any visitor to Manchester – whether you love football or not.

My non-football loving sister loved it – so much so she has recommended it to anyone visiting the city ever since she went. Her reasoning, which I have to say I agree with, is the club has such a huge story in Munich, and how they went from having the world at their feet to being the bare bones of a team. Yet somehow, from the depths of this despair they rebuilt and became champions of Europe just ten years later.

The club have embraced that huge story and created beautiful memorials to those who didn’t come home from the match with Red Star Belgrade but haven’t allowed themselves to be defined by it – instead they have created a tour which will delight anyone with even a passing interest in football, and a museum which is both entertaining and informative.

Whether you love or loathe Manchester United, I would highly recommend you visit Old Trafford if you are in Manchester – there is something very special about this place and as I left I felt a certain peace within myself – because at last – I had been.

http://www.manutd.com