Manchester United

Manchester United Football Club was first formed in 1878, albeit under a different name – Newton Heath LYR (Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway). Little suspecting the impact they were about to have on the national, even global game, the workers in the railway yard at Newton Heath indulged their passion for association football with games against other departments of the LYR and other railway companies. The words Old Trafford entered footballing folklore for the first time during the 1909/10 season. The land on which the stadium was built was bought by the Manchester Brewery Company (through John Henry Davies) and leased to the club. Davies himself paid for the building work, which commenced in 1908 under the supervision of architect Archibald Leitch. By 1910, the club had moved lock, stock and barrel from their old home of Bank Street. United’s opening fixture at Old Trafford was played on 19 February 1910. The new hosts lost 4-3 to their first visitors, Liverpool, but the stadium was successful in accommodating an 80,000 capacity crowd. Two days previously, the old wooden stand at Bank Street had been blown down by strong winds – further evidence, perhaps, that United were suited to and needed their new home. Indeed, United were crowned League champions for the second time at the end of their first full season at Old Trafford – 1910/1911. The Reds clinched the title at home on the final day of the season, beating Sunderland 5-1 with Harold Halse grabbing two of the goals. Halse also scored six goals as United beat Swindon Town 8-4 to clinch the Charity Shield. The outbreak of the Second World War forced football to the very back of people’s minds between 1939 and 1946. But even in the absence of League football, Old Trafford was still the focus of attention. On 11 March 1941, the stadium was bombed during a German air raid. The attack destroyed the main stand, dressing rooms and offices. It was a devastating blow but, within a few years, there would be optimism again around the famous old ground. After building one of the greatest teams seen in England, Matt Busby had to start all over again at the start of the 1960s. The Munich Air Disaster had robbed him, and football, of some of the era’s greatest players. But once the great manager had recovered from his own injuries, he set about forging another side to take the world by storm. United made a poor start to the 1980s, but Dave Sexton and his team recovered to win eight of their last ten league games in the 1979/80 campaign, finishing just two points behind Liverpool in the title race. In November 1986, United at last appointed a proven winner. At Aberdeen, Alex Ferguson had claimed every prize that Scotland had to offer, not to mention the added bonus of the European Cup Winners’ Cup when his team defied the odds to beat Real Madrid in the final. The dawn of the 1990s saw Alex Ferguson collect his first silverware as Manchester United manager, and Liverpool winning their last League title with an ageing team. The tide was turning… Ferguson’s first FA Cup, achieved after a replay against Crystal Palace, at the time seemed to be a stand-alone success, one that possibly saved his job after another poor season in the League. But nine years later, it seemed that Lee Martin’s winning goal against Palace lit the fuse for an explosion of unprecedented success. First and foremost, winning the FA Cup in 1990 allowed United to make a return to European competition after an absence of five years following the Heysel disaster. Far from being rusty, the Reds went all the way to the final of the European Cup Winners’ Cup in Rotterdam, where the opponents were Barcelona, the former club of United striker Mark Hughes. Two goals by Hughes sealed the match 2-1 in United’s favour in May 1991, 23 years after the club’s previous triumph in Europe. Despite a solid start to the campaign, United’s 2009/10 term contained a sting in the tail as Chelsea’s late surge for the line ended the Reds’ chances of winning a fourth successive title by a single point in a race which ran until the final day of the season. There was some solace to be found in the retention of the League Cup, achieved at Aston Villa’s expense and secured by a late winner from Wayne Rooney, whose individual excellence was rewarded with both the PFA Player’s Player of the Year and Football Writers’ Player of the Year awards. The end of that 2012/13 season brought the news that millions of Reds had been dreading for a long time: Sir Alex Ferguson was to step down as manager of Manchester United. His retirement was announced on 8 May 2013 and his selection as successor was named the very next day. David Moyes arrived from Everton, tasked with following in the footsteps of British football’s most successful manager. Louis van Gaal’s appointmen as the permanent new manager – and the club’s first boss from outside the UK and Ireland – was announced on 19 May 2014 and he started work in July after guiding his native Netherlands to the semi-finals of the World Cup in Brazil. Giggs, who had retired in May at the end of a long and glorious one-club playing career, was retained by van Gaal in the role of assistant manager.
  • Listing ID: 14097
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Sir Matt Busby Way, Old Trafford, Manchester, M16 0RA, EnglandGreater Europe,Global,M16 0RA Show phone number ***** https://www.manutd.com/

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