One of the last conversations I ever had with my Mum was at John Radcliffe Hospital and it was about Manchester United.
“United won last night, Mum.”
“I know. Against a team I’ve never heard of.”
I think that’s how she would have liked our final conversation to go, talking about FC Sheriff and Jadon Sancho, who I thank for making her so happy even while she was lying in an intensive care ward.
I should say – I’m not a Manchester United fan. But my Mum was one of the biggest and today, on what should have been her 70th birthday, I will be thinking of her getting curry and chips along Sir Matt Busby Way and standing in the Stretford End.
She loved every part of going to Old Trafford, pointing out Lou Macari’s fish and chip shop, watching triumph after triumph – but just as brilliant was getting the old overgrounds where the tickets would just say “Manchester Football Club”. She took this to mean that most people thought there was only one club in Manchester, and didn’t realise City existed at all.
It wasn’t all fun and games. When Jose Mourinho was sacked in 2018, she was so relieved that she bought a bottle of white wine to celebrate, and she couldn’t refer to Louis van Gaal’s style of football without calling him “Van Ghastly”.
But she loved Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, whom she would sing about in the kitchen, along with “ooh ah Cantona”. George Best, she would tell you, wasn’t actually the best player in the world, in fact he wasn’t even the best player at United at that particular time. That was reserved for Sir Bobby Charlton, of whom she still had a signed picture on the wall.
Despite seeing all those players live, she loved that she had been there through relegation too and the second division, and all the times that made the misery of the last few years pale in comparison.
Whatever you might think of United fans, the defeats were as much fun as the victories, because it was never really about winning but cheering for the team she had followed every weekend since the 1960s.
Although I don’t support Manchester United, one thing they have in common with my club, or in fact any club, is that they’re not really a single entity. Some people have asked me why I support a team that from year to year has different players and managers, and who don’t even play in the same stadium they used to.
But I think what really makes a club is the people who love it, and being able to find them there long after they’ve gone. In October, I went to Old Trafford, where the club had put a picture of her and a farewell message in the matchday programme. I felt the same as I’ll probably feel every time I go back to that stadium; a little bit sad, but mostly able to remember it as her favourite place.
The only time I can remember not being on speaking terms with my Mum was when United beat my team in the League Cup final – we didn’t talk all day, before or after. So when we took her on a tour of Old Trafford for her 60th, her last big birthday, she enjoyed pointing at all the trophies as if to say “do you know what these are?”
Instead, this year, when United beat Newcastle in the Carabao Cup final at Wembley, I didn’t expect to cry at the final whistle, but I did, because I knew she would be watching it somewhere. She was worried that after Ferguson she wouldn’t get to see them win the league again and, as it turned out, she was right. When they eventually do again, I hope you enjoy it Mum – with a bird’s-eye view of the pitch.
from Football - inews.co.uk https://ift.tt/RJjrVDk
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