Tuesday, March 01, 2011

Ryan Giggs: My 20 years with Manchester United's first team

The first game: 2 March 1991. You look at the photos now and so much has changed. Old Trafford, back then, was an unsophisticated place, desperately in need of investment, much in line with a city struggling from the effects of post-industrialisation. "Madchester" might have been booming but Manchester was far from the metropolis of stylish apartment blocks, Calatrava bridges and glass condominium towers we see now.

Ryan Giggs was 17, wearing a shirt that seemed slightly too large for his skinny frame. Manchester United 0 Everton 2. The team were on a run of seven league games without a win, almost a quarter of a century since their last title. It was an inauspicious debut. "The thing that sticks out is Dave Watson coming through the back of me," Giggs says. "It was 'welcome to the big boys' league'. I had a big cut on my knee for ages after that." Otherwise, he cannot remember too much apart from Ferguson shouting at everyone in the dressing room.

1 comment:

Bobbie BS said...

That shirt makes me want to cry.