MANCHESTER REMEMBERS
Each time we revisit the tragedy, the scale of the cruelty rears once again
AT OLD Trafford a minute’s silence started not by a referee’s whistle but by the simple moving of a hand on a clock. 3.04pm. Munich. 60 years.
As a hush fell, a baby briefly cried. A new life making its presence felt on this of all days.
On a TV screen in front of a thronged East Stand, the faces scrolled across on film before us. The Busby Babes, the ones who did not come home. How young, vibrant and unbridled they looked, even in black and white. Duncan Edwards, slightly shy as the camera rolled. David Pegg, a picture of nervous, youthful energy.
It wasn’t just life that was lost on February 6 1958, it was optimism, too.
Watching from their seats by the pitch were two who did, somehow, come home. Sir Bobby Charlton, quietly dignified and accompanied by Norma, the great strength in his life. And Harry Gregg, his thoughts and emotions somewhat more obvious on his first return to Old Trafford for a decade.
Gregg was a little late to his seat. A great athlete in his day, he moves more slowly at the age of 85. As he made his way across the platform, ripples of applause broke out. His tall frame covered in a winter coat and his face partly obscured by a cap, he remained immediately recognisable. There, a real hero walked.
Those men have lived with the horrors of Munich for most of their adult lives. They do not need prompting to remember. As Gregg is prone to saying: ‘I was there. I know what happened.’
But Munich has always been a pain shared by the Manchester community. And yesterday it was a hurt carried not only by the 4,500 inside Old Trafford but those watching on screens outside on the forecourts and also at the modern Munich airport — and in Belgrade where a young United team led by Nicky Butt will play today.
From Manchester City came Mike Summerbee yesterday and from Liverpool Kenny Dalglish. The Scot has known great horror, too.
Outside, beneath the Munich clock and by the foot of the statue of Law, Best and Charlton, lay wreaths and scarves. They were not all from supporters of Manchester United.
The passing of time has helped to bring some manner of peace to those affected by the tragedy. Each time we revisit it, though, the scale of the cruelty rears again.
United director Mike Edelson read from the book of Ecclesiastes to remind us that: ‘No man knows when his hour will come. Good men are trapped by evil times that fall unexpectedly upon them.’
They say Sir Bobby changed his outlook on life post- Munich. Carefree before, he was not quite so afterwards.
Gregg, meanwhile, has suffered further tragedy. The loss to cancer of first wife Mavis, aged 26, and of a daughter Karen, aged 51.
The two men have never been close but met privately before yesterday’s ceremony and there was some warmth. It was Sir Bobby who broke the ice. ‘ Hello big man,’ he said.
For Gregg — who says this will be his last trip to Old Trafford — there was also a visit to Carrington training ground in the morning.
The Irishman thought he was walking on to a Hollywood film set when he arrived at the old Cliff from Doncaster Rovers in 1957. Watching his grandson fussed over by Zlatan Ibrahimovic yesterday will not have dissuaded him from his view that he played for the greatest club in the world.
Looking out on this cold day across the length of the field towards the Stretford End, it was not hard to see what Manchester United has become. On winter days like this, you half expect to see the top tier of the towering Sir Alex Ferguson Stand disappear into the mist.
But it was Sir Matt Busby and his team who started it. It was they who first played in the European Cup that goes so far to define United and we should remember that was at a time when the Football Association didn’t really want them to enter the competition.
Yesterday, Busby and his team were remembered with the help of hymns from the wonderfully youthful voices of the Manchester United Foundation Choir. At another juncture, local singer Pete Martin led those gathered in a moving rendition of the Flowers
of Manchester, a song written in tribute to those who died. United manager Jose Mourinho was stirred enough to sing the closing words.
Mourinho, despite the frequency with which we can be moved to criticise him, understands well the history and the foundations of his current football club. He knows the stature and the standing of those who have walked his path before him. To his left sat Ferguson, a man who carried the responsibilty of office longer than any other.
Here, Mourinho was also joined by his first-team squad and a number of youth players. Not all looked entirely comfortable at first, not all fit as naturally into occasions like this as club captain Michael Carrick, sitting to Mourinho’s right on the front row.
But this was half an hour of their young lives that we hope would leave an impression. If they didn’t understand the stature of the club they play for prior to yesterday, they should do now.
It snowed the day that 23 players, crew and journalists lost their lives on the runway of Munich-Riem airport 60 years ago and it snowed in Manchester as we remembered them yesterday.
That was a co- incidence as inescapable as it was wretched.
But this was a day to meet up with old friends as well as remember and mourn old friends.
Outside the stadium beforehand, United’s 1968 European Cup winner Paddy Crerand quickened his step as he sought to make his way inside. ‘It’s always good to see people that you like,’ he smiled.
And later Harry Gregg sat downstairs in Hotel Football across the road from the stadium where he made his name. He was smiling broadly.