Son reveals extent of soccer star Best’s alcoholism
There’s one place where the memory of George Best is forever of the stylish winger who bamboozled defenders and thrilled fans. Immortalized in bronze outside Old Trafford, a statue featuring Best is as much as a crowd- puller as the Manchester United icon was in his soccer prime.
It’s where Best’s only child now goes for a glimpse at what one of the game’s first international superstars looked like before alcohol took over his life, and then destroyed it.
“I go up there and take pictures in front of him, just like everybody else does,” 34- year- old Calum Best says. “I’m a fan in that respect.”
Calum never got to see his father winning trophies at United in the 1960s, and collecting personal accolades for his extraordinary dribbling and goals. Born in 1981, Calum instead endured a tumultuous relationship with a father who struggled to cope with the end of his playing career and revelled in a hard- drinking playboy lifestyle before dying at 59 from multiple organ failure.
Approaching the 10th anniversary of the death in November 2005, Calum is telling the full story of their turbulent father- son relationship for the first time.
“Although he was on this pedestal of being this amazing, iconic footballer, which I will always be proud of, there’s a darker side to it,” he said. “My dad suffered from a drink problem, which meant we suffered, which meant our relationship suffered.”
Nothing is off limits in Calum’s book about his father, which was published Monday: violence, neglect and, of course, the extent of the drinking problem.
The focus on the flaws over the soccer exploits in Second Best has angered George’s family in his native Northern Ireland, with his sister’s husband, Norman McNarry, telling local media in Belfast that the book’s “nastiness” was a “betrayal.”
Raising the family rift himself at the start of the interview, Calum acknowledged: “It’s kicked up a fuss.”
“Belfast feel they are probably protecting their own,” Calum added. “It’s not an attack on my dad. I’m my dad’s No. 1 fan. I love him to bits, more than anybody. But this isn’t about George Best the footballer. This is about me having alcohol dependency in my relationship with my father.”
The relationship was as fraught as it was fragmented, with the Atlantic Ocean separating them for much of Calum’s childhood.
The 1968 European player of the year was at the San Jose Earthquakes when his first wife, Angie, gave birth. Calum’s arrival didn’t curb the binges, and the couple separated from George. By 1986, Angie sought to shield Calum from his father’s chaotic life, applying for divorce before returning to California after a few years in England.
George didn’t even turn up to the custody hearing, and the sense of abandonment felt by Calum is reflected throughout the book, as is a constant pursuit of his father’s love and attention. It was rarely fulfilled.
The constant rejection hurt, and seems to explain Calum’s own wild ways as a hellraising teenager enjoying the surfer- boy lifestyle on the West Coast while binging himself on drink and ever- harder drugs. Calum played soccer, but never wanted to emulate his father.
“It was hard enough living up to my dad’s reputation without trying to play,” Calum said.