Manchester United is more than just a football club - it's a philosophy

A new book chronicling Manchester United's footballing philosophy has been released

A new book by Wayne Barton, called Football, Taught by Matt Busby, is seeking to explore the intricate details of Manchester United’s football philosophy.

Barton is widely regarded as the pre-eminent writer on the club, with over 20 books to his name. His latest fascinating and pioneering read delves into the DNA of Manchester United, as Barton seeks to unravel the core principles that have shaped the club’s success over decades. With never-before-heard interviews with Sir Matt Busby, Sir Alex Ferguson and more, this is the club’s identity told in a unique way. Below is an exclusive extract from the book.

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Take all of the individual elements of Matt Busby’s architecture – his demand for complete control; his insistence that a team should always aspire to play good football; his ability to create a team who could blow opponents away with a number of goals in a short space of time; his hope that the patience and time investment would yield similar footballing results as seen by the Hungarian side at Wembley; his acceptance of one distinct individualist; and finally, his desire for his team to prove themselves against the very best, and you would arrive at the formation of the team that would become known as the Busby Babes.

In 1956 – four short years after the 1952 title win – Busby had dismantled and rebuilt his side, introducing the talent he had reckoned to be valued in the region of £200,000. His boast was proven to be correct. The Babes won the title in record fashion.

James Gibson had once dared to dream of a team completely comprised of Mancunians. That was beyond even Busby and Murphy but they did manage the next best thing, and that was to field a Manchester United team that was almost fully homegrown, and they did it in a season where the team were reigning champions, a measure of their complete superiority.

From the 24 players who managed some first-team minutes, only Ray Wood, the goalkeeper, Johnny Berry, the outside-right, and Tommy Taylor, the centre-forward, were signed. No typos here. That means eight of the regular first 11 were homegrown, and a further 13 played their part in bringing the Division One trophy back to Manchester. Not only that, they were so much better than the opposition that they won the league by a record margin of 11 points.

Another by-product of the United academy was the impact it was bound to have on the long-term prospects for an unprecedented dynasty of success. Plenty of teams had won consecutive championships, and Huddersfield and Arsenal had won three in a row in the 1920s and 1930s respectively, but only Portsmouth since the war had retained their title. Arsenal’s two titles since the war, won in 1948 and 1953, made them the most prestigious club in the country, with a total of seven. Busby’s line of thinking was different. He wanted to match that total himself. He reckoned the usual lifespan of a manager at a great team to be five years, after which time he would plummet.

“Unless he has made other arrangements,” he said, “like thinking ahead, at least five years ahead. All teams are apt to be over the top within five years of reaching it. Buying players piecemeal is at best a chancy business, at worst a financial disaster... In 1946 it was revolutionary even to think about getting boys straight from school. Get them early enough, I thought, and they would be trained according to some sort of pattern; in my case, the pattern I was trying constantly to create at Manchester United, in the first team and any other team, so that if a boy came through as far as his ability, courage, speed and character were concerned, he would fit into the pattern without feeling like a stranger among people painting pretty pictures he did not understand.”

The composition of the 1956 team, the product of a decade’s work, was compelling. United finished in eighth in 1953, then fourth in 1954, then fifth in 1955. Busby conceded it ‘wasn’t perfect’, but still believed the progress was “a remarkable affirmation that my pattern system was right. The pieces dropped out, the pieces dropped in.”

Nobody was more Salford in Manchester United’s team than Eddie Colman. There were many other local lads. Dennis Viollet, Geoff Bent, to name just two. This local influence helped bring the personalities out of the likes of Edwards (Dudley), Whelan (Dublin), Charlton (Newcastle) and so on.

It cemented the local connection, especially as the young players would live a stone’s throw from Old Trafford – in the everyday gaze of younger boys who idolised them. A perpetual stream of fishes swimming towards the development streams of The Cliff; or, as Jimmy Murphy might put it, a growing orchard for his one-day ‘golden apples’. If these youngsters could not make it on the pitch, they would provide fervent support off it. Even though the vision of Busby was still in progress, by the mid 1950s, the dreams of Gibson, Rocca and Crickmer had been realised beyond even their own comprehension.

Football, Taught by Matt Busby by Wayne Barton (Reach Sport, £20) is on sale from Amazon, reachsportshop and all good book shops.