Rest In Peace, Denis Law
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik (@Rood) and Imran (@Annihilate Now!) are here to discuss Amad saving our blushes in a win against Southampton as well as our now annual loss at home to Brighton. They discuss Amorim's post-match comments, revisit how mid-table we may or may not be, and discuss some transfer news.
One of the greatest players I have ever seen and definitely one of the nicest I have met off the field. A true gentleman. God bless Denis, we may never see your like again.
Beautiful tribute.
The Holy Trinity is forever.
One of the best to ever do it.
RIP King.
Some fantastic photos of Denis the King in the Guardian, free online. https://www.theguardian.com/footbal...tures-manchester-united-scotland-huddersfield
R.I.P a true great player and person.
RIP. never got to see him play in his prime, but watched plenty of documentarys and matches from his time as a MU player. Such a legend of the game and our club.
RIP, an absolute legend.
Great player, great person, he will be missed.
Great player, great person, he will be missed.
Forever the king of Old Trafford. Accept no imitations. Thanks for the memories, Denis.
Ah jeez. RIP.
I've literally got tears in my eyes. My 3 heroes are now all gone.
RIP Denis. You, Bobby and George brought me so much joy when I was just a wee lad.
RIP Denis. You, Bobby and George brought me so much joy when I was just a wee lad.
RIP legend
All 3 are gone but immortalised in front of the stadium forever.
All 3 are gone but immortalised in front of the stadium forever.
Don't see City' tribute on Twitter. Thought Denis Law was liked by City fans?
A bit of a prophet, a bit of an optimist.
What a wonderful snippet.
Such a lovely personality.
A few years ago below a YouTube clip probably, I read a comment from a Villa fan. He'd been to a home match in 65-66, where Denis was booed by the home fans at the start, possibly cos he was the biggest name, perhaps cos he'd scored 4 against them the previous season. He said that Denis was so incredible in the game that they all applauded him off. It finished 1-1.
Homegrown players such as Bobby n Nobby n Georgie, yet ex-City player Denis was the most popular of the lot.
Homegrown players such as Bobby n Nobby n Georgie, yet ex-City player Denis was the most popular of the lot.
I remember his hat-trick against Birmingham in the FA Cup. That was the same year he scored 7 over two legs against poor old Waterford. The Stretford End booed United and cheered for Waterford that night. So many memories I thought I had forgotten have come back. It was the same when Bobby and Bestie died.
I recall Sky had a quiz show in the 90s and while the show was mainly rubbish Denis personality and wit really shone brightly.
I'd imagine there'll be not only a tribute to Dennis but the holy trinity as a whole today.
Rest In Peace, Dennis Law
2' spells at City but always regarded as a Red.
Fantastic player. Sometimes despite the shirt they pull on you just have to tip your hat to their greatness.
Denis was a genius.
Fantastic player. Sometimes despite the shirt they pull on you just have to tip your hat to their greatness.
Denis was a genius.
Rip
A icon of the game
A icon of the game
David Squires in the Guardian did a nice tribute to Denis today.
Nice work.David Squires in the Guardian did a nice tribute to Denis today.
Michael Henderson from The Spectator magazine
Not sure if this is allowed to be posted but....
Erling Haaland could never match Denis Law
20 January
‘Talent is plentiful’, said Laurence Olivier. ‘Skill is much rarer’. Although the great actor was talking about the stage he was really acknowledging the nature of what Ken Tynan called ‘high definition’ performance. And in the world of football, there were few performers so highly defined as Denis Law.
The tributes paid to ‘the Lawman’, who died on Friday at the age of 84, may surprise those too young to have seen him play for Manchester United. He kicked his last ball 51 years ago, retiring in 1974 after representing Scotland at the World Cup. Fans raised on that overheated global phenomenon, the Premier League, must take on trust the evidence supplied by those who caught him in his pomp.
Was he that good, the once and future ‘King’ of Old Trafford? Oh yes. Ignore words like ‘legend’ or ‘icon’, which have been worn bare by repetition. Better by far to consider something an orchestral musician said of Arturo Toscanini: ‘It was worth being born to have been conducted by that man’.
Outside Old Trafford stands a memorial to three of the club’s four greatest sons. Duncan Edwards, who died in the Munich air disaster in February 1958. Bobby Charlton, who survived that crash to win the World Cup in 1966. George Best, from Belfast, who had the purest talent of any British footballer. Standing between them, right arm aloft, as if celebrating another goal, is Law, from Aberdeen.
All three were honoured as European Footballers of the Year. Best (1968) was venerated. Charlton (1966) was admired. Law (1964) was loved, and not just here. Football fans the world over recognised a compound of quicksilver and boldness that made him genuinely great.
Hugh McIlvanney, the Scottish sportswriter, liked to recall a conversation about European stars with Mario Zagallo, the Brazilian who won the World Cup as player and manager. To names like Eusebio, Gianni Rivera and Bobby Moore, Zagallo nodded approval. When McIlvanney mentioned Law, the manager said ‘out of this world’.
Law arrived at Old Trafford in 1962, after stepping on stones at Huddersfield Town, Manchester City and, briefly, Torino. He enjoyed Italian life though not the defensive character of Italian football. When Matt Busby offered Torino £115,000, then a British transfer record, he returned to Manchester, this time to wear red.
He scored 237 goals for United in the next decade, though as he told the journalist Patrick Barclay, who was researching a biography of Busby: ‘I played 400 matches for Matt, and he played me out of position every time’. Law, according to Barclay, considered himself to be ‘a box-to-box player’, which doesn’t ring entirely true. In old money he was an inside forward, capable of shaping the game as well as scoring goals.
When he emerged at Huddersfield, a slight, bespectacled teenager, some judges thought they had seen another Peter Doherty, the Northern Ireland inside forward who starred for Manchester City. Law never mislaid that golden thread. Whereas his great contemporary, Jimmy Greaves, found the net 357 times for Chelsea, Tottenham Hotspur and West Ham, the goal-poacher supreme, Law lived as comfortably outside the penalty area as within it. He was a ‘total footballer’ before the Dutch invented the term.
He wasn’t a tall man, standing 5’9, but was a superb header of the ball, often putting his bonce where defenders put their size 10s. There could hardly have been a braver footballer, for those were the days of heavy pitches, sodden leather balls, and an indulgent attitude towards ‘robust’ tackling.
There could hardly have been a braver footballer
Roy Hartle, a notoriously flinty full-back for Bolton, once told Tom Finney, the great Preston winger: ‘You can push the ball past me, Tom, and you can run past me, but you’re not going together’. Hartle was well-spoken, smoked a pipe, and later became a Conservative councillor. Different days.
Law dazzled most brightly between 1963, when he scored for the Rest of the World against England at Wembley, and 1968, when United finally won the European Cup, though he missed the final at Wembley with a knee injury. He was unable to halt the club’s decline after that triumph, and in 1973 returned to Manchester City for a final season. His last act was to score the goal that downed United at Old Trafford, and seal a relegation that was long coming.
City are now the dominant club in English football, having won four successive Premier League titles thanks to the unlimited funds of their Qatari owners. Within hours of Law’s death they awarded a contract to Erling Haaland, their boisterous Norwegian striker, who will trouser £900,000 a week for the next nine years.
Had Law been on the market today the noughts would roll on forever. He was certainly a more complete footballer than Haaland, no matter what the Premier League propagandists would have us believe. For all the hundreds of millions they have spent in recent years, not a single current United player would have got into the XI that won First Division titles in 1965 and 1967, when ‘the King’ wore ermine.
Yet, as Danny Blanchflower, Tottenham’s double-winning captain in 1961, understood, sport is about more than winning. ‘The game is about glory’, he said. ‘It is about doing things in style, with a flourish, about going out and beating the other lot, not waiting for them to die of boredom’.
That is why grown men shed tears when they heard Law had left us. They were drawn back to a more innocent time, when footballers revealed loyalty to their public by acts of skill and valour, not wailing like infants and kissing badges. Law will never be forgotten. Like Jupiter, he brought joy.
Not sure if this is allowed to be posted but....
Erling Haaland could never match Denis Law
20 January
‘Talent is plentiful’, said Laurence Olivier. ‘Skill is much rarer’. Although the great actor was talking about the stage he was really acknowledging the nature of what Ken Tynan called ‘high definition’ performance. And in the world of football, there were few performers so highly defined as Denis Law.
The tributes paid to ‘the Lawman’, who died on Friday at the age of 84, may surprise those too young to have seen him play for Manchester United. He kicked his last ball 51 years ago, retiring in 1974 after representing Scotland at the World Cup. Fans raised on that overheated global phenomenon, the Premier League, must take on trust the evidence supplied by those who caught him in his pomp.
Was he that good, the once and future ‘King’ of Old Trafford? Oh yes. Ignore words like ‘legend’ or ‘icon’, which have been worn bare by repetition. Better by far to consider something an orchestral musician said of Arturo Toscanini: ‘It was worth being born to have been conducted by that man’.
Outside Old Trafford stands a memorial to three of the club’s four greatest sons. Duncan Edwards, who died in the Munich air disaster in February 1958. Bobby Charlton, who survived that crash to win the World Cup in 1966. George Best, from Belfast, who had the purest talent of any British footballer. Standing between them, right arm aloft, as if celebrating another goal, is Law, from Aberdeen.
All three were honoured as European Footballers of the Year. Best (1968) was venerated. Charlton (1966) was admired. Law (1964) was loved, and not just here. Football fans the world over recognised a compound of quicksilver and boldness that made him genuinely great.
Hugh McIlvanney, the Scottish sportswriter, liked to recall a conversation about European stars with Mario Zagallo, the Brazilian who won the World Cup as player and manager. To names like Eusebio, Gianni Rivera and Bobby Moore, Zagallo nodded approval. When McIlvanney mentioned Law, the manager said ‘out of this world’.
Law arrived at Old Trafford in 1962, after stepping on stones at Huddersfield Town, Manchester City and, briefly, Torino. He enjoyed Italian life though not the defensive character of Italian football. When Matt Busby offered Torino £115,000, then a British transfer record, he returned to Manchester, this time to wear red.
He scored 237 goals for United in the next decade, though as he told the journalist Patrick Barclay, who was researching a biography of Busby: ‘I played 400 matches for Matt, and he played me out of position every time’. Law, according to Barclay, considered himself to be ‘a box-to-box player’, which doesn’t ring entirely true. In old money he was an inside forward, capable of shaping the game as well as scoring goals.
When he emerged at Huddersfield, a slight, bespectacled teenager, some judges thought they had seen another Peter Doherty, the Northern Ireland inside forward who starred for Manchester City. Law never mislaid that golden thread. Whereas his great contemporary, Jimmy Greaves, found the net 357 times for Chelsea, Tottenham Hotspur and West Ham, the goal-poacher supreme, Law lived as comfortably outside the penalty area as within it. He was a ‘total footballer’ before the Dutch invented the term.
He wasn’t a tall man, standing 5’9, but was a superb header of the ball, often putting his bonce where defenders put their size 10s. There could hardly have been a braver footballer, for those were the days of heavy pitches, sodden leather balls, and an indulgent attitude towards ‘robust’ tackling.
There could hardly have been a braver footballer
Roy Hartle, a notoriously flinty full-back for Bolton, once told Tom Finney, the great Preston winger: ‘You can push the ball past me, Tom, and you can run past me, but you’re not going together’. Hartle was well-spoken, smoked a pipe, and later became a Conservative councillor. Different days.
Law dazzled most brightly between 1963, when he scored for the Rest of the World against England at Wembley, and 1968, when United finally won the European Cup, though he missed the final at Wembley with a knee injury. He was unable to halt the club’s decline after that triumph, and in 1973 returned to Manchester City for a final season. His last act was to score the goal that downed United at Old Trafford, and seal a relegation that was long coming.
City are now the dominant club in English football, having won four successive Premier League titles thanks to the unlimited funds of their Qatari owners. Within hours of Law’s death they awarded a contract to Erling Haaland, their boisterous Norwegian striker, who will trouser £900,000 a week for the next nine years.
Had Law been on the market today the noughts would roll on forever. He was certainly a more complete footballer than Haaland, no matter what the Premier League propagandists would have us believe. For all the hundreds of millions they have spent in recent years, not a single current United player would have got into the XI that won First Division titles in 1965 and 1967, when ‘the King’ wore ermine.
Yet, as Danny Blanchflower, Tottenham’s double-winning captain in 1961, understood, sport is about more than winning. ‘The game is about glory’, he said. ‘It is about doing things in style, with a flourish, about going out and beating the other lot, not waiting for them to die of boredom’.
That is why grown men shed tears when they heard Law had left us. They were drawn back to a more innocent time, when footballers revealed loyalty to their public by acts of skill and valour, not wailing like infants and kissing badges. Law will never be forgotten. Like Jupiter, he brought joy.
This is true. Stepney, Brennan, Dunne, Crerand, Foulkes, Stiles, Best, Law, Charlton, Herd, Aston. That's basically the team that won the league in 1967. I'm hard-pressed to swap a single one of today's team for one of them.
That was a good, strong, reliable team. A balanced mix of superstars and top professionals to make up a Championship winning team. They all played 90 minutes in most matches, with nothing like the changes made today, by supposedly fitter players, on better diets, on better pitches, with lighter footballs, more advanced coaching, agents and PR teams! That was when winning trophies was more important than money and social media recognition.