By the early 1970s the warring club legends were so divided that they were no longer speaking – nor passing – to one another
hen Matt Busby retired in 1969, Manchester United’s three exceptional talents, three winners of the Ballon d’Or, were in decline. Bobby Charlton was 31 and age was closing in. Denis Law was 29 but had never fully recovered from his knee injury. George Best was 22 but had already won his last trophy.
“I just don’t understand him,” Bobby said in April 1973. “What do you come into football for? It’s your duty to give your best to the people who come to support you, but he didn’t seem to see this.” Best, meanwhile, accused Bobby of having “a holier than thou attitude”, commenting, “I wish I could hear him say ‘fuck’, just once”.
O’Farrell, a quiet, decent, thoughtful man, found himself in an impossible position. Best was a problem perhaps beyond any solution, but he was far from the only issue. Law was struggling with injury and becoming increasingly truculent. And then there were the internal politics of the club. The power structures that had sustained Busby and provided him with his authority inevitably resisted any successor. O’Farrell thought Paddy Crerand was past it, but Crerand was close to Busby.
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