Manchester United - Could Hollywood Make It Any Bigger?

This article was generously provided to ClubFootball by the British Council, which operates in China as the Cultural and Education Section of the British Embassy.

Manchester United are the biggest and most popular team in the world. But why? Other clubs have won more. Other teams have cost more. Other grounds can hold more. What gives this team from England their status as the giants of football?
 
Soft Drinks
 
If Coca-Cola and Pepsi got a football team together it would be the most famous in the world because 98% of the global population have heard of at least one of the two brands. They haven't produced a football team though; they produce soft drinks.
 
Hard Facts
 
Manchester United, on the other hand, produce the most famous football club ever. Approximately 79% of the world have heard of the club.
 
From stokebrokers in Surrey (county in the South of England) to students in Singapore, the fortunes of Manchester United are followed and celebrated. When the club recently conducted their own research to find out which is the best supported club in the world they found that they were number 1 with 39% of the vote. Juventus were second - with 4% of the vote.
 
Based on this global fan base, of Manchester United have established a sophisticated marketing operation that makes them not only the most popular, but also the richest club in the world. The club were recently quoted at being worth more than £1 billion on the London Stock Exchange.
 
What is the secret of this success? Just why are United so big and so popular? After all, Real Madrid have won more European Championships (seven vs United's two); Liverpool have won the English League more and Corinthians of Brazil won the inaugural FIFA World Club Competition in January 2000, whilst United didn't even make it to the Semi-Finals.
 
But the secret behind United's success lies not in facts and statistics. It lies in culture - popular culture to be exact. United is like a huge Hollywood blockbuster. And no script-writer would have dared to come up with a script as wild, as improbable, as emotional as United's.
 
Lights, Camera, Action
 
United started life in 1878 as Newton Heath, initially comprised of a group of railway workers.
 
They enjoyed immediate success and turned professional in 1885. Always destined for the big screen they didn't start to demand top billing until the 1940's as David Meek, a Manchester based journalist for over 40 years recalls:
"I think it began really when Matt Busby came home from the war and set about making something of a club that had been something of a sleeping giant before he arrived. They reached the quarter finals of the European Cup in his first season."
United won their first major trophy in 37 years in 1948 when they picked up the F.A. Cup.
 
From tragedy to triumph
 
It was during Matt Busby's reign that one of football's most tragic events occurred. United entered European competition for the first time in 1956 and reached the semi final of the European Cup. After winning the league title again in 1957, they entered Europe again and in February of 1958 played an away game in Belgrade against Red Star.
 
On the journey home, the plane stopped to refuel in Munich. Snow was falling and the runway was icy. Twice the captain had to abort the takeoff. The third time the plane overshot the runway and the plane's wing clipped a house.
 
The ensuing crash was responsible for the death of twenty-three people, including eight of Matt Busby's young team - "Busby's Babes."
 
Some of the survivors never played again and the full potential of the side was never realised. Sir Matt himself survived the crash and despite loosing half the side, United still went on to make it to the F.A. Cup Final that year.
 
Within ten years of the Munich crash Busby had rebuilt an all-star cast, including Bobby Charlton, Denis Law and football's first sex-symbol footballer, George Best.
 
This side won the League Title in 1965 and again in 1967, narrowly lost the European Cup final in 1966 but were victors against the legendary Benfica in 1968.
 
It had taken Sir Matt over twenty years to achieve the ultimate club football goal. The stuff of a truly epic movie, like the Hollywood products of the day.
 
The passage from Munich through to European Cup glory just ten years later is the perfect example of United's true-life drama providing a dream script.
 
They have transcended the boundaries of football more than any other club. Their fortunes ever since have provided the kind of rollercoaster ride you expect from the big screen.
 
After a period that even saw them relegated to the old English Second Division (now known as the First Division) they have gone on to dominate the English Premiership.
 
Their ability to turn the tide and deal with adversity was most recently shown in the final of the 1999 European Champions League against Bayern Munich in Barcelona. At 1-0 down, with Roy Keane out and David Beckham not at his best, they seemed to be dead and buried after 90 minutes.
 
It looked like a hopeless situation but just as the Bayern fans were getting ready to celebrate an historic victory, United tore up the script and struck. Twice. Perhaps one of the most amazing fightbacks of all time. United have that ability to provide a plot twist even right at the end.
 
Romantic interest
 
And that's not all. To make sure the audience stays really hooked, our script writers have now added the love interest too.
 
Over the years, United have celebrated the sexy player - moody, unpredictable, prone to flashes of brilliance but sometimes fatally flawed - the perfect leading man.
 
Best, Law, Hughes, Giggs, Cantona, Beckham. And, just to round things off, they now have the perfect leading woman too - Victoria Beckham, also known as Posh from the Spice Girls, one of the most famous women on the planet.
 
If she's going to marry a footballer, then there's only one club really... United have always lived up to their nickname and had a touch of the devil about them. They are the rock'n'roll club. The Rolling Stones compared to Liverpool's Beatles. And what sells better these days than love, celebrity and rock'n'roll?
 
Distribution
 
But no Hollywood film becomes a universal blockbuster without a slick marketing machine behind it.
 
United now aspire to the world stage and their marketing is fully geared to support this.
 
For example, Manchester United recently embarked on a pre-season tour of China. The Manchester United website is the most visited in China and they were happy to further their links with the country. Dwight Yorke, United's Trinidad and Tobagon international, recalls with some amazement the warm reception the team got:
"The whole trip was an eye opener because it was the first time I'd really been on a pre-season trip with a club. And when we went to Shanghai and places like that the reception that we got from the fans when we arrived, well, we needed security guards everywhere, even people to sleep on our floor. There was security people because of people outside going ballistic about the club and the players."
Yorke, who has been playing for United since 1998 was clearly shocked at how popular the team were, particularly in a country on the other side of the planet from England:
"Until you actually play there and witness how really big Manchester United are you will continue to just know from the outside that they are just a big club. When you are actually in it and see the things that happen, as I said, it's just amazing."
And that's not the half of it. Manchester United have opened three Red Cafes - in Old Trafford, Dublin and Singapore - which are a fully interactive experience where fans can watch the games, visit exhibitions from the Manchester United museum, and soak up the whole Manchester United experience.
 
There is the multimedia with the website and now Manchester United TV which shows documentaries, games, films. There is the megastore which sells everything to do with the club. You've seen the game, bought the hat and the t-shirt, and the Ryan Giggs figurine.
 
The film which once seemed to write itself as it went along is now, out of necessity, tightly scripted, re-scripted, translated, interpreted.
 
And the sequels?
 
So their name is up there in lights, they've grabbed top billing. Can they keep it up? Can they keep on re-inventing and recycling the myth? Can the machine roll on? And is the winning on the field sustainable?
 
Probably. The two feed off each other. More fans mean more money - more trophies - more success means more glamourous players - means more fans - means more money...
 
And if the sequel bombs and they fall off the top spot for a while? It's got to happen at some point but all the better for the script-writers - they'll be sure to produce an even bigger and better ending next time.
 
When you go to the cinema to check out the next episode perhaps you won't be drinking Coca Cola or Pepsi Cola, instead get yourself a large Andy Cola...

May 2001