London/Manchester: The 7.51am to Crewe is cancelled, and Best shuffles out of platform No.8. So does the man with B.Fernandes on his back. With everyone else, they return to waiting and scanning for the platform for the next train scheduled to depart Euston an hour later. Without a murmur of protest.
Michael Carrick’s team had lost only once in 10 home games in 2026 averaging 2.7 points per game at Old Trafford. Even as people go in, others walk through the Munich Tunnel, a memorial for the air crash victims of 1958, wait in front of the Stretford End to boo Manchester City as they arrive and cheer the home team. You can go around the amphitheatre, buy the match day programme for £4, half-and-half scarves for £15 and any other memorabilia of your choosing.
Because he didn’t know there were two Old Traffords, comes first, the cricket ground, the one that had George Best confused. Going into the 199th match between the teams from Manchester, it was the best home record in the Premier League this year. Reason enough for men, women, boys and girls of Manchester United persuasion to spend a sunny afternoon at the “theatre of dreams. You walk past the Lancaster County Cricket Ground, cross the road and a stall that calls itself the King of Burger and is bookended by images of Eric Cantona and Bobby Charlton. The Trafford Bar, with murals of Best and Charlton on one side and Denis Law and Cantona on another, is on your right. You walk a bit with a throng that grows thicker and bigger by the minute and you are on Sir Matt Busby Way. Not everyone is a ticket holder and that is okay. Imagine doing that on match day at any stadium in India. The security is present, mounted police and dog squad too, but they let tourists, tickets holders and protesters who are ticket holders do their thing. Kick-off is around the corner and pubs disgorge boisterous people who make their way to Old Trafford. Beyond the stadium, pubs are a good way to live a football game in England. Adam and Eve in East London’s Stratford felt like a miniature Emirates last week, stunned by Morgan Rogers’s early goal and erupting when Martin Odegaard equalised. It shook when Kai Havertz scored the winner. Manchester United struggled to impose their numerical superiority and with City trying to defend their way out, the mood didn’t change much till Erling Haaland’s slick, sucker-punch of a goal. That sparked a debate about off-side and whether Enzo Fernandes was interfering with the play.
With red and green smoke flares, a large group of United supporters with banners that called for the Glazers to be ousted marched in, chanting, “we know who you are, cheating ba####ds,” the dig aimed as much at City as to United’s American owners. By the end, chants of “Champions” and “Arsenal” were bouncing off its high ceiling.
