Alan Davies - Manchester United's Forgotten Player

Born and raised in Manchester, Alan Davies started his professional playing career with Manchester United in December 1978. After making his Manchester United league debut in a narrow 1-0 victory against Southampton at Old Trafford in May 1982, Davies remained on Manchester United's books till the end of the 1984-85 season.

Although the talented maverick appeared in both matches in the 1983 FA Cup Final against Brighton and Hove Albion, the midfield player was restricted to a mere seven first team appearances for Manchester United between 1978 and 1985. Alan Davies failed to live up to his early promise and he was eventually sold to Newcastle United for an estimated transfer fee of ?65,000 in the summer of 1985. The midfielder never settled down at St James? Park, however, and he had loan spells with Charlton Athletic and Carlisle United before he moved on to famous Welsh club Swansea City in August 1987.

The move to Wales helped Davies revitalise his professional footballing career and he played an important part in Swansea's promotion success in 1988. He proceeded to appear in 84 league matches for the Swans before he was sold to Bradford City for a transfer fee of ?130,000 in June 1989. However, after just 26 league appearances for the club the player followed manager Terry Yorath back to Swansea in exchange for Vetch Field hero Robbie James in the summer of 1990. Alan Davies also played for Wales and he went on to collect a total of 13 international caps.

United Blog Articles is a website committed to Manchester United Football Club. Soccer is unquestionably the most popular sport in the world and it is probably only fair to say that Man Utd is the most popular club in the world. Read additional articles on Welsh players at UnitedBlogArticles.com.

Manchester United's Field of Dreams and the Red Army

Manchester United is one of the most exhilarating clubs in Europe. When you obtain the tickets of this club then you not only get a chance to see the thrilling game of this club, however it also gives you an opportunity to become familiar with the atmosphere of Old Trafford. It is also popularly called as the Field of Dreams. It is the home soil of the Red Devils as well as carnival ground meant for the Red Army.

It is well known fact that from the time when it was 1910, aficionado and supporters are purchasing Manchester United tickets to their home sports event at Old Trafford( except the era of World War II for 8 years when it was bombarded). Bobby Charlton, one of the most prominent players had named the sports ground as "Field of Dreams". Sir Robert "Bobby" Charlton was not an unknown name for the people at that time. He was really very popular for his aggressive game on or after "Midfield" in addition to his brutal long-range shot. He was called as the "Ballon d'Or" European footballer in the year of 1966 and he successfully won the "FIFA World Cup".

Old Trafford is the second-biggest English football sports ground which has the capacity of 76,212 Manchester United ticket purchasing cohorts. The great thing about this sports ground is that it has five-star rating given by UEFA and it is in the category of "UEFA elite stadium". It is one of the two to get this honor. It has got the chance to host a lot of FA Cup semi-final contests as an equitable spot plus a small number of "English national football team" England intercontinental clashes. It has also get the chance to horde many other big competitions in "1966 FIFA World Cup", "UEFA Euro 1996" as well as the "2003 UEFA Champions League Final".

The playing field of Old Trafford is delimited by four roofed stands authoritatively identified as the North, East, South as well as West stands. Every stand has at least two tiers, apart from the South Stand. This stand has only one tier because of edifice precincts. The lower tier of every stand is divided into two segments which are called as lower segments and upper segments. The lower segments have been rehabilitated from patios where supporters stood in the beginning of 1990s.

West Stand is the most famous stand at Old Trafford which is notably recognized as the "Stretford End". Initially planned to embrace 20,000 supporters, the Stretford End was the very last stand to be enclosed plus in addition the final left over all-roofed stand at the land previous to the strained improve to seating in the beginning of 1990s. Manchester United's most intransigent fans called as The Red Army are placed at Stretford End. The majority of the clamor along with ambiance at Old Trafford originates from this stand. The noise of Red Army was compared to a jumbo jet elating off. It is almost unfeasible to catch a set in the Stretford End as the supporters that fill up this stand presubscribed to their Manchester United period tickets each year.

It was a well known fact that Manchester United's Red Army was one of the most iniquitous and the largest crowd of cohorts that British football has seen till now. The city would be in a pandemonium when the Manchester's Red Army pursued their squad to a missing game. Everybody of the Red Army group would go by train, car, coach, and also by foot if required. In the era of mid-seventies more precisely "1974-75 in English football" when Manchester United had been downgraded from the apex flight of English football and participated one period in the "Football League Second Division", the Red Army did such bedlam at grounds up along with down the nation visiting sports ground a place where they outnumbered the home support at times, it showed the way to the preface of home with away supporter isolation and hurdling at football stadiums all the way through England.

Now we cannot compare the recent days Red Army to its foil in 1970's....80's. There is no Manchester based fans club; it extends athwart the globe, with a supporter stand of more than 300 millions. All these people would always like to search out to Old Trafford. They really like to watch the game and also they want to understand the original nature of that atmosphere. It really makes very uphill task to purchase the tickets of Manchester United.

The writer belongs to Sports Blog where he write his own articles which are the Sports Articles only.

Old Trafford - Manchester United's Theatre of Dreams

Old Trafford Football Ground is located at - Sir Matt Busby Way, Old Trafford, Manchester. Sir Matt Busby Way was created in 1993, and was formerly known as Warwick Road North.

The ground's nickname is the Theatre Of Dreams.

Old Trafford has been Manchester United's home since 1910, with the exception of an eight-year period from 1941 to 1949, when it was bombed in the second world war. During that period United played their 'home' games at the ground of their rivals, Manchester City - at a financial cost of course. They had to pay City for the privilege consisting of a flat fee, and a gate percentage.

Old Trafford's current capacity is over 76,000. It's hoped that in time it will expand even further to 90,000 with greater capacity in the South Stand.

The ground has frequently hosted FA Cup semi-final matches as a neutral venue and several England international fixtures while the new Wembley Stadium was under construction. Before Wembley Stadium was built in 1923 the FA Cup Finals were played around the country, with Old Trafford hosting several of these.

Manchester United were formerly called Newton Heath, but it was decided in 1909 to build a new stadium. Designed by Scottish architect Archibald Leitch, the ground featured seating in the south stand under cover, while the remaining three stands were uncovered terraces.

In 1965 the old roof pillars were replaced with modern-style cantilevering on top of the roof, allowing all spectators a completely unobstructed view. This was an important step, as the World Cup was to be staged in the UK in the following year, 1966. Old Trafford was one of the venues used for the tournament.

By the 1980's the capacity had dropped to around 60,000 due to all the improvements in the ground. The capacity dropped still further in 1990, when the Taylor Report recommended, for safety reasons, and with the Government's agreement, that all stadia be converted to all-seaters.

Old Trafford's most recent expansion, which took place between July 2005 and May 2006, saw an increase of around 8,000 seats with the addition of second tiers to both the north-west and north-east sections of the ground.

Further redevelopments saw United buy up additional land round about.

The Old Trafford pitch is now surrounded by four covered all-seater stands, officially known as the North, East, South and West Stands. The West End is the 'Stretford End' where the diehard, most vocal, United fans sit.

On 29 May 2008, to celebrate the 40th anniversary of Manchester United's first European Cup title, a statue of the club's old stars of George Best, Denis Law and Bobby Charlton, entitled "The United Trinity", was unveiled across Sir Matt Busby Way from the East Stand.

The ground continues to break attendance records. The newer Emirates Stadium, home of Arsenal FC, has a lower capacity, just over 60,000. Only one football ground has a higher capacity than the Theatre of Dreams, and that's at the new Wembley Stadium in London.

Manchester United supporters have an insatiable appetite for watching their team play. It seems that however big the ground gets, the seats will almost always be filled. That's what success on the pitch does for this wonderful game, and this glorious team that is Manchester United.

Geoff Cummings maintains a blog at http://manunitedis1.blogspot.com - where updates on Manchester United`s fortunes are provided. Geoff also owns the site at http://www.ourhometools.com

Manchester United's Top 5 Strikers Before the Reign of Alex Ferguson

Manchester United, almost certainly the biggest football club in the world. As a result, they've had a few pretty decent players run out onto the pitch for them over the years. Rightly or wrongly, the position in any football team that gets the most attention is striker.

With that in mind, who have been the top strikers for Man United over the years? For what they are worth, here are my thoughts on the top 5 strikers in the years prior to Sir Alex's reign at United. Don't worry, I'm well aware not everyone who reads this will agree with me.

Let's start in the past and work forward - seems to be fairly logical. I'm going to claim that the first forward of real note is a certain Jack Rowley who was part of the team before and during the Busby Babes era. Rowley played for United between 1937 and 1955, amassing a grand total of 211 goals in 424 appearances. That alone gets him a spot among my top strikers.

Overlapping in time and therefore sharing the pitch, my next selection is Stan Pearson who scored 148 goals in 343 appearances playing between 1937 to 1953.

Next I've picked out Dennis Violet who played for the reds of Manchester in no fewer than 291 games during the Busby Babes period. The lightening quick centre forward scored 178 goals for United and was one of the survivors of the Munich air disaster.

Moving on we have non other than Bobby Charlton - now Sir Bobby Charlton of course. Another member of the Busby Babes who also survived the crash in Munich Bobby netted 249 times for United - the club record. For a long time he also held the record for the most appearances for the club at 758, a figure that has since been surpassed by Ryan Giggs.

My final selection, and surely few will question this one, is a certain Dennis Law. 'The King' or the 'Lawman' as he was affectionately know played for Manchester United between 1962 and 1973. During that time he played for United a total of 409 times, scoring an impressive 237 goals. Law won European Footballer of the year in 1965, during a season in which he top-scored for United with 28 and helped then to win their first league title since Munich.

Well, there you have it. My selection of the best strikers to play for United in pre-Ferguson. Why did I make the distinction and only feature forwards who played for Manchester United before Alex Ferguson became manager in 1986? Well, there have been a good many years since then so the Ferguson reign deserves special attention. There are plenty of great strikers who have played for the red half of Manchester under Sir Alex. Details of my pick of that bunch will have to wait for another day.

Emil Flore is a pretty keen sports watcher - though he doesn't actually play much sport himself! Among his sporting passions is a love of football. This is reflected in his site http://www.footballshirtsearch.co.uk where you fill find Manchester United Shirts along with football shirts for many other teams.

Roy Keane - Manchester United's Irish Rebel

In 1993, Manchester United manager Sir Alex Ferguson paid a then club record fee of ?3.75 million for the gifted Irishman. While at Old Trafford, Roy Keane proceeded to make a total of 326 appearances for the Reds finding the back of the net on 33 occasions. When he finally decided to leave the club in 2005, the faithful stalwart had helped Manchester United to win six Premier League Championships, including two doubles in 1994 and 1996.

He could be brutally thuggish as a player scaring the living daylights out of his opponents. Keeping Hibernian tradition alive, he was also widely known for drinking just as hard as he played the game. Nonetheless, the hard working skirmisher emerged as one of the most important players in Sir Alex Ferguson's brilliant side of the 1990s. Driven by a manic perfectionism, the Irish rebel was eventually appointed Manchester United skipper before the start of the 1997-98 season. A swashbuckling character if there ever was one, Keane would never accept the prawn sandwich brigade at Old Trafford.

An Irish international, Roy Keane made his debut for the Republic of Ireland in a friendly match at home to Chile in May 1991 and was a regular member of the Irish side for eleven years earning a total of 66 full caps. In 2000, both the Football Writers and the Professional Footballers Association voted him their Player of the Year. His behaviour often raising eyebrows by number, he was without doubt a deep and complicated footballer. Now, if you take the Irishness out of Roy Keane, he would probably stop being Roy Keane.

"Sometimes you wonder, do they understand the game of football? They have a few drinks and probably the prawn sandwiches, and they don't realise what's going on out on the pitch." Roy Keane quote.

United Blog Articles is a website dedicated to Manchester United. Soccer is without doubt the most popular sport in the world. And it is probably only fair to say that Manchester United is the most popular club world wide. Read more on Roy Keane at United Blog Articles.