Duncan Edwards 75th Birthday Tribute by those he shared the pitch with

Down, Bobby. Robson Bobby Robson and Brian Robson were going to be my number one pick until I discovered that you might be able to pick players you've never seen before. He was a guy who always wanted this, even when I first came to Lester when he was 17 years old. He was telling Alan that he was sorry, er, Duncan Edward, right. I always heard about Duncan Ed. I was desperate to see him because he was a football fan. Especially at that age and the Man United bus was turning the corner on Filbert Street. He was playing for the youth team and desperately I saw Duncan EDS come out with the other stars too and the coach grabbed me and threw me to the ground.

On the bus and we went to play Saffron l so I never saw it but I heard Allan and other people who are good judges of the game and who had seen it think it wasn't believable so I love Brian Robson and its fantastic quantity. of international matches and great leadership and goals as well and his goals as well. I think Brian Robson is not everyone's cup of tea because he's not silky smooth like Glenn Hodle and people are very, very effective. I think he liked Mo too, so maybe you. I couldn't play him opposite Bobby Chon, both of them would be too much, it's true, but yeah, I'll go with Allen there.

I think Dunan Ed should do it. My first choice was Johnny Haynes because of the impression I had when I left. school at 15 and I went to Fulham and there was the captain of England, you know, playing for Fulham in those days in the second division when I first got there, and the first job I had was sweeping Terraces and they used to train at Fulham in those days and Out Come Angy with the ball in his hand and on the field and they did what they called them in those days a 43 2 one they did four laps three laps two laps one and the ball came out and they had a five as a team for the rest of the day and at the end of the morning while I was sweeping The Terraces I was watching on the train and I got 12 balls and he came over to the other side and placed them on the halfway line and he walked back and ran about four yards and there was a target who saw strong players but wonderful passes, but I never saw anyone who had done everything, you know, and I thought, what a player! in a way, he was my first hero, really Duncan and um, I used to think well, if he can make a 60 or 70 yard pass with his left or right foot on the ground or in the air, I have to try it.

Do that too, you know, and I and I used to practice and I learned a lot from him, probably more than any other player, he really had it all and, where I try to describe him as the complete all-rounder because when he had the ball. He was our best attacker, he could make long passes, short passes, he could dribble, he was very agile on his feet for a big guy and he was tremendous in the air, the ball used to come and Rocky destroyed it and controlled it with his chest. the ball fell at his feet and then he made things happen for Manchester United at every level and not only was he better than the other players when the team lost the ball, he was the first to win it back.

I haven't seen anyone chasing Duncan, no one ever really got past him, it all stopped at Duncan Edward, he had everything he was, he was a complete player as far as I was concerned, the player and we used to train twice per week in Manchester on Tuesdays. and on Thursdays and a Thursday afternoon Duncan would relax like a school boy and we couldn't believe the skill he had and the strength and maturity of a school boy and that was my first impression of Duncan B, well, I first saw Duncan Edwards playing. for the England school boys and he was an outstanding young player Captain of the England school boys the year before me and he joined Manchester United and I was hesitant about joining Manchester United at that time because they had a lot of good players, but I went to see They play Wolver Hampton in the youth cup final which they won 72 and saw this giant playing at left half.

I was a right-half at the time and I thought it would be awesome to play on the same team as this guy. because he was so outstanding and that was the main reason for me joining Manchester United. Well, if I can say that when I met Duncan for the first time it was for Manchester United in the others in a league, I understand that he was no longer with us, you know, long before. in his prime, I mean, he would have been the greatest player of all time, make no mistake about it, um, Pelle and people like K, Becken B and George, the greatest fantasy players, but I think Duncan, with the pass , the last, the last game.

He played, was it um Red Star Belr and he just ran the show, he ran the whole game, it was incredible, just the field was pretty muddy and he had this ability that the mud didn't make any difference in his passing. He had the strength and finesse that he used to slide the ball over the mud with such power and spin that it made no difference. You know he could do this and we lesser mortals were fighting in the mud, but Duncan. It didn't make any difference to him he had everything you know I mean he was a perfect player and uh I've never seen any perfect player as he loved to play football I think today when I see some of the players. today and I see some of today's mannerisms comparing certain players to Duncan Edwards and I just say to myself he doesn't know what you're talking about, good timing, the big sadness is that he didn't play long enough to show it to everyone.

In the world, what a great player he was, we knew it because we trained with him and worked with him, and people like Bobby Chon have become perhaps the great English striker or player in England, and he will tell you that and well, there was no one who touch the great Duncan Edwards, not even he could compare to Duncan and how great he became, just imagine how great Duncan Edwards would have become and that is the sadness that no one, in my opinion, will ever compare because of all his greatness, uh, its everything. Ronda Talent, an England captain, would have been without a doubt.

I didn't feel like he wasn't good enough to go in there, but really it was just Dunan Edwards who was really up front and shoulders. above everyone else really um in terms of overall talent, I've never seen anyone like him before um, I've seen, I've seen tough players, I've seen fast players, I've seen smart players, smart players, everything I should have. . he had done, I knew what he was doing and I knew what he wanted to do and I knew he could do it. He had enormous charisma. His charisma spread everywhere and you felt when you played if he was with you.

You know you're part of a powerful entity, if you took it away, you actually took away, so to speak, almost a big part of your energy, we made that guy stronger, he was fantastic, he was. I don't know his actual goal scoring stats, but you just get the impression that he could do anything and if you needed a goal, he would just go all the way and score a goal. He was that real kid hero, just fantastic. Anyone played football like him. He was a magnificent player. He had everything that we never saw the best in Duncan because he was very young when this tragedy happened and he was a great player and U had a wonderful future ahead of him and of course he was taken away from him at a very young age.

Dunan Edwards is here now. At 18 years old, the first name in the P was Edwards, it doesn't matter who else was in this club, that's no disrespect to the players that are here now, he was so good, I've never seen a player with everything, all those things together. I think Pelle was the closest thing to that, but Pelle wasn't part of Dunan, he was um, and you know, in today's modern game, where a player is forced to cover huge amounts of distance, Duncan was tailor-made for that. and he did it with the United Team Bobby Charon is in who we play alongside him and there will be a baseball player there, there is a hoddle or a Hudson or a curry or a gascoin that would come into this team.

Well, this is where I'm going. to put my man Duncan Edwards Edwards yeah uh I think they were both set for a fantastic career at Manchester United in the bosby babes era apart from the horrible accident that took many fantastic footballers from Manchester and again when they were kids. My father used to take me. He used to push Marv to this power, this strong. Just a great build for a footballer. He was simply in charge of the middle of the park for Manchester United. And in the old days, before kickoff, I looked at him and thought.

Oh, hell, watch them build on that man and I look, I mean, I'm different now, obviously because of the years he's been around, but when I saw him, another loss against him that day, very, very strong, well, the first time I met Duncan Edward. and I played against him was at Preston North End in the league game, it was the beginning of Buzby BBS. I remember they beat us by 52 and they were absolutely incredible and I thought he was a magnificent 16 year old kid about 6'1 133 Stone. Incredible skill Duncan made his first team debut against Cardiff City at Old Trafford on Easter Monday 1953 aged just 16, of course, er, Duncan Edwards.

I think that was a special player in Dunan Edwards and Bobby says he was the best. game played against played with sorry and uh and I saw him playing twice against Scotland for Scotland under 20s against Scotland under 23s, he put on for England under 23s and played at center to score hattick the next time he played left wing against Scotland in a Scottish Game of the Week at iOS Park and Scott managed to beat him 3-2 so he was only a teenager and I think he had 17 caps and lost his life at 21 years of age these days.

He only played four games a year, so he pointed out that he was 17 or 18 for England, which is incredible, God knows how many cats we have, he would have had if he had played today, when to talk about playing 8 n . games a season, you know, European Championships, World Cups, so he had a phenomenal record even for a 21-year-old and the other players that Tommy Tay bought from Barnley, David Peg, Eddie Coleman, all these players, You know, they were a fantastic promise. that team had and they're all young guys, you know, they grew up together, he was so powerful that he didn't have to do some kind of R, people were bouncing off of him, they were trying to R him, he had everything that you're watching a game and you're thinking about pass it the right way, he passed it, you know you were thinking about seeing him and he would, but it didn't happen that way