Like many a child of the 60s besotted by football, I have grown up with the images of George Best in his pomp burnt into my mind.  Close my eyes and think of him and he is in full flow, a magnificent sight, his Manchester United red shirt flashing past suddenly old looking defenders, desperately trying to stop him anyway that they could.

Georgie had it all. The pop star looks, the natural athleticism and a God given talent that only a few could dream of.

The fact that he retired in effect at 27 and never played in a World Cup, and yet is still revered by so many, just shows the impact he made in that glorious mid to late 1960s period.

Aged just 19 in 1966, he was christened ‘El Beatle’ after his performances in that years European Cup quarter finals against Benfica. A photo of him wearing a sombrero at the airport after the game was front-page news.  He really was the first celebrity footballer and that brought a glaring spotlight that he would find hard to escape.

Georgie, Georgie they call him a Belfast boy, was born in 1946 and grew up in Cregagh, East Belfast.

He played football at every spare opportunity, and was eventually spotted aged 15 by a Manchester United scout called Bob Bishop.

Bishop immediately recommended him to the then legendary Man Utd manager Matt Busby, labelling the boy a  ‘genius’ even at that tender age.  A shy lad at that time, and homesick at first in Manchester, he took flight back home, but eventually settled down to made his debut at 17 and would go on to make an impressive 470 appearances in eleven years.

On the pitch, he was unstoppable. At 5 foot 8 and a slim 10 stone, his ability with the ball close to his feet, his pace and footballing brain was evident from the start as United won the old first division title in 1964/65.

Off the pitch, 1965 saw him spotted dancing in the crowd at a Top of The Pops looking every inch the ‘with it’ teenager.

United picked up the title again in 1966/67 and then in 67/68 they found themselves up against Real Madrid in the European Cup semi –finals.

Best scored the only goal of the home fixture with a 15-yard strike that was later described by the United goalkeeper Alex Stepney as one of Best’s finest goals. In the return fixture at the Bernabeu stadium, Best was effectively marked out of the game, but the one time he got the better of his marker, he provided the telling cross for Bill Foulkes to score and level the game at 3–3 and therefore to win on  aggregate 4-3, to move on to the final at Wembley versus Benfica and their star man Eusebio.

In a classic encounter, United wearing an unfamiliar all blue kit won the game 4- 1 in extra time with Best scoring the second with a mazy dribble.

He had a great year in 1968 which also saw him pick up the Football Writers ‘Footballer of the Year’ becoming the youngest ever recipient of the award and he also won the Ballon d’Or as the European Player of the year. All at the age of just 22. 

Then, in many ways, the decline begins. Sir Matt Busby retired at the end of the 1969 season leaving a team in transition as the influx of new players failed to match the likes of Law, Best and Charlton. They went on to finish 11th and then 9th in the next two seasons under the new leadership of Wilf McGuiness.

Within a year or so, Best would begin to miss the occasional training session and was constantly in trouble with the authorities at the club. He was now becoming as famous for his off the field exploits as the on field ones.He opened a nightclub called ‘Slack Alice’,  as well as owning restaurants and fashion boutiques in partnership with his long time pal, Mike Summerbee of Manchester City.

Then, he officially retired only to be coaxed back, but the past glories were gone. His last game for United was in 1974 after a showdown with the then manager Tommy Docherty.

Over the next few years, he played all over the world for eleven clubs, picking up short term contracts in South Africa, the Republic of Ireland, the United States, Scotland and Australia.

There were the occasional glimpses of the old magic, like at Fulham playing alongside Rodney Marsh and also in his time in the US, but in truth, he couldn’t sustain it.

His famous and often repeated line of ‘I spent a lot of money on booze, birds and fast cars – the rest I just squandered’  sums up nicely how his life and career had ended up 

A mate of mine Pete, still insists that Northern Ireland should have taken him to the World Cup when they qualified in 1982, and he isn’t alone in that. The reality was that he just wasn’t fit enough at his then age of 35. He wouldn’t be adding to his 37 caps for his country.

Best was married twice, to former models. First Angie, with whom he had a son Calum in 1981 and later to Alex.

From 1984, things were beginning to seriously unravel. He received a three-month prison sentence for drink driving, and spent Christmas that year in Pentonville Prison.

His drink problem persisted and Best was diagnosed with severe liver damage in March 2000.

In August 2002, he had a successful liver transplant at Kings College Hospital in London.

I remember seeing him on Sky TV a few months after the operation and I thought he looked well, if a little frail with hindsight, but I sincerely hoped he could make the most of this new chance.

Sadly, it was not to be and he was soon back on the bottle.

He was dead at 59, as infections and multiple organ failure did for him. It later transpired his mother Anne had also died of drink related problems at the age of just 55.

The football world mourned him. Best once said ‘Pele called me the greatest footballer in the world, that is the ultimate salute to my life.’
I once got very close to meeting him, when I was working on a book called The Fashion of Football. A contact who worked at the clothing company Ben Sherman, and who had an ‘in’ with George, lined up a meeting.

Sadly though the wheels came off before our date and he was involved in some drink related skirmish, that meant he went underground and so was untraceable. Gutted doesn’t cover it.

‘I was the one who took football off the back pages and put it on to page one’ he once said.

You certainly did that George, you certainly did that.

The Mumper of SE5