60 years ago this month...

[reedy63]

That game is when the programme was one sheet, that's very hard to buy nowadays.

 

[Isaw Joeshaw]

Saturday February 16, 1963
United 0-2 West Ham
Attendance: 18176

Writing this the day after a disappointing defeat (v Middlesbrough, for the benefit of readers in years to come), it is easy to slip into the negativity of fans (or ‘supporters’ as we were called then; ‘fans’ was reserved for rock singers and Hollywood actors) who are always convinced that whenever we are looking forward to a match, we will inevitably be let down. It was just over 2 months since the last home game, and it was exciting to be getting back to some sort of normality with a home game again; but, on a pitch that was covered in snow except for the goal areas, United were always second best against West Ham, Graham Shaw had a penalty saved, and we ended up losing 2-0. Heap’s cartoon, drawn on the Saturday afternoon in the office, summed it up well as usual:
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I don’t get the reference in the first picture: the England test cricket team were playing out a boring draw at the time, and failed to re-gain The Ashes.
I had been wondering for a while why I had lost the programme for the West Ham match, which I cannot find anywhere; it turns out it was a single sheet of paper, so it either got mislaid or has disintegrated.
The following reports and photos have been kindly sent to me by Silent Blade:
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One final picture, showing Pace as ever prepared to improvise in search of a goal. This effort missed, and the ball had already been given out of play; sort of sums up a frustrating return to football on the snow:
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And one final personal memory. Very occasionally, I played in goal on snow-covered pitches, both at school and in local leagues; I used to love the diving around in the snow, safe in the knowledge that any howlers could be blamed on the terrible playing conditions…

Wow ! One of my abiding memories of the Doc was that overhead kick attempt on goal as I don’t think I’d ever seen one before , certainly not from a Blades player and never thought I would ever see such a fantastic image of it . Well done !

Also , right from being a young kid I loved playing on snow covered pitches . If I had a strength as a footballer it was that of being able to pick a pass , which was never easy on the appalling surfaces we used to play on back then .

However , given an inch or so of a snow topping , it seemed so easy to glide the ball across the surface and achieve the desired result .

Needless to say , my all time hero was an absolute master at playing in these conditions.

 

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Wow ! One of my abiding memories of the Doc was that overhead kick attempt on goal as I don’t think I’d ever seen one before , certainly not from a Blades player and never thought I would ever see such a fantastic image of it . Well done !

Also , right from being a young kid I loved playing on snow covered pitches . If I had a strength as a footballer it was that of being able to pick a pass , which was never easy on the appalling surfaces we used to play on back then .

However , given an inch or so of a snow topping , it seemed so easy to glide the ball across the surface and achieve the desired result .

Needless to say , my all time hero was an absolute master at playing in these conditions.

Nicely put about the snow-covered pitches. As a goalie the worry was always that the goal area would consist of hard-rutted bog - not ideal for spectacular dives!
The credit for the photo of Pace’s overhead shot goes entirely to Silent Blade of course - I don’t know where he finds these things!

 

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That game is when the programme was one sheet, that's very hard to buy nowadays.

Annoyed that it did not survive. Though I am cheered by the fact that The following week there was a friendly match, and I do have the single sheet for that. Sell it and retire to the Caribbean, perhaps?

 

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That game is when the programme was one sheet, that's very hard to buy nowadays.

Never wishing let my readers down, I had a look through my Reserves/Juniors/Friendlies random collection, and found the West Ham programme lurking insignificantly there. So here it is:

Not a classic, a bit crumpled, bits of writing on it, but it has survived. Do you have any idea how much it is worth? I have no intention of selling, but Mrs HBT occasionally comments on how useful the space occupied by my programme collection would be…

 

[reedy63]

Sharrowblade is best to ask. he is an expert on united programmes I think £30 but could we out.

 

[Silent Blade]

Never wishing let my readers down, I had a look through my Reserves/Juniors/Friendlies random collection, and found the West Ham programme lurking insignificantly there. So here it is:
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Not a classic, a bit crumpled, bits of writing on it, but it has survived. Do you have any idea how much it is worth? I have no intention of selling, but Mrs HBT occasionally comments on how useful the space occupied by my programme collection would be…

Sharrowblade

 

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The bad news: Saturday, February 23, 1963, we were supposed to be playing Wednesday away, but despite the fact that 6 games went ahead in League 1, Hillsborough was not fit to play on (add your own punchline), so another week went by without a league match.
BUT: the good news is that United arranged a friendly against Stoke, to give both teams some match practice:

February 23, 1963
Friendly Match
United 2-0 Stoke
(Summers, Simpson)
Attendance: 10061

In my first match at The Lane, in September 1953, I had seen the legendary Stanley Matthews, who at the grand old age of 38, had finally acquired a Cup winner’s medal, much to the delight of everyone except Bolton supporters. 10 years later I saw him in this game, his last at Bramall Lane, I believe, at the crazy age of 48. Stoke had taken him back to his roots, and their crowds thus increased, and on the pitch he helped them return to the top division; he will have been disappointed that his contributions in League 1 were limited, because of injury problems, and he finally retired at the age of 50.

Compared with the previous week’s single-sheet programme, we had got our act together and had it properly printed, with a rather expensive two pence price.
In addition to Matthews, there were other big names in the Stoke team for a League 2 side: Jackie Mudie, also ex-Blackpool; Denis Viollet, former Busby Babe; and Eddie Clamp, a well-named hard man signed from Wolves, allegedly to provide protection for Matthews. As a result, Stoke had the oldest league squad in the country. A decent crowd saw a forgettable friendly, though we witnessed the novelty of a substitution - Stuart went off injured for Stoke.

And finally some more good news:

On the back of the programme, the next match is announced for March 2, v Burnley… AND IT TOOK PLACE! The Big Freeze was coming to an end. An awful lot of football was about to be played.

 

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Normal Service is Resumed

Saturday, March 2nd, 1963
United 1-0 Burnley
(Hodgson)
Attendance: 26,939

At last, football returned to something close to normal, and the enthusiasm was reflected in an above-average attendance, aided by the fact that Burnley were at that time one of the best teams in the country. The returning crowd were rewarded with a dominant performance from United, although the clever goal from Hodgson in the second minute was the only goal of the game. As ever, Heap’s cartoon in the Green ‘Un captured the mood:

Given that the programme is the first proper one since the beginning of the Big Freeze, it is an interesting read. The impact of the weeks of inactivity is discussed, and how the season had now to be re-organised; there is also an update on the juniors, an early indication of a crop of youngsters who would go on to make their mark. The table of appearances so far is a reminder of how consistent the team selection still was (10 players already over 20 appearances after 25 games), and that goal scoring was the main problem, with only Pace in double figures. And in the wider football world, there are interesting items on possible reforms (dividing the clubs into 5 leagues with 4 up and 4 down, only rejected after a lengthy review that would have shamed VAR; and a Russian proposal to replace goal average with goal difference, which eventually was accepted, to the relief of those of us not experts in mathematics).

The match itself produced a good win for United. I have a general memory of Adam Blacklaw in goal - he was one of the goalkeepers I always liked, though he was not regarded as a star. Very solid, and a good shot-stopper in matches against us. And our goal was a good team-goal, finished off by clever play by Pace and Hodgson. Reports and pics courtesy of Silent Blade :

It felt good to be back. And because of the backlog of games, we would all be back again in a few days, ready to play in the 3rd round of the Cup.

 

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Wednesday, March 6th, 1963
FA Cup, 3rd Round
United 3-1 Bolton
(Summers, Kettleborough - 2)
Attendance: 27154

While we are already looking forward to a 6th Round tie, 60 years ago we finally got to play our 3rd Round tie, with my all-time favourite programme front cover, expressing very clearly the frustrations of the previous 2 months:

The remainder of the programme is 2 months out-of-date, but still has its interest, not least because the expected line-ups from 2 months previously showed no changes.
It is a measure of how powerful the allure of the Cup was - this match produced a bigger crowd than the preceding league match v Burnley, who at that time were more attractive opposition. Sad to say, whatever the attraction of the Cup, I have no memory of this game whatsoever, so I will leave it to the press report to describe what turned out to be a good win, with Kettleborough having one of his best spells with United.

(The last piece of the report is out of order - apologies)
So, the action was back, and the next match was only 3 days later. Guess where - away at Bolton!

 

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Saturday, March 9, 1963, at 7.30 p.m.
Bolton 3-2 United (Allchurch, Pace)
Attendance: 12827

We had beaten Bolton at home in the League, and beaten them again in the Cup just 3 days before this game. So the outcome of this game was not in doubt, and sure enough, we managed to lose this game to a hat-trick from Sheffield-born Freddie Hill, whose brother Brian played for Wednesday. At age 23, Freddie Hill, who had won 2 caps for England, was the oldest member of the Bolton forward line, 2 of whom (Francis Lee and Wyn Davies) went on to have outstanding careers.

I have no idea why this match kicked off at 7.30 on a Saturday evening; the next home match was scheduled for the same time.
The programme itself does not have much content, but is very full in its material on United.

United were unusually without Joe Shaw, presumably because of injury, and this will have affected the performance; the unusual kick-off time meant that the press coverage available is limited:

Largely because of the need to get the Cup competition moving, this was the first of 4 successive away games for United. The next round of the Cup followed in midweek, and the lure of the Cup was again irresistible - a trip to Port Vale could just fit in with the school day, so it was an opportunity to add the FA Cup rosette to the scarf and rattle in search of that elusive opportunity to see United at Wembley in a Cup Final.

 

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As a footnote to the United/Bolton mini-saga, it was shortly after these 2 games, with Bolton playing a young and inexperienced forward-line, that they bought Billy Russell, who following injury, was no longer playing regularly for us. It turned out that his best days were behind him. But he had been a remarkable success at Bramall Lane: we signed him as an amateur footballer, and it turned out that he was a model professional. With an afternoon at Newcastle in the 6th round of the Cup when he scored a hat-trick in the first 20 minutes, which those of us lucky enough to be there will never forget.

 

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Wednesday, March 13, 1963
FA Cup Round 4
Port Vale 1-2 United (Allchurch[pen], Pace)
Attendance: 22,207

I managed to get to this game, by going on one of the Supporters Club coaches which presumably set off without me needing to leave school early. Not sure where I kept the scarf, rosette and rattle all day at school! I remember feeling optimistic about this game. Port Vale were 3rd Division (top half of the League), and one of the bits of history I was aware of was the record away win there (10-0, in 1892); I didn’t know that they had giant-killed us in 1897. I was also hoping that our former player Colin Grainger would be playing for them - some of my earliest footballing memories are of him playing for United and England when I was very young. As occasionally (!) happens when following United, nothing turned out as expected. First of all, the coach ended up in a ditch somewhere in the wilds of the Peak District; nothing life-threatening, but it was only because the following coach stopped and let us all pile on to it for an uncomfortable journey in deteriorating weather which meant that we got to the ground just before kick-off and about to get soaked to the skin on the terraces. And then, good as it was to see Colin Grainger again, it was not in the script that he would score a goal in the opening minutes, nor that Kettleborough would get injured and spend most of the game limping on the right-wing. So half-time arrived, we were soaked, not sure of our transport back, United were losing, effectively down to 10 men, and generally being outplayed.
BUT: in the second-half, we were transformed, began to dominate, Allchurch won and then scored his first penalty for United, Hodgson was here, there and everywhere in the mud, and eventually he set up the winner for Pace. Life was good again, we were dreaming of Wembley, a replacement coach arrived before the final whistle, and the driver this time managed to avoid all roadside ditches. Such evenings made everything else in life seem simple.
The programme was an outrageous 6 pence, with very little content:

A couple of pics and report below:

The 5th Round was only 3 days away, in the effort to catch up on postponed matches. Away at 2nd Division Southampton, so a good chance to make the 6th Round again. School football had started again, so I had no chance of getting to the game. After the trials and tribulations of getting to Port Vale, that was probably no bad thing.

 

[Silent Blade]

Bob Socks and his friends (not sure how many in total) piled in my dad's car for the trip to Port Vale!

 

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Bob Socks and his friends (not sure how many in total) piled in my dad's car for the trip to Port Vale!

No room in the car for 50 extra passengers from the coach in the ditch, then

 

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FA Cup 5th Round
Saturday March 16
Southampton 1-0 United
Attendance: 20647

The battle of 2 red-and-white teams meant that, as was normal at that time, neither team played in their usual colours, so it was a case of the team in white losing to the team in old gold, thus ending yet another promising Cup run, against a Division 2 side. The fact that this game came only 3 days after the Port Vale game meant that it would not have been surprising if the players were tired, but the reports suggest that United played well, but failed to convert chances into goals. With Kettleborough out injured, Billy Russell came into the team for what turned to be his last appearance for the Blades - he was about to be transferred to Bolton.
The programme was again underwhelming for 6 pence, with little content:



Southampton were a club on the up, with 2 of the best wingers in the country (Paine and Sydenham), and other good experienced (Knapp, signed from Leicester, the ball-juggling Burnside signed from West Brom). United appear to have played quite well, but failed to take their chances; Southampton appear to have roughed United early on, and to have taken one of their big chances. The photo below appears to be of Kirby’s header:

Reports below, courtesy of Silent Blade



Hitting the bar in the last minute suggests that this really was not going to be United’s year.
A couple of programme-based footnotes. First, from United’s next home programme, an evaluation of Russell’s career at Bramall Lane:

And from the Southampton programme, a price-list for admission charges, which suggests that the only children who can buy tickets are boys. Looks very odd from the perspective of 60 years on:

 

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Saturday, March 23, 1963
Birmingham 0-1 United (Wagstaffe)
Attendance: 18032

Birmingham were on a poor run of form, and candidates for relegation. Fortunately, United were able to take advantage of this, and win the points which kept them safely mid-table. The regular United line-up was beginning to age, and with the heavy demands of fixtures following the Big Freeze, it is not surprising that injuries were beginning to create problems, leading to the inclusion of Mallender, Tony Wagstaffe and Hartle for the Birmingham trip. The youngsters had been playing well for the Juniors and Reserves, and this win confirmed the feeling that an exciting crop of youngsters was about to make the breakthrough. Both Wagstaffe and Mallender excelled, and more youngsters were about to get their chance to impress. It all added to the realisation that nothing lasts for ever, but the future need not be feared.

The programme is a good one, with the added bonus of photographs and reasonable price (4 pence):

A rush of 4 successive away matches was over, and there were now 3 home matches to come, offering the opportunity to move into the top half of the table.

 

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Tuesday, March 26, 1963
United 0-0 Leicester
Attendance: 26837

For me, there are 2 noteworthy aspects to this match. One is the fact that although I know that I went to this match, and should therefore have a copy of the programme (and even spare copies), I have searched high and low, and failed to find it. It at least reminds me to repeat an offer to (both?) my readers that if you would like copies of some of the programmes from this era, do ask. Happy to meet up after a home game to hand them over. They are in good, but not perfect condition, and unloading some of these spares would be good for domestic harmony, if you catch my drift…
The other point is that this was the first match when I added Gordon Banks to my list of favourite goalkeepers. We had seen him before (in semi-finals, for example), but perhaps we had not put him under much pressure before; he looked the real thing this evening, and the 0-0 score line was largely down to his great saves and general impressive presence. Of course, I would be lying if I claimed to have known that he would go on to be a World Cup winner…
It is clear from the match report and the following match programme that this was that rarity - an excellent 0-0 draw. Leicester were a good team at the time, and the point kept us securely in mid-table.

 

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Saturday, March 30th, 1963
United 2-1 Everton
(Allchurch, Hodgson)
Attendance: 21859

United, in the middle of the very busy post-Big Freeze schedule, were back to almost full strength (Hartle continued to deputise for Simpson on the left-wing), and they were running into decent form, capable of matching the best. Everton were very much among that best, and the big-spenders in the transfer market at that time, and they came to the Lane in 3rd place in the League. They left having been well-beaten (2-1 flattered them), and their chances of being League Champions had taken a severe knock.
Heap, from his office in town, found lots of different elements for his humour to make up for the lack of goals in the first-half in the matches up and down the country. And Peter Howard’s report in the Green ‘Un picked upon details before the kick-off in each half that I have long forgotten - the group of Everton supporters who ran across the cricket wicket of all things to get to the Kop end to see their team attack; and the South American style chanting before the start of the second-half - whatever was that on a wet Saturday afternoon in Sheffield?

It is also interesting that Tony Kay (ex-Wednesday) received a hostile crowd reaction - an indication of the type of player he was, I think.
John Hathaway’s analysis brings home how well United could play, without turning their dominance into big wins. This United team was a good one, and by this time a very experienced one, but they never quite took that last step up.

Extracts from the programme, and the league table after the match, follow:

So, Everton lost ground in 3rd place, and United consolidated their mid-table position, with perhaps the prospect of better to follow. Manchester City in 4 days time, were not to be feared…

 

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Wednesday 3rd April, 1963
United 3-1 Manchester City
(Pace 3)
Attendance: 16,710

United’s good run continued with a comfortable victory over relegation-threatened Man City. Pace scored the first goal after 18 seconds (no match for Simpson’s 8-second goal at Burnley in October 1963). Richardson seems to have been playing in a more attacking role than usual, as he created the first goal with a clever pass, and he later only just lost out to Pace in the race to tap in the second, after City keeper Dowd had stopped Hartle’s shot:

The match report makes clear that this was a deserved win, again with 2 of the younger reserve players - Wagstaff and Hartle - playing a full part in the victory:

The programme has several items of interest:
1. It is critical of the defensive line-up City had been using (2-5-3), in the hopes of conceding few goals and thus avoiding relegation. Conceding in 18 seconds will have been a serious blow.
2. The optimism about rising crowds will not have been encouraged in the light of the low crowd for this game. The recent rise in attendance figures was going into reverse.
3. And the optimism of United participating in the Inter-Cities Fairs Cup was not to turn into a positive outcome, either. United were doing well, but with hindsight, it is clear that all was not well.

 

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Saturday April 6, 1963
West Brom 1-2 United (Richardson, Wagstaff)
Attendance: 12,497

The good run of form continued with another win, again with Tony Wagstaff prominent in one of his best spells in the 1st team, and even more impressively with Bob Widdowson deputising in goal for the injured Hodgy. Widdowson made just 7 league appearances in 8 years. Hartle was also injured, but Simpson was fit again and able to return on the left-wing. West Brom, in contrast, were rather in decline, and had dropped into the bottom half of the League. They had sold their principal goal scorer, Derek Kevan, to Chelsea, and their line-up was lacking in big names. The two I was most aware of were Bobby Hope (Scottish international), and Bobby Cram, later captain of Colchester when they famously knocked Leeds out of the Cup (1971), and uncle of the more famous athlete Steve Cram. West Brom’s decline was reflected in the low attendance.
As ever, Heap’s cartoon is a good introduction to the afternoon of sport:

United were again good value for their win. Richardson was again doing more attacking than I generally remember him for, and the mis-cued shot which deceived the keeper and went in to give United the lead was the kind of thing that made us value him more for his defensive work. Wagstaff again scored a well-taken goal, but in the long run he did not prove to be a prolific goal scorer.

This result left United in the top half of the table, above Wednesday, and again with the promise of a high finishing position:

And to add to the optimism, the success of the younger players when needed was backed up by how well the Reserves were doing; a 3-0 win over Huddersfield left United top of the Central League:

 

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Easter 1963, Part 1

Saturday, April 13, 3.00 p.m.
United 3-3 Arsenal
(Allchurch - 3[2 pens])
Attendance: 21,487

To re-create the sense of how crazy football used to be at Easter, I am going to try to deal with the Easter programme as a single block in 3 parts. In the space of 4 days,United played 3 games: Saturday (Arsenal at home), Monday (Blackpool away), Tuesday (Blackpool at home). There were sometimes slight variations on this (Wednesday had played away at Blackburn on Good Friday, which explains the opening frame of the Heap cartoon which follows shortly). The demands on the players must have been enormous (no substitutes allowed, so they all played the full 90 minutes), and the double-headers often produced inconsistent results; Wednesday, for example, lost the away match at Blackburn 3-0, but then won the home match 4-0. Many factors must have contributed to such sudden changes of fortune.
United’s good run of form had seen us move up the league, to the point where we were only below Arsenal on goal difference. Arsenal boasted several star players, especially George Eastham, and Joe Baker, who had returned from a spell in Italy, at a time where transfers abroad were rare. They made several changes, presumably because of injuries, but United were also short of 3 regulars - Hodgkinson, Kettleborough and Hartle. Widdowson again played in goal; I shall have a word with my brother about why he failed to note this in the programme. Big brothers, eh…

As ever, Heap dealt wittily with happenings at different grounds:

My/our bad decision that day was to stay on the Kop for the first half, rather than leg it round to the Lane End to watch United attack. A first half hat-trick, including 2 penalties by Allchurch, would surely have made the sprint round via the cricket pavilion worthwhile! At least I can look at the photos of what I only saw in the distance:

The notes in the programme never cease to interest me: the analysis of Brian Richardson is a case in point, as well as the comments on the reserves and juniors, many of whom went on to have good careers. And looking backwards, there is the extraordinary story of the 6-4 defeat of Arsenal in 1928, with United going 4-0 up after 13 minutes. Amazing stuff.

And finally, the match reports, provided, as ever, by Silent Blade

 

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Easter 1963 - Part 2

Monday, April 15, 3.00 p.m.
Blackpool 3-1 United (Wagstaff)
Attendance: 16,764

John Hathaway’s match report in the Sheffield Telegraph begins with the phrase ‘After the Lord Mayor’s show’, and he can’t have been the only person thinking that. After the excitement of the Arsenal match, this was a damp squib, to add another cliche. It wasn’t even much of a rollercoaster ride. [That’s enough - Ed., as Private Eye used to say.] The weather wasn’t great, the programme was awful (almost totally devoid of content), Hodgy returned from injury and gave the first goal away, we lost to a team lower in the league than us, and Wednesday beat Blackburn 4-0. The only positive was that young Tony Wagstaff continued his good form in deputising for Kettleborough, and his knack of scoring goals. And possibly that the return match was the following day, meaning that there was a possibility of making amends quickly.

 

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Easter 1963: Part 2a

Monday, April 15, 3.00 p.m.
United Reserves 3-2 Blackpool Reserves

Not only the players had crazy Easters - supporters did also. I found the programme for this game with my Dad’s writing on it, so he clearly went to Bramall Lane on Easter Saturday, Monday, Tuesday. The only writing on it are the half-time scores for United (losing 3-1) and Wednesday (winning 1-0).He normally wrote profusely on programmes (team changes, full-time scores, updating league tables), but I assume those 2 half-time scores, and the full-times which followed (Wednesday won 4-0) dampened even his seemingly boundless enthusiasm for a day. Such is the life of a dedicated football fan.

 

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Easter 1963: Part 3

Tuesday, April 16th, at 3.00 p.m.
United 0-0 Blackpool
Attendance: 21,637

Another frustrating game, of which I have no direct memory. I was always impressed by the Blackpool goalkeeper, Tony Waiters, and I can visualise a couple of diving saves he made at the Lane, but I have no idea if they are from this particular match. The match report suggests that United dominated, but failed to take their chances, and the crowd became impatient. Looking back, I think the players could be cut some slack: 10 of them (Hodgy missed the first match) had played 3 full games in 4 days, which must have been physically and mentally exhausting. John Hathaway’s match report calls for some of the youngsters to be given an opportunity, and although this was not the end of an era, it was the first intimation of changes to come.

Because of the rush of fixtures, the programme has to find topics to talk about away from the last couple of matches, and the Lines from the Pavilion succeed with 2 topics: scorers of hat-tricks for United from 1955 (a good number, with Pace very much the dominant figure), and the amazing consistency of the famous back 6 - four of them had played every game that season, with Joe Shaw and Hodgy missing a couple of matches each. Absolutely amazing. And I also found the item on Supporters Clubs interesting.

So, in conclusion, an exhausting but underwhelming Easter, with the need to improve results in order to maintain our top-half position. The next 2 games were ManU and Man City, both away. Tough fixtures, you might think; but 60 years ago, ManU were 4th from bottom, and ManCity were 3rd from bottom, so points were there for the taking.

 

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Saturday, April 20, 1963
Man Utd 1-1 United (Hartle)
Attendance: 31,179

United’s good run continued, away at a Man Utd team that was seriously under-achieving. From Utd’s point of view, this match was memorable for 2 main reasons: Mick Jones made an impressive debut, aged 17; and I was lucky enough to witness, from behind the goal, Hodgy saving a Bobby Charlton penalty.

It again seemed that things were beginning to change, particularly in attack, with 3 inexperienced players included in the side (Hartle, Wagstaff, Jones). And though ManU were going through a bad spell, they had plenty of good players, so it was encouraging to earn a good draw. The league table now looked like this:

And if any of you are superstitious and want a good omen for this weekend’s semi-final against Man City, 60 years ago our next game was also against Man City, and the outcome was positive. But as the league table above shows, Man City today are a different proposition.

 

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(With apologies for the delay in posting this)

Wednesday, April 24, 1963
Man City 1-3 United (Pace, Jones[2])
Attendance: 19,277

Sometimes, looking back at events allows us realise things we didn’t appreciate at the time. I certainly don’t remember thinking that we had uncovered a dream pairing of strikers, the experience and guile of Pace alongside the youthful strength and power of Mick Jones. The pairing of Jones and Birchenall trips off the tongue of those of us of a certain age, but, for me at least, ‘Pace and Jones’ doesn’t ring a bell, even though each in his own right is a Blades legend.
The report in the following day’s Sheffield Telegraph makes it clear that United well deserved their victory, which left Man City battling against relegation. United, on the other hand, continued their good form, and were looking good for a top half of the league finish, playing attractive football:

I always liked the Man City programmes from that era, partly because it looked good, and partly because they always gave plenty of space to material about their opponents:

In this crazy season, it was only 2 days to the next match, Friday evening against bottom of the League Leyton Orient. And strangely, this is the match from that season I remember best. And perhaps even more strangely, it wasn’t for the reason hinted at in the second paragraph of the match report above…

 

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Friday, April 26, 1963, at 7.30 p.m.
United 2-0 Leyton Orient
(Jones, Hartle)
Attendance: 20,703

A Friday evening kick-off was a rare event at the time, and this was our only home game (to date) against Leyton Orient in the top division. But there was another factor which made this evening match special: the presence of 4 teenagers in the United line-up, 2 of them making their debut. John Harris had judged quite rightly that a match against the bottom of the league when so many matches were being played in quick succession was a perfect opportunity to allow the best of a good crop of youngsters the opportunity to show what they could do. I remember thinking that this could be the beginning of our version of the Busby Babes; I see that the Lines from the Pavilion refer to the Busby Babes in the analysis of the ManU match, so perhaps my thinking was not as original as I believed.

The youngsters were:
1.Len Badger, making his league debut, aged 17.Small, classy, ball-playing right-back, went onto become a Blades legend, playing over 500 games.
2. Bernard Shaw, aged 18, also a small full-back, who went on to have an excellent career after a spell of illness at The Lane. Played over 100 games for each of United, Wolves, Wednesday. Younger brother of Graham Shaw, no relation to Joe.
3. Mick Jones, playing his 3rd game. Made his debut at Old Trafford the week before, aged 17, scored 2 at Man City a few days later, on his 18th birthday, and added another goal v Leyton. Very much a sign of things to come, but unfortunately many of his achievements were not to be with United.
4. Tony Wagstaff, aged 19, inside-forward, had made his debut 2 seasons previously, and was enjoying one of his best spells at the Lane, creating and scoring goals. Played over 100 games, a neat footballer.

I recall the atmosphere was really appreciative - it had an end-of-season feel, with everyone (including the senior players) willing the youngsters to succeed. And they did - especially the full-backs with their skills, and Mick Jones with his bustling enthusiasm (and goal)
Bramall Lane was a good place to be: the following extracts from the programme for the next home match created a image of excellent togetherness in the squad, and the League Table showed United in a healthy position:

 

[Silent Blade]

I remember my dad recalling the Orient match also many older Blades told me they were at the match. It must have been the most memorable game of the season because of the full backs' debuts despite that we had nothing to play for near the end of the season

 

[HodgysBrokenThumb]

I remember my dad recalling the Orient match also many older Blades told me they were at the match. It must have been the most memorable game of the season because of the full backs' debuts despite that we had nothing to play for near the end of the season

There was presumably a mix of reasons. A feeling that the future looked good, with the new ‘Busby Babes’ feel; the glimpse of the passing of an era - for some of us that back 6, who played virtually every game each season, was all we had known, and to see 2 young kids come in and replace Coldwell and Graham Shaw so professionally was amazing; they were clearly welcomed by the senior players, and that suggested a strong dressing room; to see Mick Jones scoring goals around his 18th birthday suggested that there could be life after Pace. There was a feel good factor that evening. And to be honest, until I started preparing recent posts for this thread, I had thought for years that the Leyton match was the last game of the season, everything was so relaxed.