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Man C v Man U 1960

Programme of the Week Manchester City vs Manchester United 12th March 1960

The latest in a series about football programmes from my collection that relate to a game being played in the next few days.

Manchester City vs Manchester United 2019 / 2020

This weekend sees the first Manchester derby of the season, at the Etihad Stadium. In this week’s midweek Premier League fixtures, City thumped Burnley 4-1 at Turf Moor. Meanwhile, against all the pundits’ predictions, United beat Tottenham Hotspur 2-1 at Old Trafford on Jose Mourinho’s return.

Karma?

With 15 games gone, City are third in the Premier League. They are 3 points behind Leicester City and 11 points behind runaway leaders Liverpool. United started the season very slowly and there is still press speculation around the Manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s job. But United are now up into sixth place, 2 points behind Wolverhampton Wanderers in 5th and 8 behind Chelsea in the final Champions League spot.

Each side needs the three points and needs to achieve more consistency. In the last five games, City have won 3; drawn 1 and lost 1. United have won 2; drawn 2 and lost 1.

Manchester City vs Manchester United 12th March 1960

This is 6th Round of the FA Cup day and neither Manchester City nor Manchester United are left in the competition. City were unceremoniously dumped out in the 3rd round. They were beaten 1-5 at home by Southampton!

United made it to the 5th Round (winning away at Anfield on the way). But they were defeated 0-1 at home by eventual semi-finalists Sheffield Wednesday.

Unthinkable in today’s environment, but the two Clubs decided to arrange a Friendly Match at Maine Road to fill the fixture gap!

There are only ten Division One league games left and neither side is pulling up any trees. In the 22-team league, City are 5th from bottom 27 points and United are in 12th place with 31 points. Earlier in the season City beat United 3-0 at Maine road and drew 0-0 in the game at Old Trafford.

Manchester City vs Manchester United 12th March 1960 – Match Programme

City produced their usual 16-page programme for the fixture. The front cover is Sky Blue and features a black and white aerial photograph of Maine Road. Heresy to some, but I always found a more pulsating atmosphere at Maine Road than I did at Old Trafford; but I didn’t always enjoy the walk there! 😊

On the inside cover are the season’s fixtures and scores to date, along with the league tables.

The page three Editorial explains the circumstances surrounding the match and congratulates Bert Trautmann on his 400th league appearance in the previous match.

Page 5 offers pen pictures of the United side – a side still being rebuilt following the Munich tragedy. Page six is entitled ‘A (very) Brief History of Manchester United F.C. and page 7 has a photo from the previous week’s game at Leicester City.

Page 8 has the half time scoreboard, which shows two other local derbies in the FA Cup 6th Round. Beaten finalists Blackburn are away at Burnley and the two Sheffield teams meet at Bramall Lane.

On page 9 are the team lists. Page 11 has a bizarre article by Bob Parkinson from the Manchester Evening News about an extra-terrestrial football scout!

Pages 12 & 13 have details of recent matches as well as appearances and goals to date. Page 14 has a table of all the first division scores so far and the back cover carries an advert for train travel to Leeds for next week’s game.

The programme costs fourpence.

Manchester City vs Manchester United 12th March 1960 – The Main Men

Once again, we are spoilt for choice.

The City team features Colin Barlow on the right wing. Barlow would finish this season as second highest goal scorer behind (the injured) Billy McAdams. Alongside Barlow, at inside right is Joe Hayes, scorer of the opening goal in the 1956 FA Cup Final. Right back Bill Leivers is another survivor from that Cup winning team.

As United rebuild after Munich, familiar names such as Foulkes; Setters; Brennan; Giles; Viollet and Charlton are in the team. Not to forget the wonderful Albert Quixall who had joined from Sheffield Wednesday for a record £45,000 transfer fee!

The Goalkeepers

But I want to focus on the two goalkeepers. Bert Trautmann and Harry Gregg.

Trautmann’s story was remarkable for the time. The German Paratrooper captured on the Western Front and imprisoned in Ashton in Makerfield until 1948. Refusing to be repatriated, he signed for City in 1949 after being noticed playing for non-league St Helens Town.

20,000 people attended a demonstration against the club signing the ex prisoner of war, but over time he was genuinely accepted by the local population. In 1956 he was named Footballer of the Year, in no little part due to his Cup Winning performance against Birmingham City, when he broke his neck and played on.

Harry Gregg was a Munich survivor. Miraculously, both he and Bill Foulkes emerged unscathed from the wreckage of the aeroplane and were able to continue playing straight away. Gregg was often referred to as the ‘Hero of Munich’ rescuing Bobby Charlton; Jackie Blanchflower and Denis Viollet from the wreck.

Harry Gregg played over 200 times for United between 1957 and 1966 and is considered to have been one of their best ever keepers. Despite this longevity, he never won a medal. He missed out on the FA Cup Final in 1963 through injury and in the Championship winning season of 1964/65 injury again prevented him playing enough to qualify. Dave Gaskell and Pat Dunne (respectively) were the medal winning replacements.

International Honours

In a ten year spell (1954-64) Harry Gregg won 25 caps for Northern Ireland. Trautmann never played for his native Germany, though he was eligible for the 1954 World Cup, which Germany won. His only representative honours were to Captain the Football League Representative side against the Irish League in 1960 and as a player for the same team against the Italian League.

Both Trautmann and Gregg were honoured with the Order of the British Empire.

Manchester City vs Manchester United 12th March 1960 – The Outcome

Well, United won 3-1, but much more than that, I’m unable to tell you.

Online research hasn’t yielded anything at all about the game. Maybe someone will be kind enough to leave a comment with some extra detail?

At the end of the season, Manchester United had risen to 7th spot, 10 points behind the Champions Burnley.

However, in one of the biggest disappointments of my life, in front of over 65,000 spectators, City lost the last home game of the season.

They went down 1-2 to Burnley, handing them the league title, by one point, over Wolverhampton Wanderers.

This left City in 16th place on 37 points, but most importantly denied Wolves a first modern day cup and league double.

In the following season, this feat would be achieved by Tottenham Hotspur!

Anyway, good luck to both sides on Saturday evening – it promises to be a very entertaining match.

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