Chapter 367 The Passing of the Legend

After receiving the award, Dong Fangzhuo hurried back.

Before boarding the plane, he received a piece of bad news - on November 25, 2005, local British time, British football legend and former Manchester United star George Best stopped breathing.

Known as one of the greatest players in history, he died at the age of 59.

After Roger Williams, the chief physician at Cromwell Hospital, reluctantly announced the sad news, the British media and fans were filled with sadness. This morning local time in London, Best's fans rushed to give him his former Manchester United No. 7 jersey, a Manchester United scarf with "George, you are a legend" written on it, letters, etc. to express their love for him.

His long-term alcoholism as an adult took a toll on his body. After drinking too much in 2002, Best had to undergo a liver transplant. In early October this year, Best had to be hospitalized due to liver problems. After more than a month of fighting against death, the legendary star finally passed away at the age of 59.

Dong Fangzhuo joined Manchester United for a year and a half and has never been alone with Best, but this does not hinder his respect for this senior.

This senior once supported Dong Fangzhuo in front of the media and believed that Dong Fangzhuo could carry forward the tradition of Manchester United and become a great Manchester United captain.

In the eyes of the British, Best is the most powerful football player in Great Britain after the war. He is even ranked among the best in Europe and the world. Only Pele, Maradona, Stefano and Croy can stand shoulder to shoulder. Husband and a few others. But as a veteran player who has retired for 35 years, his death can trigger widespread remembrances from the Prime Minister to millions of civilians. The scale is close to that of Diana. This is not just something that can be played by football.

Regarding Best's premature death, the traditional view is that it was caused by his personality weaknesses, which are abundantly illustrated in his life after retirement: in order to fill the void, he indulged in alcohol and women. He was considered an example of a "genius who died young," led to self-destruction by the same forces that drove him to success.

While these sentiments are valid, Best's life cannot be entirely attributed to internal causes. As the first entertainment superstar figure in the history of modern football, Best and every aspect of his life have been amplified by modern media. This was unimaginable before his time, but since him, the private lives of athletes have been investigated. Inquiry becomes commonplace.

His name is remembered throughout Manchester, even the tea lady is no exception.

Best was born on May 22, 1946 in Belfast, the capital of Northern Ireland. His father was a shipyard worker and his mother worked in a cigarette factory. As a child, Best was alert and was admitted to the local "key" primary school, but he was not happy because the traditional project of the primary school was rugby instead of football. Later, after transferring to a school that focused on football,

His talent was quickly revealed, and Manchester United's scouts in Northern Ireland quickly sent a telegram back to coach Busby: "I think I have discovered a genius for you this time."

So, at the age of 14, Best crossed the Irish Sea and came to Old Trafford. At that time, Manchester United was in the recovery period after the Munich air disaster in 1958, and Busby was searching for young talents to rebuild its glory. But the boy Best suffered from homesickness from the beginning. He only stayed for 24 hours before running back to Belfast with his companions. However, his father was not accommodating and immediately called Busby and Best was sent back to Manchester United.

Before long, the whole city of Manchester, from the tea lady to the taxi driver, was talking about this special boy.

In 1963, he represented the first team for the first time against West Bromwich Albion at home and scored the only goal in the game to help Manchester United lead the opponent in the standings.

This is where his legend begins.

He was once the youngest European footballer, and for this he needed women and alcohol...

In 1968, after winning three consecutive league championships, Best's reputation reached its peak - Manchester United defeated Benfica, the then dominant player in European football, at Wembley Stadium and became the first English team to win the European Champions Cup. , and Best himself opened the scoring in the game. At just 22 years old, he had already become "European Footballer of the Year"... These are the wonderful moments that are talked about again and again in the memorial articles written by his admirers.

But after that, the young Best and his teammates began to have differences. For people like Sir Busby and Bobby Charlton who have experienced the "Munich Air Disaster", they have achieved their goal of reshaping the Manchester United dynasty. The motivation to continue moving forward is gone, and they are also old. But Best is different. He is still young and needs continuous success to consolidate the reputation he has gained. He is depressed about the aging and lack of progress of the team. He is not willing to just decline. He needs to relieve the pressure. He needs women and alcohol. …

In order to make his body stronger, the thin Best thought of drinking beer. When Best signed a trial contract with Manchester United in 1961, he was considered too thin to cope with the physically demanding professional football in the future. The common method of getting a young player to "get stronger" at the time was to give them a bottle of Guinness every day, as it was rich in yeast and aided digestion. It didn't take long for Best, a prohibitionist who came from a Puritan home, to fall in love with this "tradition."

The drinking culture tradition in football has a long history, and Manchester United in the 1960s was no exception. The first time Best got drunk was when he was 16 years old, when he visited Switzerland with the team - he was not very drunk at this time, and he would drink more than 1 liter of beer. Later, he would also mix whiskey with orange juice during training, and because his reputation became more and more famous, everyone turned a blind eye to it.

In 1999, he was found to have cirrhosis of the liver; he underwent a liver transplant in 2002. A year later, he started drinking again and his second marriage collapsed.

In 2004, he was sentenced to 20 months in prison for drunk driving. On November 25, 2005, he passed away amidst the attention of countless people.

Neither football nor alcohol were the fundamental reasons why Best became a social icon in the turbulent 1960s. His fashion sense and romantic style are what attract people the most.

Bobby Charlton was a hero respected by parents at the time, and his politeness and tidiness were promoted by churches, schools and governments. But in the eyes of young people, he is a disgusting, boring guy, a submissive lapdog and a country bumpkin with bad taste.

Best, by contrast, is a working-class hero.

Best lived in the 1960s, a time when rebellion, whether justified or without cause, was applauded, especially by young people. Therefore, although Best's political views are on the right and Charlton is leaning towards the Labor Party, the image of the two in the minds of young people is still opposite.

Something that would be commonplace today, but at the time it was unheard of for a player to be so dismissive of tradition, and the repercussions went far beyond the pitch. People today seem to be tired of the swagger and maverickness of young stars, but in the 1960s, as the first person to do so, Best's actions were enough to elevate himself to the spokesperson of the budding "counterculture" , whether he wants it or not.

Best once said of Charlton: "I think he is too perfect to be true. I really hope he says 'f××k' even just once." Under Charlton's authority, Best I spent three years in depression. On the eve of his testimonial match at Charlton Athletic, he threw eggs at a captain's poster in a pub.

Everyone said that without alcohol and women, Best would be imperfect because of perfection.

Opinions on Best have long been divided into two groups. Some people think that he wasted his talent, while others thank God for allowing them to see such a beautiful performance. Best himself insisted that he alone had the right to express disappointment that his career did not last, but he was not disappointed.

In 2001, he published his autobiography "Beloved", and later published "Halftime Score", which is full of all the unique things he did when he was young. This year he published his final memoir, Shoveling and Broken Showers, which chronicled football in the 1960s and 1970s.

Although Best did not necessarily connect his contempt for discipline and self-indulgence with the demand for freedom, and his disregard for responsibility and pursuit of sensual enjoyment cannot be said to be an active resistance to the social establishment, his life has indeed always been in line with Most people are different, which is not only the source of his genius, but also the source of the adulation, envy and blame he gets from others.

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"Winning against West Ham for George Best."

Ferguson just said this in the away dressing room.

During the league away game against West Ham United, players from both sides had their hands wrapped in black veils and observed three minutes of silence...

At the beginning of the game, Manchester United players seemed to have not recovered from the sorrow of losing Best. West Ham broke the deadlock in just 52 seconds. Etherington passed a diagonal pass from the left, and Haywood pushed a shot into the near corner from 12 yards in the left rib of the penalty area. Access the network.

Manchester United equalized the score in the 47th minute. Repka made a mistake in making a clearance. Dong Fangzhuo made a direct pass. Rooney got rid of Gabiton from 12 yards in the middle and shot hard. Although Carroll blocked the ball, he failed to prevent it from entering the net. This is Rooney's seventh league goal this season.

Ten minutes later, Manchester United overtook the score. Rooney took a corner kick from the right, and O'Shea headed the ball into the net from 6 yards away...

In the end, Manchester United defeated West Ham United 2:1 in the away game.

After the game, Dong Fangzhuo flew to Northern Ireland with the army...