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[h3]One of the greatest football players of all time, George Best was the first child of Dickie, a shipyard worker, and Anne. [/h3]

Growing up in Belfast, Northern Ireland with his siblings, Barbara, Julie, Grace and Ian, Best’s love of football began at an early age. Bob Bishop, a Manchester United scout, spotted him at age 15 and still at school. He immediately telegrammed manager Matt Busby, saying, “I think I’ve found you a genius”.

Busby arranged for Best to move to Manchester, to work as an office boy near Old Trafford, home of Manchester United football club, and Best began playing for their youth club. On 14 September 1963, age 17, he made his senior division debut, signed as a professional with Manchester United, where he stayed until 1974.

[quote]“I think I’ve found you a genius”.
Bob Bishop, Manchester United scout[/quote]

Best began performing immediately and scored his first goal in his second match against Burnley and had six goals under his belt by the close of the season. At the age of 18, in 1964, Best won the first of 37 international caps for Northern Ireland and the world sat up and took note. Suddenly he was being hailed as the new Stanley Matthews. Before long, the young lad from Belfast was wrapped in a lifestyle very different from the one he had known whilst growing up.

Always impetuous and outspoken, with dark, handsome looks, Best was well liked and brought a pop star image to the game. He was consequently one of the first celebrity footballers. Hugely popular with the fans, his extravagant lifestyle came with all the trappings of constantly flowing champagne, beautiful women and fast cars.

At age 20, in 1966, when Manchester United played Benfica in the European Cup quarter-final in Portugal, Best really showed the world what he was made of, by scoring two goals in the first 10 minutes of a game that ended 5-1 to Manchester United.

Described as a footballing genius, Best, whose position was winger, showed many skills on the field. An innate balance and the ability to play equally well with both feet, extraordinary dribbling skills, being particularly fast and able to accelerate past other players, combined with precise goal scoring, gave him the ability to beat defenders.
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Best, along with Bobby Charlton and Denis Law, formed a crucial part of the team when Manchester United won the Football League Championships in 1965 and 1967 and the 1968 European Cup. 1968 was also the year Best was named European Footballer of the Year and became the youngest winner of the Football Writer’s Association’s Footballer of the Year award, at age 21.

Slightly overwhelmed with his new life, Best decided he should develop interests in addition to football. Finding himself an agent and a secretary, he went into business, opening two clothing boutiques and two nightclubs in Manchester, Oscar’s and Slack Alice’s.

Having started out with a squeaky clean record and never missing a game, Best began to allow his playboy lifestyle to get the better of him and it started to interfere with his football. In 1971 he was suspended for two weeks, for failing to catch a train to play in a game at Chelsea. In 1972, he was dropped from the team for failing to attend training sessions. Manchester United’s new manager, Frank O’Farrell, ordered Best to move from his home in Cheshire into lodgings near Old Trafford, in order for him to have no excuse for missing practices or matches.

The celebrity footballer, with his excessive lifestyle of heavy drinking and endless women, was a favourite subject in the media. In December 1972, O’Farrell was fired as manager of Manchester United and replaced by the slightly controversial Tommy Docherty. ‘The Doc’, as he was known, and Best had a showdown over his erratic behaviour and Best played his last game for Manchester United against Queens Park Rangers, on 1 January 1974.

Over the next decade, Best’s life and career deteriorated steadily and he drifted between no less than 11 different clubs. He had been on the Northern Ireland national team from 1964 and continued playing for them until 1978. Following his departure from Manchester United, Best moved to Stockport County Football Club in 1975, then he played for Cork Celtic from 1975 to 1976. Deciding to broaden his horizons, Best looked to America and played for the Los Angeles Aztecs in 1976, 1977 and 1978. During this time, he also played for Fulham from 1976 to 1977.

Appreciating the relative anonymity of playing in America, Best also played for the Fort Lauderdale Strikers and San Jose Earthquakes. He later returned to the UK, enjoying stints at Hibernian and Bournemouth between 1979 and 1983. In 1983, Best went further a field and played for the Brisbane Lions in Australia. He then joined Tobermore United Football Club in Northern Ireland, in 1984, before retiring from football at the end of the 1984 season at the age of 37. In 1988, a testimonial match was held for Best at Windsor Park, in which he scored twice, watched by Sir Matt Busby and Bob Bishop, the Manchester United men who had discovered him.

Married to Angela Macdonald-James in 1978, the couple had a son, Callum. In 1984, Best was convicted of driving under the influence of alcohol and of assaulting a policeman. He appealed his conviction, which failed, and was imprisoned for 12 weeks, spending Christmas in Pentonville Prison in North London. Best’s continued alcoholism and bouts of bankruptcy took its toll on the marriage and the couple eventually divorced in 1986. Appearing drunk on the Wogan television chat show in 1994, Best was watched by millions as he publicly humiliated himself. Eight months later he assaulted a man in a London pub. It seemed that his bad boy behaviour had no end.
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In 1995, he married beautiful airhostess and model, Alex Pursey, 26 years his junior. The couple lived in Best’s Chelsea apartment but in 1998 faced eviction and agreed to leave due to a mortgage arrears of £70,000. In the late 1970s, Best opened Bestie’s Beach Club, in Hermosa Beach, California. He managed it until the 1990s and it is now called The Underground, after the London tube system.

Joining Sky Sports in 1998, Best used his football knowledge to analyse the Saturday matches. In 1999, best was voted 11th, behind Marco van Basten, at the IFFHS European Player of the Century election; and voted 16th, behind Lothar Matthaus, in the World Player of the Century election. In Brussels, 2000, Best was inducted into the International Football Hall of Champions. In March 2000, he spent several weeks in hospital with a liver problem and was diagnosed as having only 20 per cent functionality in his liver and strongly advised by doctors to give up drinking. In 2001, Best received an Honorary Doctorate from the Queen’s University of Belfast and in 2002, he was admitted to King’s College Hospital, London, for a liver transplant. That same year, he was made Freeman of Castlereagh, Northern Ireland, and an inaugural inductee into the English Football Hall of Fame. Best was named by Pelé, on the 2004 FIFA 100 list, as one of the 125 best living footballers.

Despite his serious health problems, Best continued to flout the best medical and friendly advice and continued drinking. He was criticised for being rude and behaving inappropriately. On 2 February 2004 he was convicted of another drunk driving offence and was banned from driving for 20 months. It proved the last straw for wife, Alex, who divorced him in 2004, accusing him of being physically abusive during their relationship.

Wanting to be involved with football once more, Best joined the FA Premier League Portsmouth Football Club in November 2004 as a youth coach. On 3 October 2005 he was admitted into intensive care at London’s Cromwell Hospital, with kidney problems. They were a side effect of the immno-suppressive drugs he was taking to prevent rejection of the liver, following his transplant.

Newspapers reported on 27 October 2005 that Best was close to death and printed a farewell message from him to his loved ones. On 20 November 2005, News of the World published a picture of Best in his hospital bed, at his own request. The caption read, “Don’t die like me”. Best’s treatment was stopped in the early hours of 25 November 2005 and he died age 59. The cause of death was a kidney infection, a lung infection and multiple organ failure.

The first match at Old Trafford after Best’s death was preceded by tributes from his son Callum, as well as from former teammates, including Sir Bobby Charlton. The men joined on the pitch to observe a minute’s silence whilst fans held up pictures of Best.

On Saturday 3 December 2005, a rainy day in East Belfast, 100,000 people lined the route Best’s coffin was taken from the family home to Stormont, where the funeral service was held. News teams from around the world covered the event. Best was buried, alongside his mother, in a private ceremony at Roselawn Cemetry, East Belfast. At all football matches played in the country on the day of Best’s funeral, crowds either held a minute’s silence or a minute’s applause, in his honour.
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Best received several post-humus accolades in 2006. The first was the Professional Football Association’s Special Merit award for his services to football. In March 2006, a Dash 8 aeroplane was named The George Best by Flybe airlines and was used to transport Best’s family to his memorial service in Manchester. On what would have been his 60th birthday, 22 May 2006, Belfast City Airport was renamed George Best City Airport. On the first anniversary of his death, 3 December 2006, Ulster Bank issued one million commemorative five pound notes, which sold out in five days and later reached prices of £30 on popular online auction site, eBay.

Best wrote a number of autobiographies, including ‘Bestie’, co-written with Joe Lovejoy; ‘The Good, the Bad and The Bubbly’, with Ross Benson; ‘Blessed: The Autobiography’, with Roy Collins; and ‘Scoring at Half Time’, with Martin Knight. He has been the subject of or mentioned in numerous songs, by artists including Van Morrison, Thin Lizzy, British group The Fall, The Wedding Present and Don Fardon, whose single ‘Belfast Boy’ was re-released to commemorate Best’s death.

The star player who went into alcoholic decline and suffered a tragic death will nevertheless remain in our memories as the football legend he was.

[b]Career:[/b]

[b]Youth Clubs:[/b]
1963: Manchester United

[b]Senior Clubs:[/b]
1963-1974: Manchester United
1975: Stockport County
1975-1976: Cork Celtic
1976+77+78: Los Angeles Aztecs
1976-1977: Fulham
1979+1980: Fort Lauderdale Strikers
1979–1980: Hibernian
1979-80+81: San Jose Earthquakes
1983: Bournemouth
1983: Brisbane Lions
1984: Tobermore United

[b]National Team:[/b]
1964–1978: Northern Ireland

Carey Latimore
George Best Remembered biography



- Height: 5’ 8” (1.73 m).

- Made a fitness video with Mary Stavin in 1984, titled ‘Shape Up and Dance’.

- He starred in an animated advert for milk, called ‘The White Stuff’.

- Is reported to have had two daughters with women other than his two ex-wives.

- On 7 February 1970, Best scored a club record of six goals in Manchester United’s 8-2 win over Northampton Town.

- Was affectionately called ‘The Fifth Beatle’ due to his rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle and dishevelled good looks.

- In Northern Ireland, they would say: “Maradona good; Pelé better; George Best”.

- There was a picture of him on the album cover of ‘Definitely Maybe’ (1994) by Oasis.

- In 2004, the same year as their divorce, Best’s ex-wife Alex Pursey won the Rear of the Year award and appeared in the television reality show ‘I’m a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here!’.
George Best Remembered biography




George Best Remembered biography

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