Alex Ferguson and his assistant Archie Knox arrived from Aberdeen on the day of Atkinsons dismissal,[40] and guided the club to an 11th-place finish in the league.[41] Despite a second-place finish in 1987–88, the club was back in 11th place the following season.[42] Reportedly on the verge of being dismissed, victory over Crystal Palace in the 1990 FA Cup Final replay (after a 3–3 draw) saved Fergusons career.[43][44] The following season, Manchester United claimed its first Cup Winners Cup title and competed in the 1991 UEFA Super Cup, beating European Cup holders Red Star Belgrade 1–0 in the final at Old Trafford. A second consecutive League Cup final appearance followed in 1992, in which the team beat Nottingham Forest 1–0 at Wembley.[39] In 1993, the club won its first league title since 1967, and a year later, for the first time since 1957, it won a second consecutive title – alongside the FA Cup – to complete the first Double in the clubs history.[39] A white football player with short, dark, greying hair. He is wearing a red shirt, white shorts, white socks and white football boots. He is running and has puffed-out cheeks. Ryan Giggs is the most decorated player in English football history.[45] In the 1998–99 season, Manchester United became the first team to win the Premier League, FA Cup and UEFA Champions League – The Treble – in the same season.[46] Losing 1–0 going into injury time in the 1999 UEFA Champions League Final, Teddy Sheringham and Ole Gunnar Solskjær scored late goals to claim a dramatic victory over Bayern Munich, in what is considered one of the greatest comebacks of all time.[47] The club also won the Intercontinental Cup after beating Palmeiras 1–0 in Tokyo.[48] Ferguson was subsequently knighted for his services to football.[49] Manchester United won the league again in the 1999–2000 and 2000–01 seasons. The team finished third in 2001–02, before regaining the title in 2002–03.[50] They won the 2003–04 FA Cup, beating Millwall 3–0 in the final at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff.[51] In the 2005–06 season, Manchester United failed to qualify for the knockout phase of the UEFA Champions League for the first time in over a decade,[52] but recovered to secure a second-place league finish and victory over Wigan Athletic in the 2006 Football League Cup Final. The club regained the Premier League in the 2006–07 and 2007–08 seasons, and completed the European double by beating Chelsea 6–5 on penalties in the 2008 UEFA Champions League Final in Moscows Luzhniki Stadium. Ryan Giggs made a record 759th appearance for the club in this game, overtaking previous record holder Bobby Charlton.[53] In December 2008, the club won the 2008 FIFA Club World Cup and followed this with the 2008–09 Football League Cup, and its third successive Premier League title.[54][55] That summer, Cristiano Ronaldo was sold to Real Madrid for a world record £80 million.[56] In 2010, Manchester United defeated Aston Villa 2–1 at Wembley to retain the League Cup, its first successful defence of a knockout cup competition.[57] After finishing as runner-up to Chelsea in the 2009–10 season, United achieved a record 19th league title in 2010–11, securing the championship with a 1–1 away draw against Blackburn Rovers on 14 May 2011.[58] This was extended to 20 league titles in 2012–13, securing the championship with a 3–0 home win against Aston Villa on 22 April 2013.[59] 2013–present On 8 May 2013, Ferguson announced that he was to retire as manager at the end of the football season, but would remain at the club as a director and club ambassador.[6][60] The club announced the next day that Everton manager David Moyes would replace him from 1 July, having signed a six-year contract.[61][62][63] Ryan Giggs took over as interim player-manager 10 months later on 22 April 2014, when Moyes was sacked after a poor season in which the club failed to defend their Premier League title and failed to qualify for the UEFA Champions League for the first time since 1995–96.[64] They also failed to qualify for the Europa League, meaning that it was the first time Manchester United hadnt qualified for a European competition since 1990.[65] On 19 May 2014, it was confirmed that Louis van Gaal would replace Moyes as Manchester United manager on a three-year deal, with Giggs as his assistant.[66] Malcolm Glazer, the patriarch of the Glazer family that owns the club, died on 28 May 2014.[67] Crest and colours A football crest. In the centre is a shield with a ship in full sail above a red field with three diagonal black lines. Either side of the shield are two stylised roses, separating two scrolls. The upper scroll is red and reads Manchester United in black type, while the lower scroll is white with Football Club also written in black. Manchester United badge in the 1960s The club crest is derived from the Manchester City Council coat of arms, although all that remains of it on the current crest is the ship in full sail.[68] The devil stems from the clubs nickname The Red Devils; it was included on club programmes and scarves in the 1960s, and incorporated into the club crest in 1970, although the crest was not included on the chest of the shirt until 1971 (unless the team was playing in a Cup Final).[68] A photograph of the Newton Heath team, taken in 1892, is believed to show the players wearing red-and-white quartered jerseys and blue shorts.[69] Between 1894–96, the players wore distinctive green and gold jerseys[69] which were replaced in 1896 by white shirts, which were worn with blue shorts.[69] After the name change in 1902, the club colours were changed to red shirts, white shorts, and black socks, which has become the standard Manchester United home kit.[69] Very few changes were made to the kit until 1922 when the club adopted white shirts bearing a deep red V around the neck, similar to the shirt worn in the 1909 FA Cup Final. They remained part of their home kits until 1927.[69] For a period in 1934, the cherry and white hooped change shirt became the home colours, but the following season the red shirt was recalled after the clubs lowest ever league placing of 20th in the Second Division and the hooped shirt dropped back to being the change.[69] The black socks were changed to white from 1959 to 1965, where they were replaced with red socks up until 1971, when the club reverted to black. Black shorts and/or white socks are sometimes worn with the home strip, most often in away games, if there is a clash with the opponents kit. The current home kit is a red shirt with a white buttoned crew collar and cuffs with black and red trim.[70] The Manchester United away strip has often been a white shirt, black shorts and white socks, but there have been several exceptions. These include an all-black strip with blue and gold trimmings between 1993 and 1995, the navy blue shirt with silver horizontal pinstripes worn during the 1999–2000 season,[71] and the 2011–12 away kit, which had a royal blue body and sleeves with hoops made of small midnight navy blue and black stripes, with black shorts and blue socks.[72] An all-grey away kit worn during the 1995–96 season was dropped after just five games because players claimed to have trouble finding their team-mates against the crowd.[73] In 2001, to celebrate 100 years as Manchester United, a reversible white/gold away kit was released, although the actual match day shirts were not reversible.[74] The clubs third kit is often all-blue, this was most recently the case during the 2014–15 season.[75] Exceptions include a green-and-gold halved shirt worn between 1992 and 1994, a blue-and-white striped shirt worn during the 1994–95 and 1995–96 seasons and once in 1996–97, an all-black kit worn during the Treble-winning 1998–99 season, and white shirts with black-and-red horizontal pinstripes worn between 2003 and 2005.[76] Since 2006–07, the third kit has usually been the previous seasons away kit, the exceptions being the 2008–09[77] and 2014–15 seasons.
Posted on: Tue, 20 Jan 2015 09:42:57 +0000
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