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It’s unlikely that a certain steward at Old Trafford knew the true meaning behind the five words he uttered to Manchester United’s superstar number 7 on January 5th, 1974.

A tearful George Best had been sitting in the stands in an empty Theatre of Dreams after being dropped amidst a fractured relationship with manager Tommy Docherty. He sat there replaying every spine-tingling moment he experienced on that pitch - from his debut at 17 to being crowned the greatest player in Europe.

“I remembered those great nights in Europe under the floodlights,” he recalled in his autobiography, Blessed . “The pure theatre of those occasions.

“As I sat there, lost in my own thoughts, all those great memories flooded into my mind and the tears began streaming down my face.” View 10

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