Manchester United's Darkest Day
It Was What It Was : The Football History Podcast
The Overlap
4.9 • 667 Ratings
🗓️ 11 February 2025
⏱️ 38 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Welcome back to It Was What It Was, the football history podcast.
In last week’s episode, we told the story of the rise of the Busby Babes, their brilliance, and their final match before tragedy struck. Today, Jonathan Wilson and Rob Draper take you through the darkest day in Manchester United’s history: 6 February 1958.
At Munich-Riem Airport, United’s flight stopped to refuel on its way home from Belgrade. After two failed take-off attempts, the third ended in disaster. The crash claimed 23 lives, including eight of Manchester United’s finest players. Duncan Edwards fought for survival but died 15 days later. Manager Sir Matt Busby was left critically injured - the club’s future uncertain.
In this episode, Jonathan and Rob reconstruct the events of that fateful day - and explore the immediate aftermath; the heartbreak, the shock, and how Manchester United Football Club somehow carried on.
On Friday, we will have the final part: How Sir Matt Busby’s Manchester United rose again.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | I had a big chance. |
| 0:08.9 | I wasn't a goal getter. |
| 0:10.5 | I made assists and final passes. |
| 0:13.0 | And I missed that chance. |
| 0:15.2 | I was to blame maybe that we didn't win the game. |
| 0:18.6 | And I cursed myself for that. |
| 0:20.8 | I was three or four yards from the gold, |
| 0:22.8 | and I put it over the crossbar. |
| 0:24.6 | I wanted to put extra power on it, |
| 0:26.5 | and it didn't work out right. |
| 0:27.8 | It could have been four three. |
| 0:29.6 | Then we would have played a third game, |
| 0:31.4 | and they would not have travelled on that day. |
| 0:34.6 | Welcome to It Was What It Was with me, Rob Draper, |
| 0:37.2 | and Jonathan Wilson. That quote, very haunting |
| 0:40.9 | quote, comes from the inside forward of Red Star Belgrade, Dragislav Zekulaatz. And he's talking about |
| 0:48.1 | a chance he missed in the game against Manchester United. It is a game just before United will |
| 0:53.2 | travel home and they'll be |
| 0:54.4 | involved in a Munich Air disaster. And he, obviously, quite wrongly blamed himself that, oh, |
| 1:00.5 | if I'd scored that goal, maybe they would have had to hang around for a replay. Maybe they |
| 1:05.0 | wouldn't have gone on the plane. And it's an illustration of the guilt and trauma that affected |
| 1:10.6 | so many people after this, one of the |
... |
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