News Desk
On Monday, Manchester Cathedral hosted an honour for Sir Bobby Charlton, a former football player and manager.
A number of prominent figures in the football world, including England manager Gareth Southgate, Manchester United, the Football Association, and Manchester City CEO Ferran Soriano, attended the memorial service. Thousands of fans turned out for the event, adding to the sense of solidarity in celebrating a traditional hero.
William Balderston, Charlton’s grandson, shared his fondness for plane-spotting and talked about his grandfather’s improvised tales involving two characters, Jelly and Custardy. He added that Munich looms large over everything since he could not look at a snowflake or an aeroplane without remembering that fateful day. Charlton experienced disappointments, letdowns, frustrations, tragedy, and cynicism, but he never quite lost that feeling that United was something special.
The Holy Trinity statue—Charlton, George Best, and Denis Law—was passed by the cortege, which was held closer in bronze than it had ever been in real life. The three of them were last seen together just before Best passed away, eighteen years ago, when Charlton and Law met at Stockport station and went to London to see their old teammate who was terminally ill.
Throughout his life, Charlton served as a living tribute to Munich, honouring the fallen with his exceptional football skills and paying tribute to them once more with the dignity of his memory. Finally, there was his own memorial, a memorial for Munich, a memorial for the ideal dashed in the snow and slush.
Charlton described the eighteen months leading up to Munich as “paradise,” where he and his peers played outstanding attacking football. Britannia Flight 609, which had refuelled in Munich, crashed during takeoff, bringing one league title with it. It was carefree but successful, joyous but glorious. Paradise vanished in an instant.
The widow of one of the other Munich survivors, Kenny Morgans, Stephanie Morgans, recalled those prelapsarian days. She remembered how the Babes used to get their suits made in whatever style Eddie Colman decided was in style at the same tailor on Deansgate, and how they all started wearing trilbies after they started listening to Frank Sinatra.
Everything that Charlton did after seemed to be an attempt to pay homage to those bygone days, including his disbelief of the football systems of the 1960s and his establishment of soccer schools where David Beckham earned his degree. He was a man of great duty, but he also seemed to have a strong sense of responsibility to his gift.
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