It doesn’t matter who you support. If you’ve been to any ground across Europe, home or away, and Manchester United are one of the teams playing, the chances are you’ve heard that three-word chant moments before kick-off. “Bring on United!” “Bring on United!” If you’re a United fan, you get goosebumps. If you’re an opposition fan, your stomach fills with dread. Or, at least, that’s the way it used to be.
Andy Mitten is best known as a journalist for FourFourTwo and The Athletic, but he’s also a die-hard United fan who founded the fanzine United We Stand, as well as following his beloved club all over the world. Through doing something he loves for so long, Mitten has built a little black book of contacts made up from players, past and present. The sort of contacts that make a book like this possible.
Bring on United is billed as “Ferguson’s golden generation in their own words”. When you hear that, you might be expecting this to be about the treble-winning team of 1999, with the likes of Schmeichel, Keane, Cole, Yorke, and Sheringham. But it actually covers the period from 2000 to 2010. But that’s the thing, when you get a manager like Fergie who managed the club for twenty-six years and rebuilt them three times. With thirteen Premier Leagues, five FA Cups, four League Cups, two Champions Leagues, and a Club World Cup – among other honours – how do you actually determine when his Golden Generation was?
Ruud van Nistelrooy provides the foreword to this book. With this book being published in late 2024, I’m not sure if he’d have even returned to Old Trafford as part of Erik ten Hag’s coaching team at the time of penning this foreword. The fact that Ruud has since been interim United manager seems like a strange fever dream. Could he have even imagined that when he agreed to contribute to this book?
After the foreword, the book is divided into eleven chapters. Each one comprised of an in-depth interview with a United player from that generation. The contributors are: Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, Jaap Stam, Diego Forlan, Darren Fletcher, Wes Brown, Patrice Evra, John O’Shea, Gary Neville, Dimitar Berbatov, Nemanja Vidic, and Ryan Giggs. My only criticism here is that Mitten didn’t opt to give one of the chapters to a goalkeeper. Then this could’ve been a fantasy starting eleven.
Naturally, I don’t want to give away too much in this review, but I can guarantee that every single player who contributed to this book has a story to tell. Anecdotes from their time playing for – at the time – the greatest club in the world. They provide insight into working alongside Alex Ferguson and how the great man thinks. He built a family unit that led to his side being so successful over his twenty-six years at the helm.
This is a book packed full of nostalgia and a lot of happy memories. It doesn’t matter which chapter you’re reading in this book; there’s one thing that every player has in common. They all miss it. And that’s the sad part for any professional athlete. The body lives out long before the mind, the heart or the passion do. Evra, in particular, is the player I’ve heard on many occasions talk about the glory days and how they’d give anything to pull on that famous shirt and walk out at Old Trafford again. But the reality is that it just wouldn’t be the same.
The downside comes upon reflection once you’ve finished the book. It got me thinking a lot. The fact of the matter is that Fergie has been gone for thirteen years, and things just haven’t been the same. You read a book like this, and you’re reminded of how great things used to be. With that comes the sobering reminder that things aren’t that good anymore and the dread that they might not ever be good again.
I think we’ve had some good managers in the last thirteen years. Good managers who weren’t given enough time, while the board structure above is not fit for purpose, but they’ll never take any accountability themselves. At the time of posting this review, United are playing their first pre-season game for the 25/26 season with only Mattheus Cunha officially signed, while the Bryan Mbeumo deal has dragged on and on. I get the impression that in a few months’ time, Ruben Amorim will be just another scapegoat. And how I’d love to be wrong about that.
So, if you are a United fan, the chances are you will love this book. Just be prepared for the feeling of emptiness that might strike you upon completion.
My Goodreads rating: ★★★★☆ (4 stars)
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