The Busby Babe

The "Busby Babes" is the name given to the group of footballers, recruited and trained by Manchester United chief scout Joe Armstrong and assistant manager Jimmy Murphy, who progressed from the club's youth team into the first team under the management of the eponymous Matt Busby from the late 1940s and throughout the 1950s.

The Busby Babes were notable not only for being young and gifted, but for being developed by the club itself, rather than bought from other clubs, which was customary then. The term, coined by Manchester Evening News journalist Frank Nicklin in 1951, usually refers to the players who won the league championship in seasons 1955-56 and 1956-57 with an average age of 21 and 22 respectively.

But their dreams shattered when they were involved in a plane crash which famously know as "The Munich Air Disaster". 

The Munich Air Disaster on February 6th 1958

Eight of the players –  Roger Byrne (28), Eddie Colman (21), Mark Jones (24), Duncan Edwards (21), Billy Whelan (22), Tommy Taylor (26), David Pegg (22) and Geoff Bent (25) – died in the Munich Air Disaster in February 1958, while Jackie Blanchflower (24 at the time of the crash) and senior player Johnny Berry (31 at the time of the crash) were injured to such an extent that they never played again. Berry was the senior player in the team by the time of the crash, having been signed from Birmingham City in 1951, by which time he was already 25.

 

        Roger Byrne                         Eddie Colman                          Mark Jones                          Duncan Edwards

           Billy Whelan                          Tommy Taylor                            David Pegg                       Geoff Bent

                                                  One of the Munich Air Crash Disaster survivor (Jackie Blanchflower)

The last remaining player from the pre-Munich side was Bobby Charlton (20 at the time of the crash), retired from playing in 1975; though he had left Manchester United two years earlier, he had continued playing as player-manager of Preston North End. As a player, he set the all-time goalscoring record for Manchester United and England, and his goal scoring record was unbroken for 35 years after his last game for United, while his England record was not broken until 2015, when another United player (Wayne Rooney) scored his 50th England goal.

                                            Sir Bobby Charlton still watches Manchester United matches until now

Sir Bobby Charlton (Right) with the man who broke his goalscoring records, Wayne Rooney (Left)