40 YEARS AGO TODAY

The Times Monday 19/4/65
Collins elected

R Collins, the Scottish international inside-forward who has led Leeds United to the brink of the Cup and League double, has been voted Footballer of the Year. He received almost 50 per cent of the total votes case in the annual poll by members of the Football Writers’ Association.

One sharp, snap goal sees Manchester home
League race more than ever on knife edge

Leeds United 0 Manchester United 1
Manchester United shot an arrow into the turbulent air at Elland Road on Saturday and pierced Leeds United in the heart. For the first time this season – and at the fourth time of asking – they struck the Yorkshiremen at their most sensitive spot and at the most sensitive moment.

This was Leeds’ first loss in 25 matches and it has left the League championship title more than ever on a knife-edge. Having seen their previous defeat at West Ham on November 21, viewed much of the colourful spectrum in the intervening five months and now witnessed this, there is a sense of having sat at each end of a rainbow. But who will find the pot of gold at the last?

Four contests between Leeds and Manchester this season have clearly underlined how little there is between the pair. In terms of Yorkshire, the cores have been 1-0, 0-0, 1-0 and now 0-1. They have scarcely brought the best out of each other on any occasion – apart from a dazzling quarter of an hour by Law in the FA Cup semi final replay at Nottingham which was wasted by his colleagues and cost Manchester their fifth visit to Wembley since the war.

The truth is their respective styles, chafed by intense rivalry, have scarcely blended. Nor have the elements been kind to either. At Old Trafford last December fog interrupted the game for some quarter of an hour; at Hillsborough, in their first Cup tie confrontation, wind, mud and ill temper scarred the occasion; now, on Saturday, a howling gale let itself loose almost to become a demon of destruction as the hats and streamers of an all ticket 52,000 crowd flew away like kites, as the hair stood on end – literally and figuratively – and as the ball swirled about in grotesque fashion.

In the conditions and in an atmosphere as taut as a drum – with so much at stake – the wonder of it was that we had any sort of match at all. Thus, it was the outcome rather than how it was achieved that mattered most. In the event it was a cleanly organised move by Manchester, completed with a sharp snap goal by Connelly after 14 minutes, that settled the blistering affair early on.

In that searing moment unhappy Leeds and howling Boreas were tamed on a sunny afternoon. And having laid the foundations of victory, it was the Manchester defence as a whole – in which Stiles, Foulkes and A Dunne provided a solid core – that kept the victory won.

Bearing everything in mind it was a well-taken decisive breakthrough that brought Manchester a victory they just about deserved. Best, whose sensitive qualities do not always shine when the going is difficult, for once made room for manoeuvre down the left.

It was a subtle swerve that took the ball back to his right foot; over came the centre and up went J Charlton’s dominating head to clear the Leeds lines. But at once A Dunne swung the ball back again and there was Law, stabbing a volleyed pass sideways and inwards, turning joyfully to see Connelly, in the centre-forward position, send home a left foot arrow swift and low beyond Sprake.

Were we but to know it the one positive moment had come and gone, though there were narrow squeaks to come later at both ends. And when Manchester turned round to face the gale at half time with only that slender lead in their pockets the general feeling was that they did not have enough in the bank.

But with Foulkes curbing Peacock down the middle professionally and calmly, Stiles, a little terrier, snapping up everything loose in the rear, A Dunne and the rest holding the fort manfully, Leeds in the end found themselves baffled at every turn. The gale, in fact, for them, finally became as much a foe as a friend while passes ran away from their reach.

Collins, in particular, Leeds’ pocket general, could seldom find his typical long-range game accurately as the ball was bent from its intended line. And strongly as Greenhoff played before the interval there was no Bremner at wing-half to ring incision, drive and the priceless midfield understanding with his midget captain.

Even the desperate last throws of switching Bell from full-back with Cooper, and sending up the towering J Charlton to rescue something with his head, as he has so often done this season, fell on stony ground. Manchester held their line firmly in spite of one narrow squeak at the half hour when Peacock shot inches wide after little Collins had wriggled like an eel brilliantly past three tackles to lay on the opening; later, too, when Giles flashed just wide, again from a close flick from Collins.

If Stiles and Foulkes especially earned medals at Manchester’s rear, the real hero of all was R Charlton. He was the piston, covering midfield, hunting, tackling back, spraying his passes under the storm or cutting free with some fine dribbles, his thin hair streaming in the wind.

Leeds United: Sprake, Reaney, Bell, Greenhoff, J Charlton, Hunter, Giles, Weston, Peacock, Collins, Cooper
Manchester United: P Dunne, Brennan, A Dunne, Crerand, Foulkes, Stiles, Connelly, R Charlton, Herd, Law, Best
Referee: K Stokes (Newark)

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