Manchester United Football Club is based in England, United Kingdom, and is located at the Old Trafford stadium in Old Trafford, Greater Manchester in North West England, and probably one of, if not the most admired football club around the world, with over 50 million supporters across the globe. Manchester United Football Club is a renowned English football club, that has a capacity of over 76,000 with the highest average crowd in the Premiership. Manchester United Football Club is one of the main things for which the Manchester city is most famed. Manchester also has another Premiership team called Manchester City, as Manchester United are not actually based within the city itself.

The tradition of Manchester United football club is fantastic and the majority of supporters have a real affinity to the club. Manchester has a long tradition of distinction in sport. MUFC is less than two miles from the University, top class cricket can be watched at Old Trafford, and Salford is well known for one of the best Rugby League teams in the UK, the celebrated Salford Reds.

Football

Since the late 90s, the club has been by far one of the richest in the world, and until pretty recent had the top earnings of any football club for quite a few years running. Almost overnight, the Beautiful Game, English football re-invented itself as a glamorous sport with massive commercial appeal. The power and reach of TV is turning football into one of the world's highest rewarding sports. The club itself is one of the most triumphant clubs in England, by having won the FA Premier League and the old Football League fifteen times, as well as the FA Cup eleven times and even the European Cup/UEFA Champions League a few times, and still continue to play well year after year.

Cups

They also became the 1st English team to participate in the new European Cup, at the request of the English FA, who had deprived Chelsea FC a similar chance the previous season, and they got as far as the semi-final, before being knocked out by Real Madrid.

Tragedy struck that following season, when the plane transporting the team home from a European Cup match crash landed on take-off at a refuelling stop over in Munich, Germany. The plane skidded right off the end of the runway, straight through a fence and across into an empty home. Although even despite the accident, they still reached the FA Cup final yet again, where they just lost out to Bolton Wanderers.

Manchester United have won a lot of silverware on a frequent basis throughout their thriving and proud history and on the English domestic front have won both the old 1st Division Championship the Premier League, as well as the old Second Division, and also the FA Cup and League Cup. And by the time Matt Busby left, a ManU hero, in 1969 United had won a total of 5 First Division titles, 2 English FA Cup Finals and of course they became the first English team to take home the European Cup in 1968.

Fans

When Manchester United travelled to Thailand back in 1997, 1000s of fans travelled all the way to the national stadium out in Bangkok to see their heroes play in the flesh; but the closest most of the Asian supporters get to viewing their adopted English team is on national TV, where the English Premiership is shown almost daily.

Tens of thousand of fans often pack into Old Trafford to watch Manchester play football. As mentioned earlier, the largest group of fans can be found in Asia, and the sport is fast grwoing in China. This has allowed Manchester United to create an interactive, on-line footy society that will become the definitive experience for all its fans during match days, the build up, and then the after-match scrutiny. Maintaining their top position could not have been done without the worldwide fans that have turned into United-consumers. Of course, when in Manchester, Manchester Stadium is one of the first things that springs to mind for nearly everyone, so a visit their is a frequent pilgrimage for many fans.

The Manager

Alex Ferguson has been the clubs manager for as long as I can rememeber, and shows no signs of retirement yet. He lives and breathes football, and although I am a scouse Liverpool supporter, he is one of the best football managers the world has ever seen.