Come Here To Me!

Jackie Carey, Liam Whelan, Johnny Giles, Tony Dunne, Paul McGrath.

What binds all of these men? They are all great Irish footballers who played for Manchester United, yes, but they were also all spotted by Billy Behan. As the primary talent scout for United in Ireland over several decades, Behan made no small contribution to the success of the Mancunian football giants, and no small contribution to youth football in Dublin. From a family steeped in association football, remarkably little has been written about a man who perhaps knew the game better than anyone else in the Irish capital.

Billy Behan as goalkeeper, Evening Herald.

Born in Dublin in 1911, Billy Behan was the son of William Behan, a founding member of Shamrock Rovers. Unsurprisingly, he and his siblings developed a love of the beautiful game, with Billy playing as goalkeeper for Westland Rovers, Shamrock Rovers and Shelbourne during his career in the domestic game. At 22 years of age, he signed for Manchester United in 1933, beginning an affiliation with the club which would last several decades.

A young Behan spent only one season at Manchester as a goalkeeper, though he met his wife Vera in the northern English city,  remembering that “although my star in Manchester was a brief one, it fashioned my future.” Returning to the familiar green and white hoops of Shamrock Rovers, Behan maintained strong contacts with United, and began informing the club scouts of players in the domestic Irish game he believed warranted a chance. When United scout Louis Rocca agreed to accompany Behan to watch St. James’s Gate and Cork in the Iveagh Grounds, Behan’s worth could not be doubted. Playing that day was a young Jackie Carey, destined to become a famed Manchester United player. There was a degree of luck in it all, as Rocca had actually come to Dublin to see Benny Gaughran, who had been snatched instead by Celtic. Still, Carey dominated the game and caught the eye of the visitor, and Behan recalled:

Through the co-operation of the Gate Secretary, Mr. Byrne, Louis Rocca was introduced to Jackie Carry that evening and after discussions agreed to join United for what was then regarded as a record fee for a Free State League player. That fee, believe it or not, was only three figures and Carey, who was to make for himself such an illustrious career with United, must be regarded as the greatest bargain of all time to come out of Ireland.

Jackie Carey (Image Credit: Manchester United Archive)

To English footballing fans, Jackie Carey became the great Johnny Carey. He was an integral part of the club from 1936 until 1953, captaining the team from 1946. The first Irishman to captain a winning side in an FA Cup Final and the English First Division, Carey became a household name both in England and at home, coming a long way from the youngster who had lined up in the blue and navy jersey of Dublin’s  Gaelic footballers at minor level. In the words of Eamon Dunphy, “to the Irish soccer community of the forties and fifties, Johnny Carey was more than a sporting hero. He was an iconic figure for reasons that had as much to do with national identity as sport.” During the Second World War, Carey lined-up in Dublin for a League of Ireland XI and made a guest appearance for Shamrock Rovers, drawing huge crowds eager to see the famed Dubliner.

Behan’s great love was junior football, where he nurtured and encouraged talent. In 1946 he managed Saint Patrick’s CYMS, who succeeded in winning the FAI Junior Cup in Dalymount Park, and several players from his side attracted the attention of British sides. Across the sea, things were about to change forever at Manchester United with the appointment of Matt Busby, a manager who, like Behan, believed firmly in the importance of a solid youth system in football. To Behan:

Matt Busby’s inheritance at Old Trafford in 1945 was bleak – the club had a bank overdraft of £15,000, and a crater in the middle of the ground from the Blitz which had also left the stands a shambles, forcing them to play their home games at Maine Road. Yet Matt, from the start, built up a network of contacts, throughout the home countries, which kept him briefed on available talent.

The incredible team that Matt Busby built became the ‘Busby Babes’, a name bestowed upon them by the Manchester Evening News but quickly adopted on the terraces. The team would dominate British football.  Giles Oakley, author of Red Matters: Fifty Years Supporting Manchester United, captures the essence of the Busby philosophy:

Youthful talent was supported, nurtured, trusted and encouraged at Old Trafford in a way that was strikingly unique and distinctive. Over 75 players from the youth ranks got their chance in the first team in the 25 years Sir Matt was manger. Even those who didn’t ultimately make the grade at United often had good careers elsewhere.

Cabra’s Liam Whelan, who perished in the Munich air disaster.

Central to the Busby force was Cabra lad Liam Whelan, who Bill Behan observed while playing for Home Farm. Behan had arrived at a Home Farm game seeking out Vinny Ryan, normally a wing half who had recently moved to centre forward and was scoring to beat the band, but it was Whelan instead who impressed (United did make an unsuccessful bid for Ryan).  Only nine days after the scoop of the Cabra youngster, he played a star role in a United Youths convincing 7-1  victory over Wolves. Behan later acknowledged the magnitude of Home Farm’s importance to junior football:

Hereabout I would like to make reference to Home Farm, the club described by Sir Matt Busby as the best organised amateur sports team in the world.  Home Farm is undoubtedly the finest club of its kind. …As they say in racing, class will always tell.

Like many in the Irish and British football communities, Behan was stunned by the horror of the Munich air disaster, which ripped the heart of an incredible team. The scout attended the funeral of Whelan in Cabra, but also the remembrance services in Manchester, finding the city to be in deep mourning, but also witnessing the great spirit of resilience that makes Mancunians the people they are:

I found a city shocked and numbed. I just cannot describe the pall that hung over Manchester then, for at the time I don’t think anyone was thinking clearly…. Bobby Charlton reported back a short while afterwards and was a great asset. If anyone became a man overnight it was Bobby, whose mother spent some time helping out at Old Trafford after Munich. She’s a grand person and I think she makes the best cup of tea in England.

One of the finest accounts of Billy Behan and the manner in which he operated, seeing talent like Whelan and Carey early on, comes from Johnny Giles. Behan had enormous respect for Johnny Giles, noting that “Dicky Giles (Johnny’s father), knew the game inside out, and Johnny understood what is was all about at a very early age.” Giles described Behan in his entertaining autobiography as:

…having a kind of sixth sense for identifying the players who would make it, a bit like the way they say Vincent O’Brien could look at a yearling and in his minds eye see a Derby winner. At United, they valued their Irish links, not least because of the caliber of player that Billy Behan had found for them….Billy would be moseying around the junior football matches of Dublin, either standing on the sidelines of referring matches, a football man to the core. And he was not just a talent spotter, he was an amiable man who was good at fostering relationships with a young players family.

Crucially, and if time allowed it, Behan tried to establish direct contact between the upper-echelons of Manchester United and the players families. Jimmy Holmes recounts in his autobiography being taken to meet Matt Busby in the Gresham Hotel. Other clubs learned the lessons of this approach; right before Holmes departed Dublin for Manchester, he opened his front door to see Noel Cantwell, the manager of Coventry City and former Manchester United and Ireland defender. He told him, rightly or wrongly, that busloads of kids went to United on a regular basis and never get invited back. Holmes went with Coventry instead.

A young Johnny Giles at Manchester United. Evening Herald.

Behan could look back with pride on his contribution to Manchester United. In a reflective piece published in 1968, he stated that “I take pride in the fact that emigrant Irish soccer players by their character, sportsmanship and general behaviour in England have done so much towards raising the prestige and standing of Irishmen generally in England.”

Billy Behan died in 1991. In the decades that followed his above penned reflections, he had remained steadfastly involved in Irish football at junior level, and involving himself with the Leinster Senior League. He scouted, he was a sometime referee, he did literally anything and everything he could for the game. He continued to identify young talent, including the Black Pearl of Inchicore, Paul McGrath. Johnny Giles noted in the Evening Herald  at the time of his passing that “the sad loss of Billy Behan will leave a void in football that will be felt by many people who love the game in these islands and more keenly in Manchester, the great man’s adopted city.” His friend Tommy Cullen remembered how “I don’t think he ever had an enemy. He can never be replaced, he was the gentleman of football.”