Exclusive : “The doctors said I might end up in a wheelchair” – Manchester United Youth Cup winner on traumatic decision to retire

Featuring for the Manchester United youth team, you might figure there’s a good chance that you’ll get the opportunity to play for the first team at some point. If you are part of a team that actually wins the FA Youth Cup, you would be excused for almost assuming that it would be an inevitability. Lee Lawrence unfortunately missed out through a mixture of misfortune and circumstance.

It was Wigan Athletic where Lee began as a youngster, before United made their move at a very early age. “I was at Wigan from about six years old, and I signed for United when I was nine and was there for about eleven years until I was twenty,” he says. “Wigan were in League Two, or the old Division Three, and as soon as a name like United come in, the decision is already made to be honest.”

It wasn’t just the name. In 1995 Lee’s arrival was an indication of just how much the youth system had developed. Scouting the best local lads meant not just the schoolboys and early teens, but even the under-10s were being courted too. United’s success in the Youth Cup was there for all to see, with wins and final appearances in the past few years, and it was at least a sign of re-assurance to parents that the club placed a huge amount of emphasis on the development and ability of their younger players. Furthermore, in 1995, there was only one club in Britain who were giving these young players a chance at such a prolific rate, and that was Manchester United.

Still, this was fairly new territory for both clubs and the wider footballing landscape. Whereas before, young players could play for their local small clubs and county sides – with those that represented their region usually standing out – a more pro-active approach was being undertaken to recruit players at a younger age. Perhaps at the age of 13 or 14 you can accurately assess how technically gifted a player is compared to his peers, and how comfortable he finds playing in older age brackets, enough to at least justify any kind of real excitement in a player’s potential.

With so much in the way of education (in an all-encompassing aspect) concentrating on communication and personal development particularly in infant and junior levels, clubs were taking a bold step in recruiting children to any kind of programme.

Lee says that what he can remember of his early days at United showed that they were conscious about the more profound responsibility they were taking on. “Playing football when I first joined was fun and that’s all I can really remember, having fun when I was there,” he says. “There was a really great atmosphere and the coaches made sure that you were just having a good time. From that age to the age of ten or eleven, they don’t really know how you’re going to develop, but I think it was a good thing because we were so relaxed. We were having a good time and not really aware of the size of the surroundings.”

Lee’s development included a trip to the Northern Ireland Milk Cup, which didn’t exactly go to plan. “We got to the final but I think we played a team from Paraguay and we were battered,” he laughs. “It was the most embarrassing final in the world. The experience was still fantastic though. You go on a trip to a tournament, you’re only fourteen and you have people asking for your autograph. I think that’s the very first time you start to really hope and believe that it’s something you could do for a livelihood.”

Another aspect it could be argued that the club were helping to forge or re-create was close friendships and the potential impact they could have on the long term prospects of the club. The 1992 Youth Cup team, or to be more accurate, the members of the academy of that time including the likes of Paul Scholes and Phil Neville, were to make up the bulk of the squad that would be successful for the next generation.

That was in no small part thanks to the unity, the willingness to fight for each other, and sometimes the telepathic understanding on the pitch. “Being there for a long time, you obviously made friends. I was close with Ben Collett, Phil Bardsley, David Jones. We all joined around the same time and stayed close throughout our progression,” recalls Lee.

All four were in the squad when Lee made his FA Youth Cup debut at Queens Park Rangers in December 2001, with other local lads Lee Sims and Chris Humphreys in a team that included two hotly tipped stars of the future, Darren Fletcher and Mads Timm. “I was doing so well in the under 17s that I and a few others were called into the Youth Cup squad,” says Lee. “It was absolutely brilliant. I think Danny Pugh was injured and because I was doing well, I got the call to play at left back. It gave me a boost of confidence because we knew that we weren’t just getting thrown into it, we were being given the opportunity because the club trusted us to perform.”

Perform they did and an impressive outing in a 3-1 win meant that Lawrence had done so well that he would retain his number three shirt for the remainder of the cup run that season. “The confidence just flowed to be honest,” confesses Lee, “When you’re being given the chance and you’re doing well, you just feel really good about it. We’d be going back to the under-17 team after the Youth Cup games and we’d be feeling so good that our performances just got better and better, it was almost like a snowball effect.”

Confidence and togetherness play a part, of that there is no question, yet ultimately you do need talent to succeed and talent was something that one of Lee’s team-mates in particular had in abundance.

“You could see why the manager had such high hopes for Darren Fletcher,” says Lee. “At the age of 13 or 14 when he’d come over from Scotland you’d see how good he was. He really was special, you could see the potential in him. He was head and shoulders above everyone, his technique and passing ability was sometimes scary to watch. Everyone at the club could tell he was destined to make it, and having known him as long as we did, we knew that once he got the chance he was going to take it.”

The cup run, helped with Fletcher in the side, saw the team really enjoy their momentum. Another away tie in the fourth round, this time at Birmingham, saw a 3-2 win before the same scoreline brought triumph over Hartlepool United on the anniversary of the Munich disaster. Perhaps in recognition of this, the club decided to host the tie at Old Trafford and Lee says that this again was something the young players took in their stride.

“It’s weird because when it’s all happening, it’s not something you’re always able to take in. Years later when people tell you about it and you look back and realise what everything meant, it’s only really at that point you understand how special it was,” admits Lee. “Being honest, I have vivid memories of that first game against QPR because it was my first but after that it feels like a blur. It was a joy to be selected to play. When we lost against Barnsley I’m sure I felt disappointed at the time, but I can’t really remember that disappointment, I just remember being so happy to be playing so often.” United drew 3-3 with Barnsley in the sixth round but were eliminated on penalties.

Though clearly a setback, Lee was satisfied enough with his progression to have viewed the season a great success. The following year the youngsters who had done well were joined by talented players like Chris Eagles. Lee was an ever-present in the next Youth Cup run as United won at Newcastle United then defeated both Sheffield clubs to get to the sixth round again. Victory over Tranmere Rovers set up a two-legged semi final clash with Charlton Athletic and Lee admits that there was a growing feeling in the camp that United could go all the way.

“There was definitely that kind of feeling because we all believed in each other,” he says. “I had no doubt that our team would be there or thereabouts, you only have to look at what those players went on to achieve in league football. Kieran Richardson, Phil Bardsley, David Jones and Paul McShane, they have all played lots of times at the top level and they were showing that kind of potential then, so it was no surprise that we were doing so well.”

United overcame Charlton to qualify for the final against a team that were really hotly tipped, perhaps even more so than the Reds. Middlesbrough’s academy featured names that would go on to play plenty of Premier League games with Ross Turnbull, David Wheater, James Morrison and Chris Brunt to name just four. Lee says everyone was well aware of the task that faced them in the final. “We didn’t really have nerves, we knew how good they were, but we had that confidence in each other. We were also made up that Sir Alex came in to the dressing room before the second leg to tell us to keep our heads, that if we played to the best of our ability then he was sure that we would get the right result. He’d said that to us before the first game as well. That just helped us even more, we knew we could beat anyone on our day, pound for pound we were better than them, and we went up to the Riverside and got a great result,” he says. Collett and Richardson scored the goals to get a really impressive 2-0 lead to take into the second leg at Old Trafford ten days later.

“Having got the win we were buzzing waiting for the second leg, but the coaches kept reeling us in and letting us know that the tie was only really at half time,” says Lee. “That helped us to concentrate and not get complacent ahead of the game.” Such talk helped ground the players who were not only on the verge of joining much heralded winners of the past but had also benefitted from the experience of losing the previous year.

“The experience the year before really helped us, we knew the club had the faith to play us when we were a little young, so to keep faith in that first run and then give the chance to put things right from the previous year, it was a really good learning curve. It had been mentioned a few times before the game that the club hadn’t won the trophy since 1995, so there was a fair bit of pressure to live up to even though we’d put ourselves in a good position,” says Lee. “It really was the best feeling ever to win the trophy. There was a lot of talk before the game about what it meant but we never let that get to us in terms of making us nervous. It just prepared us in a great way for the second leg, we were representing Manchester United and we wanted to do ourselves and the club justice.”

The youngsters drew the second leg 1-1 at Old Trafford to comfortably claim the FA Youth Cup. “I don’t know if it was because we were in our normal age group in the second year and so we felt like we were expected to win it, but it definitely felt like a brilliant achievement when we got the win, and we were all so happy for each other,” Lee says.

It wasn’t just the players that he speaks highly of. “You know you’re always going to get first class coaches at a club like United but even so I can’t think of a single bad thing to say,” he states. “Guys like Tony Whelan, Paul McGuinness, they were absolutely fantastic. Neil Bailey was someone I’d known at Wigan and he really helped me out, they couldn’t do enough to help you.”

The club had really grasped that sense of responsibility in developing and educating the boys into good young men as much as good players. “Definitely, there was a real importance placed on education there. We’d have about two days a week where we could go to Carrington, but even there we’d be doing some classroom work because they were very conscious about preparing you for a life without football as well as giving you all the tools necessary to hopefully become a professional player,” says Lee.

Becoming a professional for the first team was the next challenge for Lawrence. “After the cup win, six or seven us were given squad numbers the following season which felt like such a massive accomplishment and an incentive as well,” he admits. “You start believing then that you’ve really got a chance of making it. I was getting games for the reserves and I kept thinking or hoping I’d get the chance.”

Though the first team were just about to enter a period of uncertainty, the reserves and young teams were really strong. “You could tell we had a great team because we were winning the league at both age levels, the 17s and the 19s, and the reserves were doing really well too,” says Lee. “The potential in the team was massive and when the likes of Gerard Pique and Giuseppe Rossi arrived it really added to it and you got the feeling that a number were going to break through.”

It was a logical assumption to make. Lee, an aspiring left back, could look at his path to the first team and feel he had a genuine chance of making it. With the pedigree of success coming through the ranks, the ability to deal with pressure, and a quick and athletic presence, it seemed only a matter of time until he got his chance. John O’Shea and Mikael Silvestre were the main contenders for the position in the first team but both regularly found themselves playing other positions too, and with no permanent fixture in that left defensive role, nobody could have blamed Lee for feeling he had a good opportunity, however misfortune was about to strike. “I went on loan to Shrewsbury Town which I felt was a good experience to prepare me for first team football but after I returned, I injured my medial ligament and that was a huge setback for me. I never recovered and that’s the reason I don’t play today,” he says.

Lee’s star was on the rise and while nobody could place a guarantee on what he would have gone on to achieve, it was inevitable that he would have at least featured in one of the cup games over the next couple of seasons with games against Exeter City and Burton Albion. The denial of such an opportunity is a bitter pill to swallow. “When you’ve taken everything in your stride and progressed so well, I’d been there for such a long time from a young age and worked so hard. I felt that I was really on the verge of making it, winning the Youth Cup and then getting a squad number. You feel like you’re on top of the world one minute and the next it feels like the world has actually ended,” admits Lee. “To be honest, at the time I didn’t think that much of it. I thought I could come back, but I’d return and play a couple of reserve games and then it would go again. I would be in rehabilitation for sixteen or eighteen weeks, try really hard to get back, literally play one or two games and it would all go again.”

The spell at Shrewsbury Town would turn out to be the only taste of senior football Lawrence would experience. “I did love it there, it was fantastic. We played in front of decent crowds in the Youth Cup but to play first team football in front of a proper crowd like that was an experience I’ll never forget and I’m so glad that I got that chance,” he says.

People often look at the 2003 FA Youth Cup winning team and wonder why more of them didn’t quite make the grade at United, but maybe injury has a lot to answer for.

There was another player from the Youth Cup team, Ben Collett, who was cruelly injured a week after the success against Middlesbrough, ironically against the same opponents. Gary Smith’s tackle broke Collett’s leg in two places and after failed attempts to come back from injury, Collett was released in 2006, and when his professional career in New Zealand didn’t turn out as planned, he was forced to retire. Subsequently, Collett brought legal action against Smith where both Gary Neville and Sir Alex Ferguson were called to give testimonials about how good Ben could have been. Lee agrees with the plaudits. “I’m sure Ben would have been a top player,” he says. “You could ask anyone, he was the hardest working lad at the club. He was always at Carrington looking for ways to improve, the lads would go home, but he would stay behind all of the time. If anyone deserved to make it in the first team it was Ben.”

Lawrence was playing in the game that saw disaster strike for Ben. “I was at left-back and he was in front of me at left wing,” he recalls. “It looked a bad tackle but I honestly didn’t realise how bad it was. Obviously, when he came back he was just never the same again. His confidence was gone, it’s the same as you see with anyone breaking their leg really, and it was such a shame because he really deserved to make it in the game. I’ve never known anyone who lived for the game as much as he did.”

Like Ben, and to be honest, like many others who suffer the same cruel fate, Lee was given the opportunity to recover from injury at the club. Unfortunately, after he was unable to do so, Sir Alex decided that his contract would not be renewed.

“I kind of knew that I’d be getting released, simply because I’d not played in a year,” Lee concedes. “The injury had stopped everything and I suppose it was frustrating because the next contract was ‘the biggie’, the one where we’d have been able to get nice cars and all those things. I was doing okay in training but I just couldn’t get a run of games so I wasn’t surprised that, after giving me the chance to come back, they decided not to renew my deal. I just have to put it down to one of those things. The manager was really straight with me. He said, ‘You’ve been here for eleven years and you’ve never once given me any trouble. I’m really sorry but we’ll have to let you go. We don’t think with your injury that you’ll make the first team now.’ I thought that was fair and honest and I couldn’t have any complaints really, I knew before I went to see him that I was being released.”

Considering the position of the first team and how successful the other sides at the club were, does Lawrence feel that maybe more should have broken through into the first team? “I don’t know, it’s a difficult one to answer,” he says. “There were plenty of good players there and so many of that 2003 team have gone on to successful league careers. United are such a big club that they can get anyone in the world. You’re not only competing with players who are the best in the region or in the country, you’re doing it with the best in the world and maybe that’s the reason why. It sounds a bit weird but maybe we suffered because so many of that 1992 team were still doing so well for the first team. So when I’m asked about whether our side didn’t do as well as was hoped for, I think it’s a bit harsh, because so many have had really great careers in their own right. It was just a case of bad timing but I feel they’ve done really well for themselves, spot on.”

Lee himself tried to remain in the game. “I had an agent at the time, which I wasn’t always comfortable with, but a lot of the lads had them so it was just one of those things you did,” he says. “I’d only been with him for a few weeks. He said Tottenham were interested but that fell through. I don’t know why, but I have a feeling that the agent was asking for more money than I actually wanted. My dad took over and informed some clubs I was looking for a team. I had a game down at Bristol City and I felt I did really well on a short trial down there, but maybe short is the right term. I’m only 5’6 and they said they were looking for a taller player.

“I had a trial at Chester, one at Lincoln, and then when I had a trial at Boston my knees went again. I got back and had another trial at Accrington, they were really keen, but I was only there a little while and my knee went again. To be fair to them, they kept me on while I tried to get fit, but it was another four months on the sidelines getting back. We had a game at Morecambe which was my comeback and we agreed that after the game I’d sign a contract with them. After fifteen minutes the knee just went again, it completely went.”

This time there were to be no comebacks as the advice Lee received was far more serious. “The doctors said if it went again I might well end up in a wheelchair,” Lee confesses. “And that was it. From the biggest club in the world for 11 years and then, with all due respect to the smaller clubs as they are all great with wonderful tradition, scrambling around trying to get a contract at these small clubs and then being rejected because I just couldn’t stay fit and get to the same level I was used to playing at was so disheartening, I have to admit, and I knew after Accrington I had to give it in. I don’t know if it’s any easier to take believing that the reason I didn’t make it at United, or in the game, wasn’t because I wasn’t good enough, but because I was injured. I suppose it’s nice to know that it wasn’t down to my ability, maybe I might not have made it at United but I was confident enough in my own ability that I would have been able to get a good career at a Championship or Division One side. I’ve done other things since leaving the game but a couple of years back I thought I’d try and play locally. So I got fit, and everything was going well, but after a couple of games the knee went again! It was incredible. But some things are just not meant to be.”

“Everything I’ve been through has given me a different perspective,” Lee says, “I was out of the game at 21, seven or eight years on I’ve now got a beautiful wife and two beautiful kids so the way I look at it, it was a blessing in disguise because I might not have met my wife.”

Lee does have one regret. “Straight after coming out of the game I got the opportunity to go and run an academy in America. I got my coaching badges and was offered the chance to get over there. In my early twenties that was a great opportunity, I even got my work visa through, but I decided to turn it down because of a relationship I was in at the time.”

“I’d much rather have had the opportunity and not made it than not have the opportunity at all, if that makes sense,” says Lee. “Being a young kid, growing up at the biggest club in the world, that’s an experience to tell the kids and grandkids, and that’s not a bad thing to be able to do.”

The above is an extract from the book ‘Fergie’s Fledglings’. Lee appears on our weekly Talking Devils podcast on YouTube every Friday at 7pm.

Wayne Barton

Wayne is a writer and producer. His numerous books on Manchester United include the family-authorised biography of Jimmy Murphy. He wrote and produced the BT Sport films 'Too Good To Go Down' in 2018, and 'True Genius', in 2021, both adapted from his books of the same name. In 2015 he was described by the Independent as the 'leading writer on Manchester United' and former club chairman Martin Edwards has described him as 'the pre-eminent writer on the club'.

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