Talk:List of Manchester United F.C. players

featured contributions
There are two other lists of similar nature, List of Arsenal F.C. players and List of Liverpool F.C. players, which are both featured, so we should try to bring this list up to a similar standard. One main difference between the lists is that both the Arsenal and Liverpool lists have the same criteria, which is, only players with 100 or more first-class matches for the club, or have made significant contributions to the club, are included in the lists. I think we should also introduce the same criteria in this list. --Thaurisil 05:31, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

As of December 21, 2006
After researching, I have found the following players who have started in at least 100 games for MANU and are missing from our list:


 * Bob Bonthron
 * James Brown - debuted in 1935
 * Francis Burns - debuted in 1967
 * Walter Cartwright
 * Ronnie Cope
 * Alex Downie - debuted in 1902
 * Fred Erentz
 * Don Gibson - debuted in 1950
 * Billy Griffiths
 * Jack Griffiths
 * John Grimwood
 * Vince Hayes
 * Graeme Hogg - has had 109 total appearances
 * Dick Holden
 * 1) Tom Jones
 * 2) Frank Mann
 * 3) Billy McGlen
 * 4) Bill McKay
 * 5) George McLachlan
 * 6) Hugh McLenahan
 * 7) James McNaught
 * 8) Jack Mellor
 * 9) Jack Mew
 * 10) Harry Moger
 * 11) Charlie Moore - debuted in 1919
 * 12) Billy Morgan
 * 13) Teddy Partridge
 * Albert Quixall
 * 1) George Stacey
 * 2) Alfred Steward
 * 3) Harry Thomas
 * 4) George Vose
 * 5) Jack Warner - debuted in 1938
 * 6) Arthur Whalley
 * 7) Jack Wilson

--Crzycheetah 22:49, 16 December 2006 (UTC)
 * All done. All players added to list with a stub article.  Patken4 16:29, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

Omissions
Is here no place on this list for Jesper Blomqvist, Karel Poborsky, Jordi Cruyff? They may not have left to the cheers of testimonials, but I'd think their presence at the time was by many considered notable.. M URGH  disc.  16:24, 14 January 2007 (UTC)


 * For all of them, their appearance counts do not meet the criteria of 100 appearances. If their appearance counts was closer to 100, perhaps above 85 or 90, they could be considered, but none of them even reaches the 60 mark. It is just too low for them to have been able to make significant contributions for the club. Thaurisil 03:48, 21 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Juan Sebastian Veron is in sight of that 60 mark, and it feels strange to distinguish between him and Laurent Blanc.. Yes, the numbers are against all of these, but I'm not so sure about applying appearances without considering length of stay or other criteria to judge "significant contributions to the club's history".  - M URGH   disc.  05:17, 21 January 2007 (UTC)


 * I fail to see the justification for Blanc. 25 games is a long way off the 100 watermark, and I can't recall any hugely notable contribution. Oh, and I agree with Thaurisil regarding Cruyff etc. HornetMike 23:21, 21 January 2007 (UTC)


 * I agree that Blanc hasn't made sufficient contributions to be on the list, so I have removed him from the it. Anyone who feels he should be on it is welcome to add him to the list. Thaurisil 13:42, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

Substitute appearances
There are several players listed with substitute appearances before substitutes were permitted in 1965-66.


 * James McNaught
 * Harry Moger
 * Jack Mew
 * Frank Mann
 * Hugh McLenahan
 * Jack Mellor
 * David Byrne
 * Bill McKay
 * Billy McGlen

Can some-one more knowleadgable about M.U.'s history check and amend the list?

Incidentally, why is David Byrne on the list at all? If he only made 4 appearances, even allowing for the 3 goals he scored! Daemonic Kangaroo 05:45, 3 February 2007 (UTC) (Life-long Southampton supporter)


 * I have removed David Byrne as there is no article about him in Wikipedia - there are articles David Byrne (English footballer) and David Byrne (South African footballer) but both were born long after the time the David Byrne in this list actually played. Either it was a false addition or a person who is not well-known so I have removed them. No idea on the players with "substitute" appearances, alas, I will defer to any Man United experts here. Qwghlm 00:12, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

Michael Carrick
I notice Michael Carrick has been added to the list, despite only having made 50 total appearance? Personally, I don't think he's quite noteworthy enough to add to the list, especially since he's only made 50 appearances so far. Removal? PeeJay 11:28, 6 May 2007 (UTC)

Table formatting
Something's messed up in the table's formatting. When you sort by name, you'll see the issue appearing at the top of the table. - Dudesleeper · Talk 02:14, 18 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Aye, noticed that too! 67.183.222.220 (talk) 20:03, 10 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Because of the format of the table headers, it is not currently possible to make this table sortable. – PeeJay 21:03, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

Carlos Tévez
As things stand, Carlos Tévez has made 94 appearances for Manchester United. There is also a maximum of seven games left in the season for him to play in. Considering the likelihood that Tévez will not be a Manchester United player next season, and assuming that he will not play in all seven of United's remaining games, it is also likely that Tévez' United career will end with him having made a number of appearances just shy of the magical number of 100 required for inclusion in this article. However, there can be no denying that Tévez' 32 goals have had a profound effect on United's league and cup campaigns in his two seasons at Old Trafford; therefore, I wish to discuss whether or not he should be included in the list if he does indeed leave the club without having made the requisite number of appearances. – PeeJay 10:12, 30 April 2009 (UTC)


 * I would add him. If he plays in Rome, he'll be at 99 appearances.  Considering all the important goals he's scored, he would definitely meet the "significant contributions" clause.  Patken4 (talk) 14:32, 16 May 2009 (UTC)


 * This list says he's made 99 appearances, whereas the United site only says 98. Which is correct? I'm guessing United's might not have recorded Tévez's CL Final appearance or something... Ը२ձւե๓ձռ17 07:51, 26 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Probably. The stats site definitely says he's played 99 games. – PeeJay 09:01, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

Script to change flagicon|nationality to just nationality
Hi, can someone come up with a quick script to convert all the flagicon|nationality tags within the table (eg. 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 to 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿) ? When you remove the flagicon tag, the nation's flag is still visible, but you also get the name of the country spelt out. What this will enable is easy sorting of the table, so we can sort players by nationality.

I hate to say this, but the Liverpool FC players page table is, currently, better than Utd's: List of Liverpool F.C. players.

Cheers!

67.183.222.220 (talk) 20:01, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

"Significant contributions"?
After a discussion at Articles for deletion/List of Nottingham Forest F.C. players, I found myself thinking about our inclusion criteria for this list. Both Billy Whelan and Carlos Tévez are included on the basis that they made "significant contributions to the club's history", despite having made fewer than 100 appearances for Manchester United (albeit Whelan is on 98 and Tévez is on 99). So how do we define "significant contributions"? Is that even a valid inclusion criterion? If so, why do these two meet it and others don't? I'll postulate that Whelan is in because he was killed in the Munich disaster and would almost certainly have played the requisite number of games, and Tévez played in two Champions League finals and then left the club one appearance short of his ton, which would mean that if he ever played for us again, he would be in anyway. So are there any other players who could conceivably be included on similar grounds? – PeeJay 11:25, 21 February 2010 (UTC)

Club captain
I removed Nemanja Vidic from the list of Club Captains, because he is not club captain, but team captain. Gary Neville remains club captain. This is actually explained in the article used as a source for including Vidic: http://www.manutd.com/en/News-And-Features/Football-News/2010/Sep/Neville-replaced-as-skipper.aspx Hazlzz (talk) 02:21, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Wrong Neville retired. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 91.105.46.67 (talk) 23:19, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Aesthetics of the list
I want to make the list itself look better - it's good as it is, but I think it can be improved. I'll admit that my main inspiration is that Liverpool's list is much prettier, though ours is more informative and better referenced.

What I want to do is:

1) Move the explanations at the top of the table concerning appearances and career, as well as the explanations for the table headers, to endnotes. The table is intuitive enough, the explanations aren't necessary to read it, only to get the finer details out of it.

2) Move the list of captains into the list of players, by adding a column called "captaincy".

3) Adding pictures on the right side of the list.

These ideas are all pretty much stolen directly from Liverpool's list, but I think they'll really add to the aesthetics of this article. If there are no objections, I'll try to start the beautifying tomorrow. The point I'm least sure about is the second one - this would remove the notes from the captain list, which I would personally argue is a minor loss.

Hazlzz (talk) 02:43, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Semi-protection?
I was looking over the last 50 edits to the article (going back to mid-April) and it seems that the majority of IPs are not making helpful edits. The exception to this seems to be. Do the main editors of this page think a period of semi-protection would be useful? The IP edits aren't unmanageably frequent, but if PeeJay2K3 and HonorTheKing think semi-protection would be useful I'd be happy to apply it. Nev1 (talk) 15:31, 23 July 2011 (UTC) – HonorTheKing (talk) 16:34, 23 July 2011 (UTC)
 * To be honest, given that the first page in the edit history goes back three months, I don't think the volume of disruptive edits really warrants semi-protection. If you semi-protected this page, for how long would it be in effect? – PeeJay 16:23, 23 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Fair enough. I was thinking maybe a six-month period. Nev1 (talk) 16:25, 23 July 2011 (UTC)
 * I my self wouldn't mind if this page would be protected, I am on regular basis update the page after every match. But sometimes its pain the ass reverting edits from the IP users who keep adding players with less than 100 apps to this article.
 * Since HonorTheKing is the one who edits this article more than I do, I'm inclined to agree with him. After all, I certainly wouldn't object to any method of reducing vandalism. However, I do wonder if the volume of disruption is worth it, as I view protecting an article as a last resort. – PeeJay 17:25, 23 July 2011 (UTC)

Vidic - from Eastern Europe?
IMO, Vidic is incorrectly noted from Eastern Europe. Serbia is considered Southern Europe. If one goes into the Eastern Europe article the map clearly defines what is Eastern Europe and where Serbia falls into. Brudder Andrusha (talk) 20:27, 26 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Eastern Europe, in this case, equates to "anything to the east of Germany". – PeeJay 22:07, 26 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Then it is inappropriate since Serbia is Southeast of Germany. Brudder Andrusha (talk) 22:32, 26 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure you understood my meaning. Serbia, as a country, lies on a line of longitude that is further east that the lines of longitude that Germany lies on. Comprende? Anyway, I was being glib. Serbia can be described as Eastern Europe because, as the article you linked to states, it was part of the "Eastern Bloc". – PeeJay 23:58, 26 January 2012 (UTC)
 * IMO "Eastern Bloc" <> Eastern Europe. Also Vidic although born in Yugoslavia is a Serb and today it is neither Eastern Bloc (Communist) nor Eastern Europe. Brudder Andrusha (talk) 03:55, 27 January 2012 (UTC)


 * A citation verification is in order... With your explanation I'm awaiting for one. Brudder Andrusha (talk) 03:50, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

Robin van Persie
Why is he on the list with only 33 appearances? He is star and all, but seriously? (KOwool (talk) 08:48, 20 February 2013 (UTC))

– HonorTheKing (talk) 09:11, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * An IP user added him, I have removed him from the list.

Not updated
When will this page be updated again? It hasn't been done since 15 December, nor its sister pages. 86.27.16.3 (talk) 08:09, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

– HonorTheKing (talk) 11:49, 14 January 2014 (UTC)
 * I usually update all ManUtd related pages. I will update it ones I have the time. (Hopefully this weekend).

Apparently, it's a bold edit to say that none of Denis Law, Roy Keane or Gary Neville were captains for the Champions League Finals despite being club captain at the time.
Thoughts? RealDealBillMcNeal (talk) 20:29, 14 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Just because they weren't selected/available for those games doesn't mean they stopped being club captain. The roles of team captain and club captain are quite distinct, and this table deals with the players who were club captain, not just leading the team for a single game. Otherwise we'd be listing every player who ever captained the team, and that list would be immense (and impossible to source prior to about 1960). – PeeJay 20:59, 14 August 2014 (UTC)
 * "Just because they weren't selected/available for those games doesn't mean they stopped being club captain". Nobody said that. The note clearly identified that the three players weren't able to captain the three biggest games in the history of the club. Bit different than some randomer being captain in a league game. Didn't read the rest as you blatantly don't know what you're arguing. RealDealBillMcNeal (talk) 21:58, 14 August 2014 (UTC)
 * If you don't recognise the difference between captaining the club and captaining the team, you have no business making judgements on anything going on here. Yes, those games were big, but the fact that Law, Keane and Neville missed those matches is irrelevant to their status as club captain. – PeeJay 23:17, 14 August 2014 (UTC)
 * "Law, Keane and Neville missed those matches is irrelevant to their status as club captain". So why is it relevant that Keane was the most successful club captain if these matches are irrelevant?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?! Contradicting yourself yet again, and it is you who should not be made to make judgement on thse things due to your lack of knowledge regarding both football and geography. RealDealBillMcNeal (talk) 23:33, 14 August 2014 (UTC)
 * He's the most successful club captain because he was the club captain when the club won the most trophies. Do try to keep up. And I certainly don't need any geography lessons from you, thankyouverymuch. – PeeJay 00:14, 15 August 2014 (UTC)
 * He may be the most successful captain ever but he also didn't captain them in the 99 final. This is all pertinent information. Do try to keep up. Oh and you thought Ireland was part of the UK. You certainly do need geography lessons thanoyouverymuch. RealDealBillMcNeal (talk) 00:18, 15 August 2014 (UTC)
 * He may not have been on the field, but he was still club captain. Evidently you still don't understand the difference between being club captain and being team captain. Oh, and Ireland *was* part of the United Kingdom, hence the historical links. Are you being deliberately obtuse or is this how you are all the time? – PeeJay 00:21, 15 August 2014 (UTC)
 * If I didn't know the difference, wouldn't I have edited Schmeichel, Ferdinand and Giggs into the table as opposed to mentioning them in a note? Superb observation skills. India was also part of the British Empire, far more recently than Ireland was part of the UK, so if an Indian ever becomes manager he won't count as a foreign manager using your fantastic logical implementation. Eire is a foreign country - it is not "obtuse" for me to point this out. It's basic knowledge. RealDealBillMcNeal (talk) 00:53, 15 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Now you're just being facetious; India was part of the British Empire, not part of the United Kingdom. Think about your arguments before you make them because otherwise you just look stupid. – PeeJay 01:04, 15 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Key word in your entire sentence ramble being WAS. Example of the word "was" in a sentence for you: "Eire WAS in the UK but hasn't been for over 90 years!" That's how long Ireland has been foreign! It's funny how you completely evaded the Schmeichel, Ferdinand and Giggs topic, there. Smooth. RealDealBillMcNeal (talk) 01:58, 15 August 2014 (UTC)

Edit warring
I have just blocked 2 editors for edit warring on this page and another. Edit warring results in blocks, discussion results in progress. Thank you. Chillum 13:48, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

Fact issues
A brief look at the list shows appearantly several minor fact issues (unless the listed sources should be blamed). Examples: Nobby Stiles (matches), Nicky Butt (matches), Joe Cassidy (numbers of scored goals), Tom Manley (years active, corrected). I just got a bad feeling about the accuracy for the list. Grrahnbahr (talk) 20:26, 31 August 2014 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure why anything would have changed, but I'm almost certain that the info was correct when the table was originally constructed. Perhaps the source we used has started counting other competitions among players' totals, e.g. the Watney Cup or the Anglo-Italian Cup. Can't explain why Joe Cassidy was wrong though. That might just have been a spot of vandalism that went unnoticed for a while. – PeeJay 21:24, 31 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Hmm, strange. Maybe it is changed in the source? The source seems as reliable as one could expect in this field. I'll do another sweap for further errors. Grrahnbahr (talk) 23:22, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

More issues in the captain's section
I've corrected the fact issues I was able to find in the main list. But there could be more issues in the captein-section. According to the list, Patrick O'Connell was captain for the team from 1915 to 1917. According to the article List of Manchester United F.C. players (25–99 appearances) he was an active player for Manchester United from 1914 to 1915 (he is listed as a Defence player in the given list, rather using the pre-1960-designation usually used), and according the article about the player, he was a guest player for three different clubs from 1915 to 1919. According to stretfordend.co.uk and mufcinfo.com, Pat O'Connell did play (matches) for Manchester United in the 1914-15-season, and never later. The info in the article about the player could be correct though, since he could be on the record a Manchester United player, but not playting first team football for some reason.

According to mufcinfo.com/manupag/club_captains/club_captains.html, Patrick O'Connell was captain for the team from 1914 to 1915, which seems perfectly logic, as he according to other reliable sources, was a first team player in this period.

The are other mismatchs between the mufcinfo.com-list and this list. According to the mufcinfo.com-list, James McNaught was only captain for one season, and it is unknown who's captained the team from 1894 to 1896. According to the mufcinfo.com-list, Dick Duckworth was captaining the team in 1913. He's left out in this list.

The source for the list is some sheets from the Manchester United Museum. I think it is reasonable to concider using another source, the issues presented above. I have to admit I have no access to the Manchester United Museum-sheet. I haven't looked into wheather mufcinfo.com could be used as a source or not, but it seems more reliable than the source currently used. Grrahnbahr (talk) 15:15, 7 September 2014 (UTC)
 * MUFCinfo isn't a particularly reliable source, in my experience. The guy who writes it simply copies down info from various sources with no regard for fact-checking. I've had to correct him on a number of things. The info sheets from the Manchester United Museum are freely available from Old Trafford or as Word documents; I requested copies via email from the museum curator, Mark Wylie, at curator@manutd.co.uk. For Pat O'Connell, the reason he never played an official game for United after 1915 was because the First World War was going on. He continued to play wartime matches for various clubs, including United, whom he captained until 1917, when he played his last wartime game. George Anderson then took over for a year, then Jack Mew, and finally Lal Hilditch when official matches started again. As for Duckworth, he may have captained the team in a few matches, but that doesn't make him the club captain. – PeeJay 11:30, 9 September 2014 (UTC)

Captain's list
In an attempt to separate the captain's portraits from other players on the list the captain's images spilled into the reference section and the following discussion occur about the problem: --- Hi, thanks for your edit on the List of Manchester United F.C. players regarding the images as I didn't realise they extended into the ref section. However I moved those originally to separate them as captains. So as a result could we move all images into the upper section or bulk out the captain's section with some sort of stats/honours table in order to keep captains together. Seemed appropriate to ask you first so let me know if I should put this staigh on the talk page. Thankyou. Mn1548 (talk) 13:08, 28 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I understand where you're coming from! However, I think we should reserve it to players who either distinguished themselves as captains (Keane, Robson) or were only notable as United players by being captains (Jenkyns), and the current captain (so when the newest captain is announced, Valencia's picture is replaced by one of the new captain).

Let me know what you think about this. MAINEiac4434 (talk) 22:49, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I understand what you're saying regarding reserving the images for iconic captains, but that can become a bit subjective, eg Rooney, who was an iconic United captain but had most of his United career as a non-captain. And regarding and images for current captain, that would sound more appropriate if the captain's section was it's own page like List of England national football team captains where Kane is at the top and he is moved to the bottom when he is replaced. With club football though I can't see much consistency across other pages so it's hard to say what to do. That's why I suggested a honours/stats table to give us more room to work with regarding images. Thanks for your thoughts. Mn1548 (talk) 12:24, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

--- In summary solutions are:


 * Keep all the images in the first section regardless of if they're captains or not.
 * Add some sort of honours/stats table to gain more space for more portraits.

As there isn't much consistency to this across other clubs pages, there isn't an apparent strait forward answer. But I would like to do something about it to prevent a seemingly arbitrary split of images.

Though or other solutions welcome.

Thankyou. Mn1548 (talk) 15:32, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

Bolding Current Players
Should we put current players in bold to give a distinction between those who's numbers need updating and those who don't? It will also be easier to spot current players if you order the table by another stat. WDM10 (talk) 08:29, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

Current Captain
In a recent press conference, quotes from Erik Ten Hag reported by Fabrizio Romano said that Bruno Fernandes is co-captain with Harry Maguire. Has the club confirmed this or was Ten Hag referring to match day captain's only? Mn1548 (talk) 15:40, 8 March 2023 (UTC)


 * Can you provide a source please? You can't just say "so and so said this" without providing a link to that quote. – PeeJay 16:56, 9 March 2023 (UTC)
 * https://twitter.com/FabrizioRomano/status/1634017883066966020?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Etweet Mn1548 (talk) 09:38, 10 March 2023 (UTC)
 * I don’t think this implies Bruno is a co-captain. That should be for the club to announce officially. When Maguire plays, he wears the armband because he’s the club captain. – PeeJay 14:06, 10 March 2023 (UTC)