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George Best: Soccer's ultimate playboy?

By Chris Murphy, CNN
Updated 1804 GMT (0204 HKT) November 25, 2015
Best was already embracing the front page press attention that was coming his way, opening nightclubs, restaurants and even a fashion boutique. His high profile also meant he was a hit with the opposite sex. His penchant for alcohol was also evident by this point.
11 photos: George Best: Soccer's ultimate playboy?
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But controversy was never far away. He was frequently in trouble with his club and on one occasion was suspended by United for two weeks after spending the weekend with an actress instead of playing in a match against Chelsea.
11 photos: George Best: Soccer's ultimate playboy?
Show Caption
7 of 11
Best quit United at the tender age of 27 but continued to play for a number of clubs around the world, including three in the United States. Here he hands Pele an award at event to celebrate the Brazilian legend. Pele called Best "the greatest player in the world."
11 photos: George Best: Soccer's ultimate playboy?
Show Caption
8 of 11
Best finally hung up his boots in 1984 and had a troubled life post-football. He was jailed for drunk driving and assaulting a police officer the same year, with alcohol still a problem.
11 photos: George Best: Soccer's ultimate playboy?
Show Caption
9 of 11
Best had a controversial liver transplant in 2002, carried out by Britain's taxpayer-funded National Health Service, but died in 2005 after he started drinking again. United's fans flocked to the club's Old Trafford ground to pay their respects.
11 photos: George Best: Soccer's ultimate playboy?
Show Caption
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Best's legacy lives on and a film of his life is planned to start shooting in spring 2016. Of his many laconic and iconic quotes, perhaps this is his most famous: "I spent a lot of money on booze, birds and fast cars. The rest I just squandered."
11 photos: George Best: Soccer's ultimate playboy?
Show Caption
11 of 11
George Best is widely regarded as one of the greatest footballers of all time. Away from the pitch, the Northern Irishman was also one of the sport's first "playboys."
11 photos: George Best: Soccer's ultimate playboy?
Show Caption
1 of 11
"Boss, I think I've found you a genius." So said the scout that discovered Best and recommended him to then Manchester United manager Matt Busby. The shy, and slight, lad from Belfast, Northern Ireland signed for the English giants in 1961.
11 photos: George Best: Soccer's ultimate playboy?
Show Caption
2 of 11
After winning the league title in 1965 with United, Best's breakthrough performance came in a European tie with Benfica, when he scored two goals in an unplayable showing. The press dubbed him "the fifth Beatle" when he donned a sombrero upon his return to Manchester.
11 photos: George Best: Soccer's ultimate playboy?
Show Caption
3 of 11
Best's reputation was growing and he became a key part of the side that regained the English first division title in 1967.
11 photos: George Best: Soccer's ultimate playboy?
Show Caption
4 of 11
The pinnacle of Best's career came with United's first European Cup win in 1968. He scored a spectacular individual goal in extra-time with the tie against Benfica poised at 1-1. United went on to win 4-1. He was crowned European Footballer of the Year.
11 photos: George Best: Soccer's ultimate playboy?
Show Caption
5 of 11
Best was already embracing the front page press attention that was coming his way, opening nightclubs, restaurants and even a fashion boutique. His high profile also meant he was a hit with the opposite sex. His penchant for alcohol was also evident by this point.
11 photos: George Best: Soccer's ultimate playboy?
Show Caption
6 of 11
But controversy was never far away. He was frequently in trouble with his club and on one occasion was suspended by United for two weeks after spending the weekend with an actress instead of playing in a match against Chelsea.
11 photos: George Best: Soccer's ultimate playboy?
Show Caption
7 of 11
Best quit United at the tender age of 27 but continued to play for a number of clubs around the world, including three in the United States. Here he hands Pele an award at event to celebrate the Brazilian legend. Pele called Best "the greatest player in the world."
11 photos: George Best: Soccer's ultimate playboy?
Show Caption
8 of 11
Best finally hung up his boots in 1984 and had a troubled life post-football. He was jailed for drunk driving and assaulting a police officer the same year, with alcohol still a problem.
11 photos: George Best: Soccer's ultimate playboy?
Show Caption
9 of 11
Best had a controversial liver transplant in 2002, carried out by Britain's taxpayer-funded National Health Service, but died in 2005 after he started drinking again. United's fans flocked to the club's Old Trafford ground to pay their respects.
11 photos: George Best: Soccer's ultimate playboy?
Show Caption
10 of 11
Best's legacy lives on and a film of his life is planned to start shooting in spring 2016. Of his many laconic and iconic quotes, perhaps this is his most famous: "I spent a lot of money on booze, birds and fast cars. The rest I just squandered."
11 photos: George Best: Soccer's ultimate playboy?
Show Caption
11 of 11
George Best is widely regarded as one of the greatest footballers of all time. Away from the pitch, the Northern Irishman was also one of the sport's first "playboys."
11 photos: George Best: Soccer's ultimate playboy?
Show Caption
1 of 11
"Boss, I think I've found you a genius." So said the scout that discovered Best and recommended him to then Manchester United manager Matt Busby. The shy, and slight, lad from Belfast, Northern Ireland signed for the English giants in 1961.
11 photos: George Best: Soccer's ultimate playboy?
Show Caption
2 of 11
After winning the league title in 1965 with United, Best's breakthrough performance came in a European tie with Benfica, when he scored two goals in an unplayable showing. The press dubbed him "the fifth Beatle" when he donned a sombrero upon his return to Manchester.
11 photos: George Best: Soccer's ultimate playboy?
Show Caption
3 of 11
Best's reputation was growing and he became a key part of the side that regained the English first division title in 1967.
11 photos: George Best: Soccer's ultimate playboy?
Show Caption
4 of 11
The pinnacle of Best's career came with United's first European Cup win in 1968. He scored a spectacular individual goal in extra-time with the tie against Benfica poised at 1-1. United went on to win 4-1. He was crowned European Footballer of the Year.
11 photos: George Best: Soccer's ultimate playboy?
Show Caption
5 of 11
Best was already embracing the front page press attention that was coming his way, opening nightclubs, restaurants and even a fashion boutique. His high profile also meant he was a hit with the opposite sex. His penchant for alcohol was also evident by this point.
11 photos: George Best: Soccer's ultimate playboy?
Show Caption
6 of 11

Story highlights

  • One of soccer's ultimate mavericks George Best died 10 years ago
  • Ex-Man Utd star Best won two English league titles and one European Cup
  • He was known for his womanizing and a long battle with alcoholism
(
"I spent a lot of money on booze, birds and fast cars. The rest I just squandered." George Best.
He was soccer's first celebrity and the game's ultimate playboy -- impudent, outrageously talented but fatally flawed.
George Best made his name at Manchester United, winning two league titles and one European Cup triumph in 1968, the same year he was voted the continent's best player.
But the pop star lifestyle that saw the Northern Irishman christened "the fifth Beatle" came at a cost and he lost a lifelong battle with alcohol a decade ago.
"He was a free spirit on and off the pitch and the first of football's glamor pusses," Jimmy Armfield, who played against Best numerous times for his side Blackpool, told CNN Sport on the 10th anniversary of his death.
    "The aura around him added to his game -- he was playing in the swinging sixties and his game lent itself to the media. I think he reveled in that side of it."
    Armfield, who played 43 times for England between 1953 and 1966, agrees the playboy side of Best's character only adds to his legend.
    "It certainly is part of it," he added. "You can't change a man and that is what he was but it didn't take away from his terrific ability. That's what I remember him for."

    Living the high life

    Best also expressed his hope that tales of his largesse wouldn't overshadow his gifts as a footballer.
    But with an off-field existence as exuberant and colorful as his, it was bound to infiltrate his playing legacy.
    One of his most infamous lines, delivered in his unique, laconic style went as follows: "In 1969 I gave up women and alcohol -- it was the worst 20 minutes of my life."
    Later, a waiter delivering champagne to Best's hotel room was confronted with a bed that supported thousands of pounds in casino winnings, and the current Miss World.
    He asked: "Mr Best, where did it all go wrong?"

    "I've found a genius"

    "Genius" was the word that immediately lodged in the mind of former United scout Bob Bishop when he first saw Best play as a slight teenager in Belfast.
    He contacted the legendary Matt Busby, then manager of United, and told him: "Boss, I think I've found you a genius.'"
    Bishop was right and Best would go on to be dubbed by Pele as the "greatest player in the world."
    After breaking into United's side as a 17-year-old, he helped the club to the league title in the 1964-65 season -- its first since the Munich disaster of 1958 that saw eight players and three staff killed in a plane crash.
    A year later Best's fame skyrocketed with a tour de force showing in Lisbon against Benfica, his two goals in the away leg catapulting him from the back pages of the newspapers to the front.
    A picture of him wearing a sombrero upon his return to Manchester saw him dubbed "El Beatle," in reference to the hit band fronted by John Lennon and Paul McCartney.
    The apex of Best's career came in 1968, when his goal in extra time at Wembley helped United win its first European Cup, with Benfica again the vanquished opponent.
    But controversy was never far away. Suspensions and fines for hitting bars and nightclubs instead of training and matches were a regular pattern.
    In 1971 he swerved United's game with Chelsea in west London to spend the weekend with rising actress Sinead Cusack in north London instead.
    He would open a nightclub, several restaurants and even a fashion boutique as his love of the limelight mushroomed.
    Best unexpectedly quit football at the age of 27 and played his last game for United in 1974, but would go on to represent a number of clubs, including three in the United States.

    Coming soon: Best the film

    Best's rise from a Belfast estate will be documented in an upcoming film about his life produced by Stephen Evans, whose credits include "The Madness of King George."
    A screenplay is written, over 100 hours of archive footage has been collated, and an actor lined up to play Best. A crowd-funding campaign is under way and Evans hopes to start shooting in spring 2016.
    But he rejects the "ultimate playboy" tag.
    "It's more complicated than that," Evans told CNN. "He began playing at Manchester United when the paparazzi started, when the Beatles started and it all happened from there.
    "This is a shy guy from Belfast who has never been out of Belfast. The whole thing starts to move with him -- at 18 you've got a couple of hundred outside his house screaming and shouting.
    "I have massive empathy with him, his journey was quite bizarre and he was the first superstar on the planet football wise."
    Pele on life, art, and soccer
    Pele on life, art, and soccer03:28
    Evans thinks the project will resonate with the public just as much as Best did during his turbulent career.
    "Number one, he delivered on the pitch," Evans added. "Also, he was handsome and charismatic, which is quite a big bonus in life.
    "The joy for me is trying to understand him. He was very shy in his childhood and not regarded as attractive but after getting a bit of luck he gets to Manchester United.
    "Yes he slept with a few Miss Worlds -- he was incredibly handsome, monumentally famous and successful and girls threw themselves at him. That's what happens.
    "It didn't happen to me sadly but you can't win them all!"
    Best's battle with the bottle continued after he hung up his boots for good in 1984.
    He underwent a controversial liver transplant in 2002, carried out by Britain's taxpayer-funded National Health Service.
    A year later more tales of his drinking emerged and prior to his death on 25 November 2005, he was pictured in a national newspaper with the warning: "Don't die like me."
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