Duncan Edwards

Duncan Edwards

The statue of Edwards in the centre of his home town of Dudley
Personal information
Full name	Duncan Edwards
Date of birth	(1936-10-01)1 October 1936
Place of birth	Woodside, Dudley, England
Date of death	21 February 1958(1958-02-21) (aged 21)
Place of death	Munich, West Germany
Height	5 ft 11 in (1.80 m)
Playing position	Left half
Youth career
1952–1953	Manchester United
Senior career*
Years	Team	Apps	(Gls)
1953–1958	Manchester United	151	(20)
National team
1949–1952	England Schoolboys	9	(0)
1954–1957	England U23	6	(5)
1953–1954	England B	4	(0)
1955–1957	England	18	(5)
* Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only.

Duncan Edwards (1 October 1936 – 21 February 1958) was an English footballer who played for Manchester United and the England national team. He was one of the Busby Babes, the young United team formed under manager Matt Busby in the mid-1950s, and one of eight players who died as a result of the Munich air disaster.

Born in Woodside, Dudley, Worcestershire, Edwards signed for Manchester United as a teenager and went on to become the youngest player to play in the Football League First Division and the then youngest England player since the Second World War. In a professional career of less than five years he helped United to win two Football League championships and reach the semi-finals of the European Cup.

Edwards was born on 1 October 1936 at 23 Malvern Crescent in the Woodside district of Dudley, which at the time was part of the county of Worcestershire. He was the first child of Gladstone and Sarah Anne Edwards and their only child to survive to adulthood, his younger sister Carol Anne dying in 1947 at the age of 14 weeks. His cousin, three years his elder, was Dennis Stevens, who also went on to become a professional footballer.

The Edwards family later moved to 31 Elm Road on the Priory Estate, also in Dudley. Edwards attended Priory Primary School from 1941 to 1948, and Wolverhampton Street Secondary School from 1948 to 1952. He played football for his school as well as for Dudley Schools, Worcestershire and Birmingham and District teams, and also represented his school at morris dancing. He was selected to compete in the National Morris and Sword Dancing Festival, but was also offered a trial for the English Schools Football Association's under-14 team, which fell on the same day, and opted to attend the latter.