Amid all the joylessness that can come with being a modern football fan, concerned by takeovers, the cost of attending matches and the inevitability that your club is not as successful as you desire, there is one thing that will always bring cheer: a local academy graduate making an impression in the first team.
The latest such Manchester United prodigy is the Stockport-born 18-year-old Kobbie Mainoo, who at Newcastle on Saturday night will be aiming to make his second Premier League start. Jesse Lingard, Marcus Rashford and Mason Greenwood have made an impression over the past decade, helping maintain the club’s record of a youth-team graduate in every first-team squad since 1937, but it is rare that a local player progresses through the system there, with the majority coming from further afield. Many have enjoyed fleeting appearances but it is difficult to become a regular at the elite level at which United are trying to operate.
