Meet............. the Kit Men from OT
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Next up in our series of Carrington interviews are Alec Wylie and Ian Buckingham who help ensure the Reds are properly suited and booted…
So tell us about life in the kit room at Carrington?
AW: It’s certainly never dull and every day is different. Ian and I help [kit manager] Albert [Morgan] and our other kit man John Campbell on a daily basis with the players’ training kit and boots. I’m with Albert for first team home games, European aways and tours, with the rest of my time spent with the Reserves.
IB: I look after the club’s under 11-16 teams and the Academy side. I also cover Reserve games when Alec’s away with the first team and help him and Albert pack the kit for Champions League trips and drive them to the airport.
AW: One of our main jobs is to help Albert order the new kit each season, something we actually do a year in advance. We also order new kit whenever it’s needed.
What do you take in your kit bags to Reserve games?
IB: What don’t we take?! As well as the actual match kit, there’s the warm-up strip, two bags of balls, a numbers board [for substitutions], medical bag, tactics board, refreshments, iPod and speakers… everything you can think of. And not only do we organise the kit, we put our waiter hats on for the long journeys back from away games and serve the lads dinner on the way home!
Do you ever worry you’ve forgotten something?
AW: I’ve woken up in the middle of night many times thinking exactly that! During a Reserve trip to Italy I left all the shin pads at the hotel. We were already on our way to the game, but thankfully the hotel manager was due to come too and he brought them in his car!
IB: I’ve been on Reserve trips when the kit has endedup on a different flight or it’s just not turned up at baggage reclaim and I’ve had to go back to the cargo centre the next day! But we always manage to sort things.
There’s clearly great camaraderie amongst everyone at Carrington – what are your funniest memories so far?
IB: Brian McClair once asked me if I’d give his hair a quick trim but I couldn’t get the trimmer to work properly, so Brian tried himself. He shouted and asked if I’d messed with the guards on his trimmer. I said no... then he turned his head, pointed and said ‘Look!’ He’d tried trimming one of his sideburns, but had shaved it off and had a huge bald patch!
AW: The funniest for me is scoring twice for the Reserves. I’d travelled with the team to a pre-season friendly at Prestatyn Town in North Wales [in July 1996] and we’d literally just taken 11 players. The manager at the time, Jim Ryan, told me to stick a kit on just in case and with about 20 minutes to go our centre-half Ross Millard got injured which meant I was coming on! Jim shuffled things around and stuck me up front and I scored with virtually my first touch. A few years later [August 2002] I came on during a friendly against Selkirk in Scotland, as did Neil Hough [assistant head physio] and he set me up to score again.
Finally, what’s this we hear about you working for the opposition at OT…
AW: We looked after the kit for the European XI United played in a special UEFA charity [in March 2007]. It was a great to work with the likes of Gattuso, Pirlo, Maldini and Henrik Larsson.
IB: Assistant manager Gianluca Vialli really made us feel part of the team, but it was strange being sat in the away dug-out.
AW: There was some great banter - the lads were calling us traitors and we were shouting offside whenever United went forward!