Ryan Giggs was given £1 for every Man Utd goal by the steward who spotted and pinched him from rivals City
THE steward who nabbed Ryan Giggs from Manchester City and took him to United paid the Welsh legend £1 for every goal he scored – even until the end of his playing career.
Old Trafford icon Giggs has revealed that Harold Wood would pay him a pound every time the ball hit the back of the net as an incentive to play well.
Wood poached Giggs when he was just 13-years-old from under the nose of rivals City.
Sir Alex Ferguson signed the winger up for United on his 14th birthday in 1987, and the rest is history.
Giggs won 13 Premier League titles, two Champions Leagues and four FA Cups during a 24-year stint in United’s first team.
He scored 168 goals in 963 games before turning his hand to management in 2014.
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And Giggs has lifted the lid on his motivation for hitting the target, revealing that old pal Wood gave him £1 for every goal scored.
Giggs told Man Utd’s official podcast: “I was always a United fan, I played for City because my Sunday league team manager was a City scout.
“It was a natural progression. Salford boys played at Lower Broughton Road, right next to the Cliff training ground.
“The manager got to hear about me off a steward who used to come and watch me play, someone called Harold Wood who sadly died two weeks ago.
“He was a great bloke and used to come and watch us and would be knocking on the manager’s door.
“He was a car park attendant at the Cliff so he would be there when all the first team players were coming in and he’d sort all the car parking out and he was apparently knocking on the manager’s door saying, ‘listen, there’s a lad playing next door, he’s at City, he’s a United fan – you need to go and see him.’
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“He started off (working at the club) before I was there, he was at Old Trafford and at the Cliff and then when I was in the first team he was still there and he’d give me £1 every time I scored.
“He started it when I was younger and then he carried it on and by the time I was like 19, 20 I was saying, ‘Harold, come on give it a rest’ but he said, ‘no here’s your £1’. He was a great character.
“[In my late 30s] he would still be giving me it.”
