The Legend – Ryan Giggs

He’s about to lead his club in the Champions League final versus Chelsea. Let’s take a look at this legend—who after Manchester United won the league this year and he’d tied Bobby Charlton for the number of games played for Manchester, said he doesn’t care about those records; he just cares about winning championships. It was fitting that he calmly slotted home the second goal against Wigan, and hopefully he’ll fittingly get a goal in Moscow.

If there’s a winger that young players should emulate it’s Giggs, a player who’s notorious for cutting the ball back time and time again as he races down the sidelines. Just when you think he’s going to cross the ball he’ll cut it back one more time to free himself up.

"I said before the game that I am not bothered about records. This is what it is about, championships and trophies. I hope we can win another one in 10 days’ time."

Charlton’s 758th appearance came when United were an ageing, squabbling and uncertain institution. When he made his final lap of Old Trafford in 1973, they were a year from relegation. Giggs’ 758th game finished with a Premier League trophy and with United again surveying English football from the summit.

One of Giggs’ most famous goals is the maze run below:

At just 17 years old Giggs made is debut for Manchester United, a similar age to the young stars Messi and Bojan, but only time will tell if they too stay at the same club for their entire career and reach an appearances mark like Giggs. It’s so rare these days, players can jump to Italy, England or Spain, leaving the team that raised them so to speak in a split second. When you thought that their name and their club would and always be synonymous.

To the English fans there’s probably some who wish that he’d played for England’s national team rather than Wales. His fame would have reached even higher heights if he was able to play in the later stages of the World Cup, but his allegiance was more to Alex Ferguson and Manchester United. He rarely played in friendly matches, although he was injured many times, I think the main reason was to stay fresh for Manchester United.

Dunga said that Giggs would easily fit along side Kaka and Ronaldinho in the Brazilian side, after a Wales versus Brazil friendly match – one of Giggs’ rare appearence in a friendly match for Wales.

And even though Giggs’ time as a professional he’s not playing like it.