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The United captain who managed Real Betis

by
Joe Ganley
Wednesday 08 March 2023 17:30

You might think that a man who captained Manchester United and managed Real Betis to their only La Liga title would be a football icon, honoured with a prominent statue somewhere.

However, Patrick O’Connell, who was born in Dublin on this day (8 March) in 1887, died penniless in 1959 and spent 57 years lying in an unmarked grave in London.

It's only in recent years that his remarkable story has come to greater prominence within the football world.

In 2018, a film about his life, entitled Don Patricio, premiered in Dublin. And ahead of Thursday night's UEFA Europa League tie at Old Trafford, a man who served both United and Real Betis in notable roles – and also helped save FC Barcelona from financial ruin, by the way – is at last getting some long-overdue recognition.

O'Connell (middle row, third from right) played 35 times for United during the 1914/15 season, scoring two goals.
“He really should be famous,” said Fergus Dowd, of the Patrick O’Connell Memorial Fund, when he spoke to our matchday programme, United Review, five years ago.
 
O’Connell signed for United from Hull in May 1914, for a then-huge fee of £1,000. The First World War would limit his Reds career to just 35 appearances, but he also excelled at international level, where he skippered a pre-independence Ireland side to the 1914 British Home Championship.
 
When his playing career ended in 1922, O’Connell was recommended for the job of Racing Santander manager. 
 
Thus began an incredible voyage through Spanish football, which would see Patrick take the reins at Real Oviedo before driving Real Betis to their only La Liga title in 1935.
He then took charge of Barcelona, leading the Catalan club on what has subsequently been labelled as a ‘tour of salvation’ – a series of exhibition matches in Mexico and New York – that took place while the Spanish Civil War raged, raising $12,000 at a time of great financial strife.
 
In 1942, he joined Betis’s enemies, Sevilla. “It’d be like Jock Stein going from Celtic to Rangers!” laughs Fergus. 
 
“Betis had this little cafe that the players and management team would go in, and Patrick was the only man allowed in while he was Sevilla manager! Because of what he achieved at Betis, there was respect.”

How well do you know Real Betis?

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United are set for a first-ever competitive meeting with Los Verdiblancos on Thursday.

O’Connell would depart Sevilla in 1945, but the team he built won La Liga the following season – the only title in Los Rojiblancos’ history. 
 
When the two Andalusian clubs found out years later that their ex-manager was drawing national assistance in England, they arranged a testimonial to raise money, which drew a full house of both Betis and Sevilla supporters. 
 
Seville remains the place where O’Connell is most revered. “There is a whole area dedicated to his team and his influence in the Sevilla museum, and a nice painting of him,” explains Dowd. There is also a bust and slate painting of him in the Betis museum.
 
At FC Barcelona, O'Connell is a member of the hall of fame in the club's popular museum.
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Sadly, in the United Kingdom, Patrick is less well known. But the memorial fund set up in 2014 managed to raise funds to restore his grave and install a memorial where he is buried, at St Mary's Catholic Cemetery in Kensal Green, London.
 
In 2016, a book about O'Connell's life was released, entitled The Man Who Saved FC Barcelona: The Remarkable Life of Patrick O'Connell, written by Sue O'Connell – the wife of Patrick's grandson.
 
When two of his former clubs meet at Old Trafford on Thursday, and the following week in Seville, spare a thought for this influential, if overlooked, figure in football history.

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