Michael Twiss was Manchester United reserve team player of the year in 1998 and on the brink of a first team breakthrough. He's since gone on to forge a successful second career.
Comments
Sport
Michael Twiss of Port Vale during the Nationwide League Division One match against Oldham Athletic at Boundary Park
Michael Twiss was highly-rated coming through the ranks at Manchester United in the 1990s
It was the crowning moment in a generation. Manchester United's unforgettable Champions League triumph in 1999 secured a treble and capped a sensational season full of drama and narrative. But for one United player it was a case of what might had been.
"There isn't a regret but it might have been different had I stayed," muses Michael Twiss as we chat over coffee. The former United player was highly rated coming through the academy at Carrington a couple of years after the famed Class of 92.
Twiss was United's reserve team player of the year in 1998 and had already made his first team debut, as a sub in an FA Cup defeat to Barnsley. Three years later he was playing for Leigh RMI.
But in the summer of 1998, forward Twiss was in demand. He was coming off the back of a stellar season with United's reserves and had first team ambitions. A former United captain then made a call that set the wheels of fete in motion. Twiss takes up the tale.
"Steve Bruce was at Sheffield United and was looking for someone to go across," he recalls. "Eric Harrison put my name forward and I went and I shouldn't have gone.
"Even though loans are sometimes quite good and can work out, I was probably at a point where I was breaking in at United. First and foremost I missed the treble season!
"I was unlucky that I went to Sheffield United, did pre-season, played in the League Cup in the second game of the season, which was my first start, and then one of the younger lads injured me in training and my ankle went up like a balloon and I was out for eight weeks.
"I was trying to forge my way back into an established team which was difficult. I perhaps could have progressed at United if I had stayed there."
Twiss had already been involved in European nights with United prior to his loan move across the Pennines. In the late 90s Premier League allowed five subs and League Cup three, while seven were permitted in the Champions League. Twiss was in the matchday squad against FC Kosice in 1997-98 as well as in two top flight games. He may well have been involved again in that treble season, perhaps even in the matchday squad for the final in Barcelona.
"I had played a couple of games for United already and with doing that," he added. "I should have taken advantage of being in and around it but I was out of sight out of mind at Sheffield United. It wasn't like now when there is loads of stats and loan managers. I am sure there was dialogue and stuff but you just kind of disappeared for a year.
"I came back to United and they played Newcastle in the FA Cup final so we went to watch that and watched the Champions League final in the Nou Camp. But it was when you saw pictures of people you played with in pictures having won the Champions League then you do wonder what if I had that opportunity.
"I was guided by the people who were mentoring me at United, I was going with what they were looking at progressing wise. I was coming into the last year of my contract but they gave me a new deal so I knew I was coming back to United which was a good thing.
"But I could have gone on loan and done brilliantly, I just started on the wrong foot. There was only three subs so it was hard to get the opportunities."
Twiss, who spent the his debut in an FA Cup defeat to Barnsley desperately hoping United found an equaliser to force extra time so he could get another 30 minutes on the pitch, returned in the summer of 1999 but he was now joining a football powerhouse. He'd been away on loan only 12 months but the United juggernaut had accelerated. He still had opportunities, he featured in the League Cup early in the campaign against Aston Villa. But a first team breakthrough seemed further away than it had a year earlier.
He had the talent, you don't come that far at United without it, but the luck and the chance never quite came at Old Trafford. Spells at Port Vale and then Conference clubs Leigh RMI, Chester City and Morecambe followed. They yielded a promotion apiece into the Football League with the latter two and Twiss carved out a more than respectable career that ended at Altrincham in 2012.
"Through my career, I am not saying I was unlucky and you need a bit of luck in football. I was always touted as going to a better club than I was at but it never came to fruition," he said. "You would always hear people were looking at me, the ability I had meant I could easily have played at a higher level but circumstances and stuff meant it never quite happened.
Michael Twiss
Michael Twiss
"With going from team to team, was I going to drop into non league, I went to Chesterfield and they couldn't sign me and I went down to non league clubs who wanted me to trial and got a contract there and built my career back up.
"I went to Chester and Morecambe and started to go back up again in League Two but the move higher never came."
Instead Twiss's move after football took away from boots and balls and to hard hats. He now works for Kier Group, a provider of infrastructure services, construction and property developments.
His journey into his second career began as his first was ending at Altrincham. Having looked at accountancy and primary school teaching, he settled on property and construction. He studied for a Higher National Diploma at Salford University and set about seeking work experience, at Coronation Street Studios among other places.
At 34 he was pitched into an interview day at Laing O'Rourke with a room of college graduates, got the job and forged a new path which has led to his role as Project Manager at Kier.
"I have started again and learnt something new," the 47-year-old said. "I like the site management side, you could be out on site and mixing with the banter and also coming into the office. I didn't want to be sat at my desk all day."
So do his co-workers and colleagues realise he is a former Premier League footballer?
"I have never been one to say 'this is what I did," Twiss replies. "But rumours went round and then you found you had a good rapport with people on site because 85 per cent of them loved football! And you can use that to build relationships."
Twiss has built himself a successful second career, so much so that he rarely reflects on his playing days instead focusing on his work and family life. Although there are the odd exceptions.
Article continues below
"I did pause the David Beckham Netflix documentary," he said. "I was sat there next to Andy Cole and Paul Scholes, I paused it and I was there in the shot and that is the only time really where I took a picture of it and sent it round to friends, otherwise it's just people asking me."