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21st Jan 2017

Retro footage shows Ryan Giggs was tearing it up even before he was called Ryan Giggs

You can see why Man Utd snapped him up.

Tom Victor

Ryan Wilson, remember the name. Actually, don’t, because he’ll start calling himself Giggs not long after this footage was filmed.

Back in the 1980s, before he was close to making his debut for Manchester United, future club legend Ryan Giggs was still using his father’s surname of Wilson.

And footage has recently been doing the rounds again of the teenaged winger absolutely running the show in his schoolboy days, helping Salford Boys get the better of Blackburn.

The video below, from the 1988 Granada Schools Cup, shows a youngster who was clearly already a huge talent.

Manchester United had already convinced him to jump ship from neighbours City at this stage, and you can see why.

The jinking runs, the blistering pace, the wand of a left foot. These would all prove themselves to be very familiar within a matter of years.

Sometimes a young talent can pass the top teams by, but this was never likely to be the case with a talent as prodigious as Giggs.

Two-and-a-half decades and more than 1,000 games for club and country later, he retired a legend. But this is where it all began for the Welshman.

Catch up with this week’s episode of 888sport Football Friday Live