Researchers identify Luton v Manchester United as the match on when 'Last Christmas' was written

A reader asked which football match Andrew Ridgeley was watching when George Michael wrote Wham!'s Last Christmas. Contemporary accounts and scheduling records point to the only live Sunday game in February 1984: Luton 0-5 Manchester United on ITV, kicked off at 2.35pm on Sunday 12 February 1984.

George Michael later said he wrote the song in February 1984 in his childhood bedroom while Ridgeley and Michael's parents watched television downstairs. Ridgeley recalled: "We were killing time on a Sunday... The Big Match was on, which was the only live football on TV in those days.

Neither of us were really watching it. I was more interested in football than he was and his attention was clearly elsewhere." He described Michael running upstairs to his four-track recorder and coming down soon after to play the new melody. The identified match featured a goalless opening until the 36th minute, then Bryan Robson and Norman Whiteside scored before half-time.

United added three more goals in the last 12 minutes, Robson, Frank Stapleton and Whiteside completing a 5-0 victory. The piece also notes Last Christmas did not reach UK number one until 2023, having been held off the top spot in 1984 by Band Aid's Do They Know It's Christmas. Other short items in the Knowledge column: of 70 European Cup/Champions League winners since 1955-56, 30 were top of their domestic league at Christmas.

Key Topics

Crypto, Sports, Wham, George Michael, Manchester United, Luton, Christmas Songs