With almost all the club's playing staff away in the Forces, it was a difficult task trying to keep the club going.

The boardroom at Elland Road, the tea rooms and dressing rooms were requisitioned for military administration purposes, though for a couple of hours on a Saturday afternoon the ground - by kind permission of the War office - it was allowed to revert to its original purpose. Guest players and local youngsters kept some football going.

When the hostilities ceased and football was up and running again in the 1946-47 season, many of the players who had served the club in the late 1930s were back but age had caught up with some and it soon became obvious that, sadly, their best days were over.

In that first season after the war United finished bottom of the First Division, having won only six games and earned just 18 points. Away from home they picked up just one point. Billy Hampson resigned as manager and former player and England international Willis Edwards took over in April 1947.

Edwards had been one of the country's best half-backs during his career with United, possessing excellent ball control and passing ability. He was also a good header of the ball.

But he was unable to make much of an impact as manager and United fought a season-long battle against relegation from Division Two and just avoided it by finishing in 18th place.

One of football's best-known names, Major Frank Buckley, took over as manager in May 1948, Edwards taking on a role as assistant trainer. Buckley, a tough, no-nonsense central defender in his playing days, was in his mid-sixties. But he was a man with strong beliefs and some innovative ideas on fitness.

When manager at Wolves he had introduced a controversial method of treating some players with monkey gland extract which was supposed to have a beneficial effect on their speed of thought. He used the method on some of the United players but whether it worked was never proved.

He also used dancing as a way of improving balance and had a machine that sprayed footballs out at varying heights to improve the ball control ability of players. Innovative ideas? Certainly for the 1940s. But did they work?

The monkey gland extract 'treatment' never caught on in football and on the field of play United continued to struggle and finished in 15th place while having suffered a shock home FA Cup tie defeat to Newport County. Buckley came under pressure but the following season - 1949-50 - he answered his critics.

United finished in a creditable 5th place in Division Two and reached the quarter-finals of the FA Cup where they narrowly lost out to Arsenal at Highbury.

More significantly, however, Buckley had, that season, 'discovered' a 17-year-old star in the making. He had given the youngster three games at the end of the previous season and he played in every game in the 1949-50 campaign. His name? John Charles.

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