'George Best wasn't a big drinker at Man Utd and was a great athlete' says Lou Macari

George Best "was not a big drinker" at Manchester United but was always a ladies man says former teammate Lou Macari.

The United legend who was part of the 'Holy Trinity' along with Bobby Charlton and Denis Law reached his peak by helping the Reds to win the European Cup in 1968 against Benfica.

He scored a memorable goal in that final with a slaloming run where he rounded the keeper and slotted the ball into an empty net. In that same year he was named European Player of the Year.

But his life is remembered for tragedy as well as genius due to alcoholism and leading to his early death aged 59 in 2005.

And Macari, whose career at Old Trafford overlapped with Best in the early 1970s, says that he wasn't a big drinker when he played for United. He believes that Best turned to alcohol when his life spiralled out of control after leaving United.

"He was a great athlete, great trainer, at the time not a drinker of any significance at all, at the time," said Macari.

"George's problems followed on when he went from Old Trafford to nowhere, to America, to non-league football, with Barry Fry and one or two others I can remember.

"And it was maybe just the shock of all that, he turned to drink, but before that his worst fault obviously, if it is a fault, women.

"He could stand in a nightclub and talk to women for four or five hours - lager shandy or half a lager would be probably maximum he would drink. But because he eventually turned to being an alcoholic people associate that alcoholism with his football time as well.

"No, the George Best we've all seen on telly of taking five or six players on, like he did one night or a day, I don't know if it was Northampton or somewhere. He beat them all and then put it in the back of the net - that was the athlete that was there, that was the body, that was the athlete that was capable of doing that.

"And that was the great player. He did it in the Champions League final or European Cup final was at the time, scored the goal, he wriggled in and out, put it in the back of the net."