A darker side to the Trautmann legend
Bert Trautmann's place in Manchester City folklore was secured on May 8th, 1956, when an x-ray revealed that he had played the final 17 minutes of City's 3-1 victory over Birmingham in the FA Cup final at Wembley three days earlier with a broken bone in his neck. The City goalkeeper had suffered the injury diving at the feet of the Birmingham inside left, Peter Murphy, yet made several saves in the minutes that followed. For the former German paratrooper, who had earned five military medals fighting for the enemy in World War Two, it was the moment that completed a journey to acceptance that had seemed impossible when 20,000 attended a demonstration opposing City's decision to sign him in 1949. His life story was told by Alan Rowlands in a biography first published in 1990 and updated in 2005. Rowlands drew attention to Trautmann's involvement with the Hitler Youth movement and his evident commitment to Germany's cause but somehow managed not to diminish his s