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Peter Davenport joined Manchester United in March 1986 from Nottingham
Forest for a fee of £570, 000. The team had begun the 1985/86 season in
record form but injuries, and the imminent departure of Mark Hughes to
Barcelona, unsettled the side and their early season hopes had faded.
United had lost 3 of the previous 5 games and were out of both cups when
Peter made his debut against Queens Park Rangers on 15th March 1986.
They lost 1-0. Brought in as a possible replacement for Hughes,
Davenport played with a style and quality befitting his Brian Clough
background. He got off the mark in his tenth appearance, a 4-0 win
against Leicester City on 26th April 1986. Though the team continued to
struggle at the beginning of the subsequent season, Peter's performances
were worthy of note, scoring 5 goals in Ron Atkinson's final 7 games in
charge.
When Sir Alex Ferguson took over, Davenport maintained his good
form and finished the season with 16 goals. Though he was a late
starter for the 1987/88 campaign he returned to the first team to form a
partnership with the newly acquired Brian McClair. Davenport's goals
dried up for a period of 13 games in the middle of the season and,
though he returned to scoring ways towards the end, Ferguson brought
Mark Hughes back to Old Trafford in the summer of 1988 and Peter's days
were numbered. He made his final appearance on 26th October 1988 in a
2-1 defeat to Norwich City, having scored his final goal for the club in
a 1-0 League Cup win against Rotherham four weeks earlier. He left
United in November 1988 to join Middlesborough. Having been Atkinson's
last major signing he was part of Ferguson's clear out of United at the
end of the decade. (Steve Drabble)
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