Taken from the summer 2024 issue of Dazed. You can buy a copy of our latest issue here.
It‘s the day after a frustrating finish from Manchester United – conceding a late goal in a draw with relegation-facing Burnley – and I’ve arrived at Manchester Piccadilly station. Sixth in the Premier League at the time of writing with four games to play, the team are all but out of the Champions League reckoning, but there is still hope of qualifying for the Europa League. To leapfrog the likes of Aston Villa and Newcastle is one thing, but to outdo their longtime local rivals Manchester City, currently on track for a historic record-breaking fourth consecutive Premier League win, is another. United are the only other team to have even come close to this feat in the past.
A stone’s throw from the station exit, one of the north’s well-revered culinary destinations is bustling. After handing me my vegan sausage roll, a young lad behind the counter shrugs when asked about last night’s game. It was simply ”disappointing”, he says. Curiously spurred by his curt response, I pose a similar question further along in an eerily empty Starbucks. As his colleague slides a mocha my way, one barista proclaims: ”The team is good, it’s just poorly managed in my opinion. I don’t have anything [bad] to say about the players.” I march on, lending my ear to any local mouthpiece whose views flit between managerial critiques, the impact of a slew of detrimental injuries, and the city being ’blue‘ (Man City’s colours). It soon becomes clear that, much like stories of the Haçienda in its heyday, when it comes to opinions concerning Manchester United, everyone seems to have one. They are the most followed and engaged-with Premier League team, despite not securing a title since 2013. They have won 20 English league titles in all, 13 of them under Sir Alex Ferguson, the most of any other team. Their impact even gave me one of my middle names, Cole, taken from one of their top strikers, according to my father.
As I hoist my luggage into the hotel lift, the lingering scent of the local ’Spoons trails a shifty-looking chap, sliding between the doors before they close. After a friendly northern greeting and proud affirming of his support of the Red Devils, he reels off his favourite players in a tone that makes you question whether you’re mad for even asking. There’s the 28-year-old forward, Anthony Martial – calm, collected and speedy but sadly injury-prone in his nine-year tenure at the team. Bruno Fernandes, the 29-year-old midfielder, as creative as he is silky on the ball with 230 appearances and 79 goals across his four-year spell at the club. Then there’s Marcus Rashford, former Dazed cover star and pride of Manchester, acclaimed in the press for his achievements on the pitch (131 goals in 399 appearances) as well as off (campaigning for free school meals during the pandemic). Then comes a curveball. A name with barely a year’s experience under his belt playing for the senior team. A name with only 30 appearances and three goals but a name he mentioned with glee nonetheless. “Kobbie Mainoo. I mean... pftt, [Kobbie] is amazing. He’s an amazing player,” he says. ”But you don't want to put too much pressure on him.”
Mainoo is only 19 with a baby-faced smile to account for the fact. His humility offsets his increasingly fearsome reputation on the pitch, with the gentle presence of a boy still growing into himself – the hem of his oversized Balenciaga football jersey grazing his knuckles a la Ariana Grande. Flanked by agents, brand reps and his two adorably supportive sisters, Mainoo appears with a small entourage whose level of care and sensitivity is heightened as the pressure around their young star becomes more palpable. We are meeting the following afternoon at one of Sale’s local sports clubs, a lot like those that he’d spent his youth playing in, shuttling hours back and forth between home, school and training grounds. Eye contact is consistent, handshakes solid but most interestingly, he bears no signs of the pressures bestowed upon him. No signs of any ego inflation, despite plenty of reasons for there to be.
Just over a month after his first start for United in the Carabao Cup, Mainoo made his first-team Premier League debut at the age of 17, coming on as a substitute in a 3-0 win over Leicester in February. Then, in November, the United academy graduate found himself in the starting team, impressing ex-United pundits Gary Neville (”Manchester United’s best player by a street”) and the famously grumpy Roy Keane (”standout performer”) with his performance in a 3-0 win over Everton. Between touch-ups in the hair and make-up trailer, Mainoo weighs up what was once a dream but has now become his reality in the space of just over 12 months. ”I knew it was a big chance, and not many of them come around, you know?” he says with slight disbelief. ”I knew I had to come and make an impression and show myself on the pitch. It’s a great feeling.”
When Mainoo sent a spectacular, curling effort in the top-right corner during a 2-2 draw against Liverpool in April, he secured his first senior Old Trafford goal – at the ground’s hallowed Stretford End, no less – solidifying his presence and piquing the interest of any remaining naysayers. Dreams became a reality as he jogged over to the Old Trafford faithful, raising a humble salute before being engulfed by his role models-turned-peers. ”It was such a big game, such a close game,” says Mainoo. ”It was 1-1 at the time and that was the stuff you dream of. It was a dream I’d always had, running towards the family stand at the Stretford End.”
”Sometimes I get these moments where I’m like, ’Two years ago you were on my Fifa team and now I’m playing with you and I’m arguing with you on the pitch. It’s crazy” – Kobbie Mainoo
Since bursting on to the scene, Mainoo has gone from FA Youth Cup winner to senior England international in under two years. In his debut for England in March, drafted on in a friendly against Brazil at Wembley, you’d never have guessed it was his international debut. Praising his youthful energy, manager Gareth Southgate said after the game that ”sometimes, with the really young ones, they are not even thinking about [the occasion]. It’s all flowing and then maybe as you get a bit older you start to think about it a bit more. It is a beautiful, innocent moment when he is just in the flow and lapping up the opportunities as they come.” But how has he managed such monumental life shifts in a short space of time? ”I just have to adapt quickly and try to get used to all this change,” says Mainoo. ”I have good support behind me, and a good family so it’s not too crazy because they keep me grounded. They keep me humble.”
Kobbie Mainoo, or ’Kobz’ as friends and family affectionately call him, was born in 2005, the year Roy Keane was dismissed by the club mere weeks after his infamous rant against his teammates. When the pandemic struck, Mainoo would have been a 14-year-old preparing for his GCSEs. It’s too easy to forget these facts when watching him on the pitch – comfortable, assured, agile and with a technical consistency well beyond his years. His parents always put school before training. ”Can’t say I agree,” he jokes wilh a boyish grin, before clarifying its importance for him. ”Schoolwork always came first and then training came after. It was a great help to have parents who supported me.” We’re speaking just over a week after his 19th birthday celebrations — the first few days of his last teenage years. The boy is fast becoming a man, but it doesn’t seem to faze him. In fact, ”it doesn’t feel too much different,” says Mainoo. “Things are happening very fast in life and there are a lot of games in such a short period. You don’t get a lot of time to stop and think about these things that are going on.”
Mainoo grew up in Stockport, seven miles south of Manchester. As the youngest of four siblings, his earliest memories are, predictably, of ”playing football in the garden”. Much of his youth is framed by his memories of the game, playing out in the local field or rallying the troops for a match. ”I’d always drag my sisters out to stand in goal for me and stuff like that.” His sisters are shoulder to shoulder behind me, gleefully recording our conversation. When his memory evades him, they’re on hand to paint a clearer picture. When asked about how he got his start in football, he takes a moment to confer with them. ”You were playing for the school team,” one sister says. ”No, before that...” Mainoo starts. ”Mr Andy! [I was] three or four and he was a coach that used to go to the local high school and play football there. I used to go with my parents, and even they'd join in.” Mainoo doesn’t expand too much on questions about his past. You sense he still hasn’t quite gotten used to people wanting to know so much about him – and when even a simple meet-up with friends becomes Daily Mail newsworthy, it’s certainly an adjustment. Besides, what use are these reflections for a boy living out his dreams in the present? He ponders for a moment when I ask him if he is more reflective or future-facing – ”Probably future-facing.”
At Cheadle & Gatley, his first junior football club, Mainoo recalls playing in a noteworthy friendly at Man City. ”I think I played well in that; I scored a couple of goals and ended up going to the development centre at City for a bit,” he says. ”I was at United as well; I did both together for a while before I finally chose United.” It was here, as a trainee Red, where he was granted freedom to ”do my own thing. I think that’s one of the reasons I love it, through all the work and the long days.” He tells me his favourite player, Ronaldinho, is a cliche choice but true. ”Mainly because he expressed himself and played with a smile on his face. He always looked like he was having fun, and that’s how I [felt] about football. I thought it was fun and I still do.”
Mainoo is one of the few success stories in recent years at United to follow a well-worn development path. The club’s academy class of ’92, consisting of David Beckham, Ryan Giggs, Nicky Butt, Gary and Phil Neville and Paul Scholes, is still spoken about in awe. Mainoo is a huge fan of Scholes, picking him as his dream midfield partner in a fan Q&A this April. Days later, Scholes reprimanded Mainoo and teammate Alejandro Garnacho for wearing hoodies to training, in a swiftly deleted Instagram story cap-tioned, ”[...]no way can you properly train with your hoods up. Standards begin on the training pitch. Bye!” I want to ask Mainoo what he thinks of the comments and if, perhaps, there is some sort of generational divide on matters like these, but the question is vetoed by his team. Still, the class of 92’s impact still resonates. ”Definitely, because they won a lot and they’re such a big group of players from the same year. Coming through the academy, breaking in is always a big thing. That’s what everyone wants to do so I want to carry that on.”
In the present, Mainoo doesn’t need to look far to see greatness in action. When playing for England, he is flanked by some of the best midfield talent the squad have seen in recent years. There’s Jude Bellingham, another baby-faced force on the pitch who’s become a fan favourite for this year’s Ballon d’Or. Declan Rice, whose cultural impact stretches as far as having an Afrobeats hit named in his honour, and Phil Foden, who when not playing for rivals Man City, can be a guiding light on the national pitch. ”Sometimes I sit down and I get these moments where I’m like, ’Two years ago you were on my Fifa team and now I’m playing with you and I’m arguing with you on the pitch.’ So in that sense it’s crazy.” Fernandes and Casemiro are the players he currently learns the most from, particularly with their reading of the game. ”Last season when I was just training with the first team and I wasn’t playing with them, I used to think, ’How are they so quick to everything, how did they see that pass?’ So I just watched them to see what they were doing, where they were looking and what moves they were making, and tried to emulate it and put it into my game as well.”
”I want to be known as a great football player, great person and I want people to respect my game” – Kobbie Mainoo
Teammates Raphaël Varane and Diogo Dalot have been another source of wisdom when it comes to their work off the pitch. ”Raphaël told me one thing which was great advice: the best investment you make is investing in your body,” says Mainoo. ”Obviously, as a footballer, your body is your instrument, it’s what you use. So I took that on board.” After training, he’s likely in bed from 2pm till nighttime. He might come down for food, in between episodes of Stranger Things and The Sopranos. But mostly he prefers to do as little as possible. ”Obviously, I see physios outside of the club to keep myself fresh, but most of the time I just like to chill.”
Thirty feet above the ground, Jebi Labembika leans dangerously over the barriers of a cherry picker, angling his lens at Mainoo mid-pose. He’s running in circles, at ease in front of the camera, replicating the movements required to get the shot. ”The moment he got on set it felt very brotherly,” says Labembika during the only 10-minute break Mainoo has requested for the entire day. ”[Kobbie] felt like someone who I grew up with. He has that charm and innocence, but is also super confident and in charge of his body and what it can do in front of a camera. The fact that this is his first editorial... he was so confident, so aware and present.”
Mainoo has done press shots for United before, but nothing like this. It’s his first cover shoot and fashion story for one of his latest deals – signing with Nike. ”[It’s] a dream come true,” he says. ”To finally sign with them is great.” Beyond his brand deals, he has a keen eye for fashion; in fact, his nylon Intrecciato Bottega messenger bag was one of the first things that caught my eye when he arrived. It’s the first brand he mentions when I ask him about his favourites, alongside Louis Vuitton, Chrome Hearts, Enfants Riches Déprimés, Clints and Corteiz. He’s visited the Clints store in Manchester a few times and connected with Corteiz founder, Clint — ”not in person yet, but I’m sure it will happen eventually”. Also on his wishlist is a trip back to Ghana, where his parents grew up, which he has been unable to visit since December 2021. ”It’s definitely a big part of my life,” he says. ”I love going back to Ghana.”
A few days after we meet, Manchester United awards him goal of the month for his goal against Liverpool. As expected, he is already ahead of himself, with a determination to ”keep getting better on the football pitch and off. We’ve got the FA Cup final coming up, so I want to win that and finish the season strong, then rest, recover and hopefully hit the ground running in the next one.” On June 16, England play their first Euros game against Serbia. Though not certain, it’s looking all the more likely that Mainoo could find his way into a starting line-up already packed with world-class talent. It would be another dream come true to help England break their 58-year tournament drought. Amid all the hopes and pressures that come with a talent like Mainoo’s, he maintains a razor-sharp focus, calm and grace. As he is wrapping up, a small group of boys congregates by the sports ground exit, trying to catch a glimpse of the rising star. He greets them with that same famillarity Jebi was struck by, posing for pictures with a smile. In true Mainoo style, he ends our talk with a characteristically humble hope for the future. ”I want to be known as a great football player, great person and I want people to respect my game.”
Grooming Nat Bury at Leftside Creative using Humanrace, photographic assistant Nimie Li, styling assistants Lea Zoller, Chris Henderson, lighting assistants Jack Gibbons, Conrad Ohnuki, digital operator Callan Dooley, production assistants Lucy Calderhead, Grace Davies, special thanks Colin Dowdy at Sale United FC.