At home with Gary Neville: 'United's treble-winners were the best-dressed team of all-time'

Let’s be honest, Gary Neville probably isn’t the first name that comes to mind when it comes to football’s most stylish luminaries. A decade on from his Monday Night Football debut in that infamous grey suit, Manchester United’s former club captain has quietly stepped up his game with a series of well-tailored essentials. You won’t find him in a chunky knit a la Roy Keane or a Micah Richards-esque three-piece, but Neville’s low-key kit upgrade is living proof that a fitted blazer and trusty black T-shirt will elevate any wardrobe. The inspiration for which hails back to his time at United.

“That’s one of the great cub traditions – the Busby Babes blazer with the old crest,” he says. “Sir Alex Ferguson made sure we wore it at every away game and every single time we went through the airport.”

As longtime proponents of Great British suiting, it’s no surprise that Hawes & Curtis has scouted Neville for its latest summer edit. A collection made for all the rigours of wedding season – including wandering around a giant garden in desperate search of signal for the Euros score – it features plenty of linen, some elegant knitted polos and even a Double Breasted Herringbone jacket. Several of which are sure to grace an ITV pundits studio come June. To mark the occasion, figure out what’s going on at Old Trafford right now and get the origin story behind his ‘tache, we spoke to Neville as part of British GQ’s ‘At Home With’ series.

Since most of your childhood was spent in football and cricket kit, do you remember getting your first proper suit?

There's a picture of me when I was younger, wearing one of those kipper ties and a blazer that half went with a pair of pants. It wasn't particularly graceful, but the first time I ever really started wearing a suit was with United.

You don’t see the players wearing the blazers much anymore. Is there something missing in that?

I've gotta be careful here because I don't want to sound like an old man. I love wearing tracksuits. But when I look back I'm quite proud of the fact that the Busby babes wore those blazers and Manchester United's players always have to wear those blazers at some point. Do they have to wear them every game? No, but the directors should.

There’s a great video of Steve Bruce and Roy Keane at an FA Cup final suit fitting in 1996, where Bruce says all the suits are ruined after the night out. Is that true?

It's absolutely true. I have still got my ‘99 treble suit, which was Versace. Becks got us a Prada suit for the ‘99 FA Cup final and a Versace suit for the Champions League – we were the best-dressed team of all time because we had this iconic fashion guy. But we would go out after every cup final. Sometimes if we lost it sounds crazy, but it could be a better do. Everyone was absolutely bladdered, and you'd end up with the tie thrown on the floor, people spilling drinks over each other and your suit wasn't in much shape to repair the day after.

What’s the worst you’ve been?

After the ‘99 Champions League final, I never went to bed. I just drank all the way through the night through the next day, right the way through to the parade in the evening. It's the only time in my life I've never slept. We got back to the hotel about one o'clock in the morning and I just went straight through. We were in a right state when we got on that bus to go around Manchester.

Seeing Jack Grealish last year must have given you flashbacks…

If you've won the treble, you're allowed to slur your words.

When you’re doing The Overlap you tend to wear this uniform of a black T-shirt, black jeans and black trainers. Is that what you like to wear at home?

Yeah, I look like this most of the time. Since Dragon's Den last year, I've been going to Hawes & Curtis quite a lot, and actually in the Sky studios now on a Sunday, I’ll go for that look of a good T-shirt or black wool polo with a blazer and smart trainer. It's hard to find a bloody good white or black T-shirt that you can wear with everything. Now I’ve got about four or five of the Hawes & Curtis black T-shirts, and I wear the 247 Represent pants all the time.

Roy Keane tells on The Overlap about being roped into spending way too much money on a Rolex as a young player. Did you have the same thing happen to you?

I actually never wore a watch for probably the first 40 years of my life. Now I’ve got an Apple Watch for heart rate, calories and stuff like that. I’ve got the Oura ring as well but I use it sparingly now, to be fair. I've got to a point whereby I know when I've got my seven hours sleep. I can almost measure it.

When I went back and read about you joining Sky Sports, half the stories were about all you've achieved at Manchester United and the others were some sort of commentary on your moustache. Can you give me the origin story of the ‘tache?

I can't grow a beard, right? This is as good as it gets. I hate shaving, and this grows here, and it got to a point whereby I had it for too long. I took it off probably about seven or eight years ago, and my wife said, “No. Get it back.” And basically, here it is again.

I always remember Liverpool fans had a flag that said, “Gary Neville. Grow a proper muzzy or shave it off yer scruff.” To this day, it's still very funny. I've worn moisturiser every morning for 30 years though. I’m currently on Skin Food because someone at Sky recommended it.

How do you watch the football at home?

I watch the big Premier League games, the Champions League games, and I watch Salford, my team that I'm a co-owner of every week. If there's a game on a Saturday lunchtime at 12.30pm or even 5pm and it’s not a game I’m interested in I won’t watch it.

Speaking as a longtime Southampton season ticket holder, I just avoid watching my team on TV when they’re playing badly. How do you grind through some of these Manchester United matches at the moment?

So you’ve got me at a point where I can tell you a little story. Last Saturday, I was doing the game on Sunday with Sky, my wife had taken the children to the netball and I've got three season tickets at Old Trafford United who were playing at home against Burnley.

I live about a 25-minute walk from Old Trafford and at one o'clock I thought, “Am I going? I'm not going to because I know what I'm gonna see will make me pissed off.” So I stayed at home and relaxed. When I saw Burnley equalised after 87 minutes, I knew I’d made the right decision.

Finally, from what I can tell from your Instagram, you’re into your red wine. Anything you’d recommend to British GQ’s readers?

I never drank a glass of red wine when I was playing but I've got a wine room now. I started off being obsessed with Tuscan wine from the Antinori stable about 15 years ago and I've still got quite a bit of that. But then I wanted a lighter wine and got into pinot noir. I went to PerUs, two years ago with my wife Emma, which is one of the best wines in the world. I met with the owners and started to really enjoy that too.

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