Manchester United opened their Champions League campaign on Thursday night with a 4-0 win over Sabah at Old Trafford. Matheus Cunha, Bruno Fernandes and Benjamin Šeško scored before half-time, and Lisandro Martínez added a fourth after the break. Sabah, the champions of Azerbaijan, were making their debut in the competition in the same week the club turned nine years old.
That was matchday one of the league phase, which means more European nights in Manchester this autumn and a new wave of visiting fans, many of them in the city for the first time. Getting to Old Trafford is not hard. Getting to the right Old Trafford is where first-timers go wrong.
There are two Old Traffords
Old Trafford is the name of a district in Trafford, just southwest of Manchester city center, and it has two famous grounds. The football stadium is on Sir Matt Busby Way. A short walk away is Emirates Old Trafford, the cricket ground and home of Lancashire County Cricket Club.
The Metrolink stop called Old Trafford sits next to the cricket ground, not the football stadium. It still works for United games, and on a match day it is where many fans go, but it is not the closest stop and the name sends plenty of visitors to the wrong gate.
The closest tram stop is Wharfside
Three Metrolink stops are within a ten-minute walk of the stadium:
- Wharfside, on the Trafford Park line, is directly opposite the stadium. It opened on March 22, 2020, which is why older guides and forum posts do not mention it.
- Old Trafford, on the Altrincham line, next to the cricket ground. Busy but built for it: its platforms were doubled to 120 meters in 2009 so two double trams can load at once, and on match days it handles around 9,500 journeys against a normal 2,000.
- Exchange Quay, on the Eccles line, on the Salford Quays side of the stadium.
All three lines pass through Cornbrook, the network’s main interchange, where the Altrincham, Eccles, Airport, Trafford Park and South Manchester lines meet. Whichever tram you catch in the city center, Cornbrook is where you can switch to the one that suits your stop.
From Manchester Airport, with one change
If you are flying in for a match, you do not need to go into the city center first. Airport line trams run from the terminal toward Victoria and pass through Cornbrook on the way. Get off there and change to a Trafford Park line tram for Wharfside, or an Altrincham line tram for Old Trafford.
Metrolink accepts contactless cards: tap in on the platform reader before you board and tap out at the end. On a match day, allow extra time at Cornbrook, because every tram heading toward the stadium fills up there.
The station you cannot use
Look at an aerial photo of Old Trafford and you will see a railway line running right alongside the Sir Bobby Charlton Stand. There is even a station there, Manchester United Football Ground, built for match days. Services to it have been stopped at the club’s request for safety reasons, so do not plan a trip around it. The tram is the answer.
After the final whistle
Expect queues at every stop. The Old Trafford stop runs a managed queuing system on match days, and Wharfside, being closest, fills first. Two ways to beat the crush: walk the few extra minutes to whichever of the three stops is least busy, or stay in the area for an hour and let the crowd clear. The city center is around two miles away, a long but flat walk if the weather is kind.
On a non-match day
Old Trafford holds 74,158 spectators, which makes it the largest club football stadium in the United Kingdom, and it earns its nickname, the Theatre of Dreams, coined by Sir Bobby Charlton. The club museum has been in the North Stand since 1998 and the stadium runs tours.
Outside, the Munich Clock at the junction of the East and South Stands commemorates the 1958 air disaster. There are statues of the United Trinity, George Best, Denis Law and Bobby Charlton, as well as Sir Matt Busby and Sir Alex Ferguson, whose statue was unveiled in November 2012.
Across the water, Salford Quays is worth the short walk: Imperial War Museum North sits on the Trafford side of the Manchester Ship Canal, and The Lowry arts center faces it from Salford.
A stadium on borrowed time
On March 11, 2025, Manchester United confirmed plans to replace Old Trafford with a new 100,000-seat stadium designed by Foster + Partners. It will take years to build, so the current ground will be United’s home for a while yet. But if you have always meant to see a game at the original Old Trafford, the clock is running.
Quick checklist
- Wharfside, on the Trafford Park line, is the closest stop to the football stadium.
- The Old Trafford stop is by the cricket ground. It works, but it is not the closest.
- From the airport: Airport line tram to Cornbrook, then change.
- Tap in and tap out with a contactless card.
- Ignore the railway station next to the stadium. It is closed.
Following your team around Europe this season? We have done the same groundwork for Porto’s Estádio do Dragão and for Napoli’s Stadio Maradona, where the obvious-looking metro line closes long before an evening kickoff.
