Richard Ashcroft and then attended Winstanley College, where he met Nick McCabe. His teachers referred to him as "the cancer of the class", though one member of staff recalled him being "incredibly intelligent". Ashcroft was an avid football player, playing junior football for Wigan Athletic. For some time Ashcroft wanted to be a professional football player, idolising George Best, but as he grew older he lost interest in this, turning to music instead. Ashcroft formed The Verve (originally just Verve) in 1990 with McCabe, Jones, and Salisbury. The band signed to Hut Records and became well known for their appetite for both
1990 Wigan Metropolitan Borough Council election a local elections high (with the 1979 election omitted for coinciding with the general election) of 39.4%. This result had the following consequences for the total number of seats on the Council after the elections: 1990 Wigan Metropolitan Borough Council election Elections to the Wigan council were held on Thursday, 3 May 1990, with one third of the seats up for election with an additional vacancy in Bryn. Previous to the election there had also been a by-election in Abram, which the Labour Party successfully defended. Despite a wider array of parties - mainly a product from the fractious SLD