We have now reached 11 years since Sir Alex Ferguson departed Manchester United and it’s fair to say that he just hasn’t been replaced.
Anybody trying to follow on from Ferguson would have faced difficulties given his quite incredible run at Old Trafford.
27 years, 1500 games, 13 league titles, two Champions Leagues, five FA Cups, four League Cups, one Club World Cup – ‘Fergie’ won it all at United.
David Moyes, Louis van Gaal, Jose Mourinho, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, Ralf Rangnick and Erik ten Hag have all tried to bring success to United but the last 11 years have mostly been a struggle.
Sunday brought up 11 years to the day since Ferguson’s final Premier League game as United boss, a frankly bizarre 5-5 draw at West Bromwich Albion.
Ferguson’s impact is still seen to this day with a statue and a stand named after him at Old Trafford, and some still pay him the ultimate respect to this day.
Roy Keane on Gary Neville’s Sir Alex Ferguson stance
Ferguson is still known as ‘the boss’ to many former United players.
Rio Ferdinand still uses that name rather than calling him ‘Sir Alex’ and Ashley Young also noted it in a recent interview.
Gary Neville has often used it too but he has left former teammate Roy Keane somewhat baffled.
Speaking on Stick to Football, Neville branded Ferguson ‘the boss’ and Keane quizzed him on just why he keeps calling his old manager by that tag.
Neville noted that he still calls his old teachers by their school names and would never call Ferguson ‘Alex’, either through respect or habit from 25 years of calling him ‘boss’.
RK: “Why do you call him the boss?”
GN: “You’ve asked me this about 40 times in the last 12 months!”
RK: “I know but he was your manager at a football club, his contract was with the club, your contract was with the club, why do you call someone boss? I’m serious! Do you call anyone else ‘boss’, besides your wife?”
GN: “I’ve told you this, I still call the school teacher I was brought through with ‘Mr Wright’.”
RK: “That’s fine – but you’re not calling him ‘boss’.”
GN: “When you’ve been used to calling someone that for 25 years… we have had this conversation before haven’t we?”
RK: “Yeah, I don’t get it. It’s not just you, it’s everyone. ‘Boss’, I don’t get it.”
GN: “I would never call him Alex.”
RK: “But that’s his name!”
GN: “I would call him Sir Alex publicly, I would never call him Alex – no, I wouldn’t. For 25 years I called him boss.”
RK: “Yeah, because he was your boss! He’s not your boss now is he? He’s another human being, that’s it – why you calling him boss?
Roy Keane ranks Premier League managers
This whole conversation came as a result of the Stick to Football panel being asked to rank five Premier League greats – Sir Alex Ferguson, Pep Guardiola, Jurgen Klopp, Arsene Wenger and Jose Mourinho.
All five won Premier League titles but Wenger is the only one of the five to have not won a Champions League in his managerial career.
Keane has had well-publicised issues with Ferguson over the years, but did still rank him second in his list.
Keane went with Guardiola as the number one manager from those five with Mourinho third, Klopp fourth and Wenger in fifth.
The Irishman had so many great days and memorable nights under Ferguson but he still ranks Guardiola ahead of him.
That may not go down too well with United fans but Keane has never hidden his admiration for Guardiola’s City side, so maybe his choice shouldn’t be a surprise.