Heroes and Villains

Very personal thread this. For once, we have a thread where your word is absolute. Your view is your view and as I'm asking for your personal feelings on this or that player who holds a special place in your heart, feel free eulogize of demonize as much as you want to do.

who are your Heroes and Villains during your time supporting Manchester United? What did they do to endear themselves to you? Alternatively, how did a 'Villian' get on your bad side and let you feel like you'd been personally let down?

This isn't your generic, mindless thread where you just reel off a bunch of good or bad players. In the first place a player must surely have smething about him outside of being very good or bad at his job to cause him to be a player who is etched on your psyche/heart, right?

I've got quite a few for both categories...and quite a few excellent players who although I wouldn't call 'em villains, left me feeling personally let down by the time they left the club. Will post up if this thing gets enough interest. Hope it does as it's your chance to get all kinds of things of your chest

 

177 views, 5 contributions...and there's me thinking the board would want to get in on this one, d'oh!

 

I am surprised, tbh. I woulda thought people would enjoy the idea of waxing lyrical about this particular subject. Afterall, it's what would make you a supporter in the first place if you're not a Manc, right?

I've been writing on this one over the night whilst my foot doesn't let me sleep, lol, and ibruprofen has yet to kick in. Probably my lenghtiest post this year actually.

 

Heroes

1. Bryan Robson – Super hero
Anyone following United in the 80’s is going to have Robbo, Mark Hughes or Norman Whiteside right up there as a full on hero. Bryan Robson was ‘the hope’ and ‘the belief’ all rolled into one when I was a kid. He was our everything and the label Captain Marvel has never, ever been more befitting of a player who wore the red shirt. The thing about Robson was that when he went forward from midfield anything could happen. These days people wax lyrical about Steven Gerrard and remember his more memorable moments whilst omitting many of the mediocre ones. Well imagine a midfielder who was ‘on’ every time he played and actually gave his all for the shirt (and more) whilst scoring fantastic goals from any distance within 35 yards. That was Robbo.

He could have left us – he was a fancied player across Europe at a time when his team-mates simply could not match his ability, but he stayed, sacrificing many a medal and a chance for much bigger acclaim then he has now.

The thing about Robson for me as a Utd supporter was that he was someone you could instil all your hopes and belief in and he’d do his damnedest to deliver. He was the type of player that supporters in the stands have an instant affinity towards. Every ‘ohh’ every ‘ahh’ Robson lived it with you and between him, Hughes or Whiteside, you could bet one of them were the cause.

In the era where world stars like Zico, Platini, Maradona, Rumenigge, Matthaus, Falcao, Laudrup and many, many more were lighting it up internationally, Robson stood out for me as a hero for the fact he was ours where all those other players were not. Simple really. Those international stars weren’t real… they were players you saw every 2 or 4yrs or briefly in a highlight reel. Robbo was someone you got to see first or second hand all through a season.

Along with Barnes and Dalglish, Robson was the most amazing British-based player for me of the 80’s and unlike the former two, Robson was ours at a time when everyone at school was pretending to be Barnes, Platini, Zico, Lineker or Maradona. Truth be told at the age I was then Maradona and Barnes were amazing, but in a different way. I was always a dribbler and so they were players I would learn from. I was never one who could blast them in from 35yards out, lol, so the frequency of me shouting ‘Robbo’ as I cracked a shot in from a distance was rare, but he was definitely the player held most dear to me at that time for everything he gave us and for giving us that ‘something world class special’ which was not frequent at this club in the 80’s.

2. Paul Ince – The dichotomous warrior

Paul Ince, for me, was the epitome of emergence for us during the early 90’s. He is quickly submerged in murky waters when his post Utd career is discussed or the acrimony with which he was moved on. His ego was a major, major part of us becoming a dominant force. I believe that between him and Cantona we had the air of ‘we’re better than you and we’re going to show you that this is a fact.’ Ince snarling and roaming around midfield with that manic look in his eyes and the excitable energy of a young pit-bull put many a game to bed before it had even kicked off.

I remember reading one story about him in ‘4-4-2’ magazine I think it was, where Ian Wright was saying that his mate Incey was a nutter and that he’d once greeted him with a smile and a punch in the face and when Wright went ballistic at this… assault… Ince burst out laughing and said sorry it was a ‘joke.’ Charming.. but certainly in keeping with the enforcer that was Paul Ince. I’ve said on here that those early 90’s teams were as menacing, perhaps even more so than they were good or great footballers as individuals. That team were going to take points off you by hook or by crook. If you wanted a ‘rah’ (row in non London speak) Ince would be the first one in your face. He was as much ‘The Guv’nor’ as he thought he was…on the pitch. Unfortunately, that very same ego was his downfall, as he was never ‘The Guv’nor’ in Fergie’s realm.

Alongside Ince, Keane spread his wings and was your all-action goal-scoring midfielder. In Ince he had someone who was every bit as intimidatory and probably even more immediate in his actions, he also had an excellent mentor in terms of learning positioning and when to launch into an all out assault or just a sensible stab-tackle.

Ince endeared himself to me for a variety of reasons. One of them being that he was a black man who would stand defiant all around the country whilst being on the receiving end of racial abuse that is no longer in the top league in England to that extent. He also got so much stick from the West Ham boys who never and have never forgiven him for joining us. I just thought his character, bottle, self-belief and determination was something special and I have no doubt in my mind that he was key cornerstone in the building of an empire. Once he’d guided Keano that little bit and plotted the new foundations, Fergie didn’t need him anymore.. and at that point Ince’s ego had consumed him making it certain he wasn’t able to stay here and made it very easy to sell him. Supporters were not happy about that at all. That’s one of the few times I remember my dad going ballistic at a sale actually. I was personally gutted when he left. His actions on going though, well, they earn him a spot in both my heroes and villains section…

3. Roy Keane – The indomitable lion

Roy Keane is a legend. Everything he did here was for the benefit of this club. He’s the best captain the club has had in decades as unlike Robbo who was simply blessed with fantastic foot-balling ability, Keano would force the best out of everyone in his teams rather than just take it all on his own shoulders (like Robbo did whilst not really commanding his troops to do more.)

This is the unique difference between the two. Keane is a player you build dynasties around. Robbo, as an individual, is a player you pick first, especially if you were entering a cup competition.

I suppose bias blinds. Keane is a thug, a brute, an animal to opposing fans. For once, I’d say this was a player who could do no wrong in my eyes. You’d just shake your head at his ballistic moments, but I can never, ever remember being angry or upset at Keane for his actions. Many a time the second he was sent off a ‘Keano’ chant would go up, even. I guess the reason he has such a free pass is that his every action, his immediate remorse for letting the team down, and his whole make-up just screamed ‘I WANT TO WIN, I ONLY GET UPSET BECAUSE I CARE, Loike!’ There has never been a time when Keane was sent off and didn’t come back and give a set of Herculean performances as penance.

Another element that forced you into Keano’s legion of fans was his stamina, the way he could literally be two men on a pitch was breathtaking. It’s an overused phrase and is usually thrown about inappropriately. There are very few players ever who could give Keane-esque two-for-one performances at the level Keane could. One thing I always found even more thrilling about him was watching him in the flesh. On TV you get the essence, but if you saw him in his pomp for 90minutes running up and down, up and down, cajoling, forcing, snarling at everything in sight you could immediately appreciate the man and recognise his importance to this club and to our manager. I am a firm believer that if Blackburn had of gotten Keane they would have been the ones with a legacy and not us.

Ince helped Keane a lot, so did Robbo, but his will and drive would have always gotten him to the top and maybe he wouldn’t have become so refined, but he’d still be that dominator, that leader of a club, of a set of men that he was for us.

In many ways it would be easy to put Keano at #1, but for the times and eras of those before him and what they meant to me personally at those times, I’d be lying by putting Keano above them. In all honesty the top three easily stand side-by-side for different reasons.

4. Ryan Giggs – Supersonic

Ryan Giggs is a player that has given more moments of absolute ecstasy to Man Utd supporters than anyone else in the past 20yrs, in my estimation. To me, he is the natural successor to Robbo for the crown of breathtaking. If Eric had been here longer it would be him, but Giggs is and has been delighting crowds for 15yrs!! Solid. That is all-timer standard and for that he is the second man on the list I look at from a football-first point of view. I’m not going to go on and on about his on pitch antics. I’ve done a fair amount of that in numerous threads devoted to him. He’s the LOTW for his generation and in the broader sense he stands comfortably aside Finney, Matthews and Best as one of the four best wingers ever seen in the English game.

What puts Giggs over anyone barring Robbo is that his game in Europe was better than his game in the league. He was a true hero for us at a time when we doubted ourselves in Europe. He was also every bit the equal of the super-team; Juventus. In the mid 90’s it took the rest of our boys a few seasons to get to where Giggs was and it’s at that time that we won a EC. Watching him skin the best of Europe pushed him further up in my estimation. The British press may put unrealistic praise on its own, but it loves nothing more than fellating international phallus. Hailing foreign players as gods is the number one sport and Giggs defied the consensus to put in a number of breath-taking performances. He was the un-containable one in our line-up when on form. And for Giggs, Europe was his WC and he would come out on fire. His performances where often heroic, hence him being a hero.

5. Andy Cole Needs four chances to score one, but…

Another player who I rate (wouldn’t necessarily claim him as a hero of mine) for his triumph over adversity is Andrew Cole. I remember the player he was at Newcastle: A clinical, consistent goal-scoring poacher. We basically took him, erased his memory and forced him into becoming a footballer, and boy, did he get stick along the way!

Cole was Cantona’s personal punch-bag. Constantly showing his disdain at a Cole miss would be Cantona. I guess for him a striker that can’t strike after a team build-up was a pet-peeve, but his way of letting Cole know isn’t what I’d call constructive. I admire Cole for never bottling it, never shying away from this criticism and for becoming the ultimate and consummate striker for a partnership at Utd. He took all that stick and became one of the best movers across a line that I’ve ever seen. He became so intrinsic, so enmeshed in the United way as to be un-containable at times when he had the correct foil.

The midfield of the late 90’s is often toasted, Cole is quickly forgotten.. in his game he allowed so, so much space for our midfield to run into and pick him out. Scholes was the chief beneficiary as ghosting behind Cole was one of the easiest jobs in football and to a player like Scholes, that’s like waving a red flag at a bull.

All Cole ever got was stick for missing chances, the press loved jumping on this, Glenn Hoddle gave them all the fuel they asked for with his stupid comments. What the press at large failed to mention most times, was that Cole was the king of creating chances for himself out of absolutely nothing. His speed of thought and slight of foot often put him in positions no one else would even dream of, often giving him the right to miss some of those chances, which were admittedly sitters.

Off the pitch he is supposedly a bit of a ********. This doesn’t take away from what he gave us on the field. I admire him for having the bottle and wherewithal to triumph when it’d have been easier to fail and escape the club the first time Cantona piled on him.

6. Dwight Yorke – You Beauty!

What a waste. Before he lost the plot, this guy was winning me over at a rate of knots. He was simply amazing for us before he lost all interest. I believe that at the rate he was going, he would have emerged as a world star and a EPOTY or ballon d’or contender. On every stage and with every play, Yorke looked a world beater. Scoring goals of all kinds and playing the kind of team game with the midfield and Cole that dreams are made of. Honestly, the treble year had Yorke give one of the best seasons I’ve seen a pro give. In Europe he and Cole tore anything they came into contact with apart and in the league he was impossible to mark.

Yorke is your archetypal hero for playing like a hero. He also makes my villain list for pissing it all away. He still angers me when I think of how he threw it all away. The biggest waste of talent I can remember since McGrath.


7. Mark Hughes – The Scorer of great goals.

If I’d missed a game and caught BBC’s Grandstand vidi-printer at ten-to-five on a Saturday and saw Hughes 62, 81 or some-such come up on screen I knew at least one of those goals would be fantastic and couldn’t wait to see them on MotD.

If you put Sparky into the modern era, the pussified ‘hard-men’ of today would cry their eyes out. Sparky wasn’t born, he was forged from some substance unbeknownst to man at large. For a start, his thighs would not have looked out of place on The Hulk and then you had his determination. Have you ever seen one of those Rocky films were the erstwhile hero is getting clubbed to death and insists on blocking punches with his face? Well, Sparky had that same determination. He just would not be beaten. I cannot think of a single CB in the history of the game that could over-power Sparky out-right. Not one. Once those legs planted and he set his body in that half-hunch backed into the CB, the only way the ball was going to be won was by foul means.

Not a man that has played this game, at any level could bully Mark Hughes. As I said, the so-called hard-men of today would refuse to play against him. He was a product perfect for the era in which he played the game. If you put him in a video game with stats his would be power: 99, balance: 99, strength: 99. He made Wayne Rooney’s strength look like that of a baby elephant compared to its father, the true king of the jungle. I shit you not.

Any kind of shielding of the ball was known as a ‘Hughes’ at my school, lol, if you stood upright and prevented the CB from getting the ball you would shout ‘Hughes’ if you could then score a fantastic goal you’d either say ‘Maradona’ or ‘Hughes’ depending on what type of goal it was.

Hughes was an embodiment of what it meant to fight to the end. 90minutes for him must have been his homage to a war, any war he could re-enact. The only thing Hughes lacked to make good on a ‘Braveheart’ kind of persona was a voice. Sparky was deathly silent as a player. His eyes and his actions were his voice and between the two it was made clear he isn’t the one to ******** with. Also, woe betide you if you bullied any of the weaker members of a team Sparky was in….

I think Hughes could be seen as the big brother of the big brother in an extended family, you know? That end of level boss who comes out when the sub-boss has taken a beating. If Hughes was actually angry, then an injustice had occurred. If Hughes was smouldering and prowling the pitch he was just being his usual jovial self.

What I always found funny about Hughes was how he was never labelled a ‘hard-man’ where people like Ron Harris, Tommy Smith, Norman Hunter and Graeme Souness were, as well as probably Keano and Ince for us in more modern times … I’d put Hughes up to ‘Spark’ any of them if push came to shove.. the thing is, he’d probably do it away from the prying eyes of the fans and have it become myth.. see, unlike most of those players, Hughes was never a bully so the air of menace is mis-placed. The ones making trouble and being seen to be ‘hard’ and outrageous to the crowd at large will earn ‘hard man’ labels.. the stronger, silent types are known through their actions if push was to come to a real shove.. just as most people don’t know that Wes is the genuine hard-man at the club right now and has been for quite some time.. is how I always saw Sparky during his time.

I also think Hughes is the best outright volley specialist this club has seen since Charlton hung up his boots. His foot-to-eye co-ordination was something else. In fact, most of his wonder goals would come from an oddly angled ball being recompensed by an even odder volley connection goal-ward. The amount of times a Hughes volley looked impossible, I can’t even recount. Along with any show of body strength being a ‘Hughes,’ any volley you could score off of was a ‘Hughes’ as well.

I think were a Bryan Robson is a country or even international favourite, the likes of Paul Ince and Mark Hughes are full-on cult heroes who fans will have emblazoned on their psyche’s until they are dead. If I wanted a hard-arsed SS in my team Sparky would be the first name on the team-sheet.

8. Ruud Van Nistlerooy – The Terminator

“Give me your kit, boots and team. I have been sent from PSV to score goals for you!” Imagine Ruud with Arnie’s voice. It may as well of been. He was like a robot when he first got here. See villain section for the rest. Ruud isn’t a personal hero of mine, but his heroics deserve mention here.

9. Ole Gunnar Solskjaer – Irrepressible Professor

Ole isn’t so much a hero of mine as a person who has earned himself legendary status. But where heroism comes in with him is his battle with injury and his penchant for coming off the bench to score important goals. The Professor, so-called, because unlike most player’s, Ole has had to come off the bench in a super-sub role often in his time here, and his reading of the game from the touchline and understanding of where to go to score the simple or sublime is more than studious. He’s a real expert at it and I will wager he will go on to become a very good manager because of the way he can read the game from the touchline.

I think where Ole can be a hero for any United supporter is in the way he has remained so, so humble over the years and how he still has that ‘little boy living the dream’ glow to his face after all those medals and constant adulation of the fans. After ‘Keano, there’s only one Keano’ ‘you are my Solskjaer’ is probably my most heard chant in the stands. Ole is a refreshing character amongst the odiousness of the modern game and characters like Richardson and Obi.

Villains


1. Jaap Stam – But why?

Dear Jaap,

I feel it my duty to inform you of your stupidity. In making your position untenable, you ruined our chances of going on to dominate Europe and keep a tremendous side together. I hold you almost totally responsible for your departure. Just what the ******** where you thinking? You do not write a book exposing or inferring anything about the club or its manager and expect to stay at said club. You knew full well it was ruled over by a maniacal control freak who is most definitely an autocrat, you idiot.

Signed,

DS

2. John O’Shea From debut season to this? No. Just no.

3. Ruud Van Nistlerooy

Very disappointed in how a legend with all the airs and graces ended his tenure here. You have to be blind to not notice the visible decline in the player and it hurt more with Ruud because he was one of very few who came here, embraced the history of the club to the hilt and lived and breathed United.

His goal output and scintillating performances over his time here makes him a legend and probably more of an anti-hero than a villain, but it does pain me to see the smile return to others now that they don’t feel his glare and aura over them, most notably Ronaldo of course, who has something to account for in all of the goings on, but as the older and senior player, I felt Ruud should have risen above it all and not have things come to such a miserable head.

I think for me the strangest thing that happened with Ruud was the journey he took whilst here. His first two years – the performance level was of all-time repute, unquestionably. I remember at the time Ruud first arrived me and my friends were used to the hit and miss style of Utd-type strikers. When this guy arrived he shattered perception. Imagine; hit,hit,hit,hit,hit,hit.hit.hit.hit.hit.hit,hit – it was machine-like, it was tyrannical, it was absurd. I said to a mate the very first game I saw Ruud in that Cole will be gone soon, he just cannot compete with that and nor would he try – it was one battle too many – an undeniably superior striker was here and he never missed the target. I also remember thinking this guy is so intense, so obsessive that anything but starting would not wash. I mentioned it on here years ago, but obviously I type so much (shite) that it’s beyond my scope to find (calling all stalk…err… researchers!! )

What I didn’t like towards the end was the banter about Ruud. BS is a very surreal detachment from the real world in many ways. For the most part, people remain courteous and watch their p’s and q’s.. alas, the real world is often a vulgar and aggressive place, and the comments and anger I heard directed at Ruud were, admittedly, very hard to stomach. The adamant venom you average fan can have is what makes rivalries between club’s great, it can however be sad to see when directed at one of their own. It’s as if people forget all that this player has done for the club whilst besmirching him. I don’t think I was ever like that with Ruud, but have probably kept a noticeable silence on the subject after an initial outlaying of my thoughts pertaining to the whole sorry situation.

4. Kieran Richardson – Incongruous ingratitude

Kieran Richardson is the embodiment of everything a supporter does not want to see in a player lining up for his club – a player who thinks he has made it without even being on the first rung of a ladder that reaches the heavens.

He is also a slap in the face to supporters who would or have literally shed blood and tears for this club and would probably offer up a human sacrifice to the alter of Busby to have ever made it as a pro here.

He does not appreciate the honour of wearing the red shirt, he does not respect the badge, he doesn’t seem to have taken on board Keano’s public address… he doesn’t seem to understand that having a huge ******** off grin on his face after running a ball out of touch or messing up an intricate passing chain is not acceptable and will wind-up usually very fair-minded supporters who will clap and cheer a donkey wearing the red shirt…if it is giving its all…

I’m not really a match-goer these days, I don’t get to OT often, I don’t have the whole match-day blues of waking up in the dead of night (early morning ) for an away on the other side of the country and the concerns of making my way home after an 8pm away KO and all that, but if I did, Kieran Richardson would make me more angry than he does at this moment in time. If I were paying good money to see such a player half-arse a few hundred metres away I’d not be happy.

See, a trier, someone like Fletcher or Fortune, well, they get stick, but at the end of the day their effort has to be acknowledged. Not every player is an Ince, Robbo or Keano – someone who is going to sweat blood or in Robbo’s case literally injure or play on with an injury for the cause, but every type of player we have has his own way of showing that he cares.

Look at Rio, Ronaldo, Scholes, Giggs and Evra. None of this lot are going to go on a pitch and burst a blood vessel snarling and screaming like a Vidic, Gaz or Rooney would, but in their own way each of them will give you everything they can contribute within their own sphere of ability. Rio will not get stuck in on aerial play most of the time, but he takes personal pride in moping the floor with any striker he comes up against along the ground and without this vital contribution we really would be up Shit Creek on many an occasion.

Look at Ronaldo – he runs his heart out for this team, he will give you everything he has in at least one direction every single time he is out there – not only against your big 4 and in Europe, but against South-********ing-end in a CC match he could well see as beneath him.

Scholes & Giggs cannot stand making mistakes. I don’t know if that is caught on TV, but when Scholes makes a bad key pass or shot, he will be shaking his head about it for as long as it takes to correct the wrong. Giggs turns into a right little cry-baby, blaming an innocent party for a bad pass – not wanting to admit he mis-controlled it ^__^ you just see that they care, they take great pride in playing here even though they are both legends and could afford a Richardson-type smile for a rare bad play.

Moving on to Evra. This little guy got so much stick last season, he gets picked out as our weakest link because of his height… but what does he do? Yes, he rolls his sleeves up, tries even harder and is turning into an absolute stellar purchase.

In every single instance these names are bigger and better known than Richardson, yet they have double; the pride, application and drive to succeed, why is that? At which point was it that Richardson thought he had the status to buy a Bentley and park it next to Rio or Giggsy’s Aston Martin, which they earned by giving us this or that performance befitting what we pay them per week?

I usually don’t bash young players, but in this instance, just think, Richardson is older than Fletcher, Rooney and Ronaldo…. Yet he doesn’t have half the application or pride that any of them do…

I’ve said it many times before, if Richardson turns his career around here and moves away from villainous derivatives, he’ll have shocked me more than any player I’ve seen here since supporting the club.

5. Dwight Yorke – You twat!

He could easily be #1 in this list, he would be if I’d have thought it through before putting thoughts down. Yorke’s United story is the stuff of celluloid dreams. It has the lowly beginnings, the venture from obscurity to apparent greatness, the time at the top, the all-consuming ego that made it plummet back to earth and then the miserable exit from the club.

In the 1992/93 season, after United had won the league, Sir Alex Ferguson (good old Alec Ferguson at the time) walked into the dressing room and said to his players that he wanted to win this thing again, and again. He then said that he had a brown envelope with names written in it of who he thought would let success get to their head and subsequently lose the plot and be useless to him. As recounted by Mark Hughes, the players never did get to find out whether he did have this fabled brown envelope with names in, but as a psychology trick it worked wonders in geeing up the same set of players to go out there and prove him wrong the next season – although they didn’t even know if they were in this envelope or whether it even existed, they weren’t going to be the ones confronted with some back-dated envelope with their name in it.

Boy, one can only assume that this practice had long since stopped by the time Yorke got here. Once he’d had that stellar ’99 season he began to change, began the hob-knobbing with celebrity bimbos that the press got a hold of, began to have a little too much swagger and generally and obviously it began to grate and catch up with him. His game began to decline, he seemed to not really care whether he was on the bench or starting and it was only a matter of time before he’d be out of the club.

Yorkie is a villain to me because he was destined for greatness if he’d have kept his application up to the same standard it was when people weren’t sure if he was able to make it at United. Ruud might have been a sublime scoring machine, but in his way, Yorke was every bit his equal in the SS role and he could have forged an all-time partnership with Ruud if he’d have kept playing to the standard he had shown he was capable of with Cole.

He let me down, personally, I remember saying to my dad ‘he’s like a mini-Pele’ in that he could do everything to a very good standard – Yorke was adept with any ball on either side of his body; headers high or diving, bicycle kicks and acrobatic finishes, volleys, left foot and right foot drives, deft chips and so on. Obviously nowhere near Pele’s level of performance, but in his own little way Yorke was my mini-Pele and he was in heaven with all the movement behind him and technical displays circumventing.

What bugged me most about Yorke is that he, like Giggs in particular had that unique gift of being able to raise his game higher and higher for European nights. The Yorke you got in the league was not a scratch on the Yorke who could piss on any opposing defence he came up against abroad – that bugs me. The potential such players have when realised will propel them right up to at least the top of their position. Where Rivaldo made the most of his talent, Yorke went the other way. It’s a bitter pill to swallow.

I often wonder where Yorke would have stood amongst his generation if he had the thirst for continued success many of his peers did.

6. Paul Ince – The traitor

Embittered by the acrimonious split from the club he held so dear, Ince decided he’d join Liverpool upon his return from Inter. A final act of defiance that personified the character he was. I don’t think I want to go into further detail about this one.. my heart sank when he signed for them and if you want to see Utd fans who were around during his time and really felt he was an icon to that team really split in opinions and rage, just ask them about Paul Ince. Many will just launch into a blind tirade seeing his act of joining Liverpool as an overshadowing factor that makes his Utd feats almost null and void…

He’s kissed and made up with ‘The manager’ (Fergus to you or I) since then, but two proud men like that…they’ll never genuinely bury that hatchet. Ince has always been more of a hero than a villain to me. His defiant nature was key in what we were and it is something many players who played with him fed off of, I even think a bit of Ince rubbed off on the manager himself. If things could have been that little bit different…well, I guess not…cos then Ince wouldn’t be Ince anymore..


7. David Beckham – Victim of his own celebrity?

Still a legend, but also a villain to the piece in that he gave his absolute all for another shirt whilst not doing so for us before he left. So much nonsense is spouted about how Fergie shouldn’t have let Beckham go. If you have eyes and saw the ‘before glory’ and ‘after glory’ David Beckham, it’s a no-brainer.

By most reports, Beckham was Fergie’s favourite academy kid, he treated him like a son. So the reneging of the principles taught by the old man must have left a bitterly sour taste in the mouth. Those you care most about have the ability to hurt you the deepest, after all.

For me, by the end, the super-hero Beckham England got was at the cost of our Beckham, the one who had devoted his life to becoming great at the things he was good at and spent hour after hour honing his skills before the press got him. I often wonder how much it burnt the manager to see his favourite pupil playing like a man possessed for country and then coming back to club and not applying the same bluster. Aligned with the trophy wife, the press and the celebrity lifestyle, there was only one way it was going to end.

What gets me about Beckham is that he, perhaps more so than anyone else, should have known he was getting on his surrogate father’s tits and really, really pushing his luck. At that point did he even care, did he think he’d get a free pass or what? The wearing of a ********ing ‘Alice band’ to highlight ‘the boot’ episode was even more pathetic. Ole well deserved his place in the team, for out-performing Beckham in his own position and offering more of a goal threat and application Beckham, by now reserved almost exclusively for the glamour ties and England.

The way he turned out is a major disappointment when you look at how the rest of the fabled midfield have remained legends into their thirties. Beckham is almost a parody of himself now and is going to struggle to find a new club if he leaves Real. That rot set in when he left us with his newfound Galatico attitude. Giggs and Scholes are here and they are amazing. Under Fergie’s wing and whilst keeping their humility, the two of them have modified their games and taken on the role of mentors to a fledgling team. Beckham may well have been able to do that here as well if that ego hadn’t consumed him and had him believe his own hype. Whilst he had those fantastic years here and earned himself a place in the history of the club as part of one of the best midfield’s we’ve ever had, he wasted so much of himself that it leaves a neutral feeling towards him as opposed to the open celebration of all three of the remaining midfielders from that prized group.