IT is over a decade since he left the dugout but Sir Alex Ferguson has lost none of his sense of timing.
When to sell, when to buy, when to change and ultimately when to go, Fergie has always been in a class of his own.
Over the years there were countless decisions which had everyone scratching their head — but Sir Alex always knew the time was right.
Some were more obvious than others. Like the night Manchester United won the Treble on the back of his substitutions.
Others less so, like the summer of 1995 when terrace legends Mark Hughes, Paul Ince and Andrei Kanchelskis were sold at the peak of their powers.
The whole of football thought the manager had lost his marbles.
But Fergie knew better, as he chose that year to unleash his “you win nothing with kids” Double heroes.
Just as he knew best when it came to right-hand men.
Brian Kidd, Steve McClaren, Archie Knox and Co — an endless list of world-class coaches who all came and went.
And, of course, the biggest decision of all. Calling time on 26 years in which he had gone from the brink of the bullet to English football’s greatest-ever gaffer.
The majority of people are convinced Ferguson stepped down because he knew United’s era of dominance was over.
Maybe not the nosedive to come but certainly that an almighty rebuild was just around the corner. Another mass overhaul, yet not one he was prepared to oversee.
Now another end has arrived. Not as dramatic or as out-of-nowhere, admittedly, but an end nonetheless.
Next summer Fergie will leave his 12-year role as global ambassador. Many see it as the most ruthless swing of Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s cost-cutting axe — and they are wrong.
For while he is trying to save every penny in making United great again — how’s that going, Sir Jim? — Ferguson has not suddenly and callously been told he is surplus to requirements.
This decision was a two-way call. An amicable parting. Football’s own conscious uncoupling, in Chris Martin and Gwyneth Paltrow lingo.
And not, incidentally, a departure which means we will no longer see Fergie at Old Trafford on a matchday.
That simply will not happen. He will still be there rain, wind or shine . . .
Only now as a high-profile non-executive director, rather than a man with the ear — and the sway — behind the owners’ biggest decisions.
Like he was when urging United to re-sign Cristiano Ronaldo in 2021.
Admittedly not his finest hour, rather an indication of the influence he still retained.
Back then, until just before Ratcliffe and his Ineos team arrived, in fact, Ferguson had the owners’ ear. Almost a hotline to the Glazer family, you could say.
And those days are done.
Not that Sir Alex is bereft at the thought. For a start, some of the staff sackings have enraged the Scot — long-serving photographer John Peters and kitman Alec Wylie, for example.
This is not a cosy-cosy relationship with Ratcliffe being severed.
If anything, it is closer to the opposite. And as Fergie the Red, in every sense The Boss — those who played under him still call him that — knows, trousering £2million or so a year in such tight times is not a good look.
Fair enough, not an amount anyone would turn down in normal circumstances.
Yet when many in the steerage class are losing their livelihoods, it is not something that would have sat well with him.
There is also the practical side of things as well.
At the end of December, Sir Alex will be 83 years old, albeit still a freakishly fit 83 years old.
Yet even though the grey matter remains oh-so-sharp and the mind clear as a bell, the bones grow creakier and even Superman had to put his feet up on occasion.
That does not mean you will not see shots of Fergie alongside Ratcliffe at various points — Sir Jim loves too much the associated glamour of being pictured with the greatest.
But any idea of Sir Alex having an emperor’s thumbs-down power has gone for good — and quite frankly that is something which suits both sides.
