Page 76 - Alex Ferguson: My Autobiography

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I WAS at home on a snowy January night in 2010 when my phone beeped with a text message. ‘I don’t

know whether you remember me,’ it started, ‘but I need to call you.’ Ruud van Nistelrooy. Christ,
what was this? I said to Cathy, ‘He left four years ago.’ Cathy’s reply: ‘What’s he wanting? Maybe
he’d like to come back to United.’
‘No, don’t be silly,’ I told her.
I had no idea what it might be. But I texted him back: OK. So he rang. First, the small talk. Had

some injuries, fit now, not getting a game, blah blah. Then he came out with it. ‘I want to apologise
for my behaviour in my last year at United.’
I like people who can apologise. I’ve always admired that. In the modern culture of self-
absorption, people forget there is such a word as sorry. Footballers are cocooned by the manager and
the club, the media, agents, or pals who just tell then how flipping good they are. It’s refreshing to
find one who can pick up a phone much later and say, ‘I was wrong, and I’m sorry.’
Ruud offered no explanation. Perhaps I should have taken that chance to say, ‘Why did it go that

way?’
Mulling over Ruud’s call to me, that winter night, I knew that two or three Premier League clubs
were looking at him, but couldn’t see that being a reason for him wanting to speak to me. There would
have been no need for him to repair his relationship with Manchester United in order for him to play
for another club in England. Perhaps it was a guilt complex. It might have been playing on his mind
for ages. Ruud was doubtless a more mature person by that stage.

The first sign of trouble in our relationship had been that Ruud had started to mouth off all the time
to Carlos Queiroz about Ronaldo. There were a few stand-up confrontations, but nothing
unmanageable. Then Ruud switched his fire to Gary Neville. Gary was ready for that and won the
battle. David Bellion was another who seemed to arouse anger in Ruud. There were quite a few
altercations all the way through his final season with us, but it was mainly Van Nistelrooy on
Ronaldo.
At the end of the previous season, 2004–05, we had reached the final of the FA Cup, against

Arsenal. Van Nistelrooy had a horrible game. The previous Wednesday his agent, Rodger Linse, had
sought out David Gill and asked for a move. ‘Ruud wants to leave.’
David pointed out that we had a Cup final on the Saturday, and that perhaps this wasn’t the best
moment for our main centre-forward to ask to leave. David asked why he wanted to go. Rodger
Linse’s reply was that Van Nistelrooy thought the team had stagnated and didn’t believe we could win
the Champions League. His view was that we couldn’t win the European Cup with young players –

the likes of Rooney and Ronaldo.
After the Cup final, David called Rodger and asked him to get Ruud in for a meeting with me. Our