United boss has left Reds only scraps

Size, naturally, depends on your perspective.

And when Alex Ferguson first arrived at Manchester United in 1986, he hadn’t really experienced anything on that scale. In those testing first few months, he would regularly sidle up to the likes of Norman Whiteside and let out a low whistle: “Big place this. Big club.”

Of course, at that point, the scale of the challenge he was brought in to meet seemed even larger. There was no argument who the biggest team were. And it took Ferguson quite a while to realise what exactly it would take to overhaul Liverpool. As if to hammer home the point, he lost out in a succession of transfers, from Glenn Hysen to John Barnes.