Carlos Queiroz kicks us off:
“Sir Alex can feel very proud, not just of the time he has spent here, but with what he has achieved in it. For one man to spend 18 years at a single club is very unusual. Sometimes in Portugal, where coaches can lose their jobs before the season even starts, 18 days can be considered a good achievement.
“I have moved around the world quite a lot during my own career but no matter where I go, Sir Alex is held in great esteem and is a role model for us all. He has created a template other managers try to follow and everyone can take positive lessons from the work he has done down the years.
“Sir Alex is the leader of this club. Everything that happens at Manchester United comes from him. He is the one who sets the mission for us. He presents the challenge. Everyone knows their responsibility and that is due to him.
“He creates a sense of passion and makes sure each of us knows that millions of people relate to the work we do. We care about everything we do because it has such a huge impact on so many people's lives. Dealing with the knowledge that the happiness of those people is derived from the success of our work is not easy.
“But it is something that Sir Alex has handled every day of his life for the last 18 years. That is why the achievements and milestones he has reached are so completely remarkable.”
The Guardian report that Fergie may still be around for a while:
‘Sir Alex Ferguson is wired for a few more seasons yet as manager of Manchester United. Ferguson says that he has been filled with a new vigour since having a heart pacemaker fitted in February.
‘He said that having the pacemaker fitted was the best thing he had done. 'It's a funny thing, your health. There's a little deterioration and you put it down to tiredness, the job, something like that. You don't put it down to a problem. After I got the pacemaker I felt great.
‘'When you get to your sixties, you're not guaranteed your health and if that deterioration had continued I would have quit. But so long as my health is good and I'm enjoying the job, I should carry on.'
‘Ferguson, whose 1,000th match will be the Champions League game against Lyon at Old Trafford, says that the rolling contract he signed a year ago was his idea, 'so I could pick the day when I quit'. He admits, though, that his tenure is subject to results. 'The way we're missing chances, Jesus Christ, we could be in the UniBond League.'’
The Guardian also complied some of his best quotes:
"Clubs come away from Anfield choking on their own vomit and biting their own tongues knowing they have been done by the referee" - airing his love of the institution that is Liverpool Football Club for the first time after ten-man United grabbed a 3-3 draw in 1988.
"Their effort was obscene" - after relegated West Ham had the cheek to beat United and wreck their 1992 title challenge.
"Big? It isn't big. It's magnificent! I've seen some whoppers in my time, but Dion's is something else" - his verdict on Dion Dublin's lunchbox, according to the then Coventry chairman Bryan Richardson, in 1994.
"I f*****g told yese not to ask that John. You know the rules here" - introducing John Motson to the hairdryer after Motty had the cheek to ask why Roy Keane had slugged Jan Fjortoft in 1995.
"If he was an inch taller he'd be the best centre half in Britain. His father is 6ft 2in - I'd check the milkman" - appraising Gary Neville's parentage in 1996.
"He probably started crying" - explaining why Jack Walker would not let Alan Shearer go to Old Trafford in 1996.
"He's a bully, a f*****g big-time Charlie" - warm praise for his former midfield stalwart Paul Ince in 1998.
"When an Italian says it's pasta I check under the sauce to make sure" - the old charmer limbers up for a visit to Milan in 1999.
"Football. Bloody hell" - dumbstruck after United's Treble victory in 1999.
"I'm no' f*****g talking to you. Veron's a great f***ing player. Youse are all f***ing idiots" - buttering up the press after criticism of Juan Veron in 2002.
"My greatest challenge was knocking Liverpool right off their f****n' perch... and you can print that" - responding to Alan Hansen's suggestion that regaining the title in 2002-03 would be his greatest challenge.
"Just f*****g patch him up" - Fergie's reputed instruction to the United physio after lamping a stray boot into David Beckham's face in 2003.
"It's getting tickly now - squeaky-bum time, I call it" - tickling Arsenal's undercarriage in 2003.
"Real Madrid - they have a nice draw, they must have picked it themselves. The Spanish or Italian teams don't play each other, how do you think they work that out? They don't want us in the final, that's for sure, but I'm not listening" - after United drew Real in the Big Cup quarter-final in 2003.
"Arsenal played too many draws. The best team in England? That's always debatable" - fulsome in his praise for Arsenal's 2003-04 Invincibles.
"Could I have two bullets?" - when asked two months ago 'If you had one bullet and Victoria Beckham and Arsene Wenger were in the room, what would you do?'.
And his the ten most important moments in his career:
July 1989: Selling Paul McGrath and Norman Whiteside
Ferguson inherited a club in turmoil when he joined in 1986. Ron Atkinson had pieced together a talented bunch of players, but an ill-disciplined drinking culture had blossomed. Ferguson laid down his intentions when he sold Old Trafford heroes Paul McGrath and Norman Whiteside in the summer of 1989, since when he has had spies in the pubs and clubs of Manchester checking on his players. Any subsequent players who enjoyed nightlife that little bit too much - Lee Sharpe and Dwight Yorke, for example - were removed before they could contaminate others with their lifestyle, while discipline became a key part of future successes.
May 1990: Dropping Jim Leighton before FA Cup final replay
Never has the motto that the club's success is more important than any one individual been better applied. Leighton had been Ferguson's keeper for years at Aberdeen, and the manager brought his compatriot south of the border for £750,000 in 1988. But the vaseline-eyebrowed stopper had always been susceptible to crosses and set pieces, a flaw exposed by Crystal Palace at Wembley. When Gary O'Reilly scrambled the ball home from a free-kick after indecision from Leighton, Ferguson's mind was made up - Les Sealey would replace the Scot in the replay. Sealey kept a clean sheet as United won Ferguson's first silverware, and Leighton - who was devastated, and hardly ever spoke to Ferguson again - was shipped off to Dundee. "The easiest decision was to pick Jim again," Ferguson said later. "The hard decision won us the cup."
October 1992: Signing Eric Cantona from rivals Leeds United
It seemed certain United would win their first title for 25 years in the 1991-92 season, until the team suffered a serious bout of goalscoring jitters and Leeds signed a mercurial Frenchman named Eric Cantona. At the start of the next season, the Leeds chairman made a phonecall he was to regret - inquiring as to the availability of Denis Irwin. A few minutes later, Eric Cantona was on his way across the Pennines, and a team that was still struggling to score goals had found its inspiration. Cantona was at United for five seasons, and the only year they didn't win the league in that time was the season he was suspended for four months. Enough said.
April 1994: Imposing a media ban on the team
In times of need, the team needs to be united. With supposed experts claiming United were falling apart after they had seemed set for the domestic Treble - United had lost to Aston Villa in the League Cup final, Blackburn were closing the gap at the top of the table, and Cantona was sent off twice in the space of four days - Ferguson took the mantle and said only he was allowed to speak to the media. With ranks closed and the team allowed to concentrate on on-field matters, they re-imposed themselves in the league and demolished Chelsea in the FA Cup final.
June 1995: Selling Paul Ince, Mark Hughes and Andrei Kanchelskis
Fans were outraged when three superstars were flogged in one summer, but Ferguson had already seen the future in a legendary training match between the club's youngsters and the first team. Ferguson had decided the current crop of players didn't have the necessary nous to challenge for the Champions League - already his Holy Grail - and elected to dismantle the team and groom a fresh batch for that very task. Written off after their first match, a 3-1 defeat at Villa Park - "you'll never win anything with kids," opined Alan Hansen infamously - Ferguson was proved right in the end.
Apr 1996: Playing mind-games with Kevin Keegan
Not a great coach, Ferguson's strongest asset has always been his man-management skills. But this is not limited to those in his charge, for even opposition coaches have succumbed to his wily words - none more so, of course, than Keegan. The Newcastle manager's outburst after Ferguson had dared to question the attitude of the Leeds and Nottingham Forest players is part of Premiership folklore now, but Ferguson had nagged at Keegan's consciousness long before then by regularly suggesting United could make up a 14-point deficit. Keegan tinkered with his awesome attack to counter the threat, signing Faustino Asprilla, but in the process disrupted the flow of his team. The league was United's.
Aug 1998: Signing Dwight Yorke for £12m
The Champions League continued to elude Ferguson mainly because his team couldn't break down the top defences in Europe - a 0-2 aggregate defeat to Borussia Dortmund in 1997, and a 1-1 away goals loss to Monaco in 1998 evidenced that. Ferguson thus took a calculated risk by paying big money for the unproven Dwight Yorke. But, when paired with Andy Cole, Yorke was devastating: the "Calypso Kids" tore the continent to shreds, leaving, among others, Barcelona manager Louis van Gaal shrugging his shoulders in desperation as they scored three at the Nou Camp.
Apr 1999: Making a key substitution against Inter
The draw in 1999 certainly didn't make it easy for United to reach the Champions League final. They had to escape from a group involving Barca and Bayern Munich in the days when only the top team and the best runners-up made it to the quarter-finals. There they faced the favourites Inter, who halved United's first leg 2-0 lead midway through the second-half of the second leg at the San Siro and were threatening to overrun their visitors. Ferguson stood up to his toughest test yet, replacing Ronny Johnsen - who had been playing as a defensive midfielder - with Paul Scholes in a bid to regain control of the ball, something Sven-Goran Eriksson and Arsene Wenger could note. Scholes scored with five minutes to go; the rest, as they say, is history.
Nov 2002: Forcing several top players to have operations mid-season
Having lost the league to Arsenal in 2002, the Red Devils, affected by niggling injuries, struggled to regain form at the start of the next season. An era was supposedly at an end. Then Ferguson expressed his faith in his fringe players by ordering several top stars - including Roy Keane and Nicky Butt - to have operations, knowing this would leave only a piecemeal line-up. Installing top trenchman Gary Neville as centre-back and returning the team to the spirit of the gritty old days, United clawed themselves back into contention and then, with all their big guns back, put together a devastating run to overhaul Arsenal.
June 2003: Selling David Beckham to Real Madrid
With United still unable to reconquer Europe, Ferguson decided it was time to dismantle a second team and build a third dynasty. Beckham was the first of the golden generation to leave - Nicky Butt has since followed and Ryan Giggs is rumoured to be next - after a series of fall-outs with the manager. Beckham's commercial activities had, in Ferguson's opinion, consumed him and affected his football. Critics said United missed Beckham as they again failed to win the title, but the same critics have since written off the England captain after a disappointing Euro 2004. Cristiano Ronaldo plus around £12m for a fading, ageing Beckham now seems a massive bargain. Ferguson, with Ronaldo and Wayne Rooney now under his wing, is preparing to have the last laugh once again.
Oliver Holt with a tribute(ish) in the Mirror:
‘There was something about Sky's moving tribute to Sir Alex Ferguson this week that wiped away all the petty controversies of his reign and revealed the manager in all his genius.
‘It was a reminder, if we needed it, to look at the bigger picture, ignore his hair-drier bursts of abuse and his irrational rants and concentrate on what the man has given to Manchester United and English football. Who else could talk about the sight of the adolescent Ryan Giggs flying down the wing and recall it lyrically as "a bit of silver paper floating in the wind"?
‘Who else could talk about the club as if it were somehow a living being with a swashbuckling character you couldn't change even if you wanted to? Who else could reduce his hope for how his achievements will be remembered to one simple phrase. "I hope I will have maintained the way the club is," he said.