As published by The Indie as they reflect on Fergie's 999 games:
ROLL OF HONOUR
Games played: 999. Won: 567. Drawn: 242. Lost: 190. Goals for: 1,782. Against: 944. Honours: Premier League 1992-93, 1993-94, 1995-96, 1996-97, 1998-99, 1999-2000, 2000-01, 2002-03. Champions' League 1998-99. European Cup-Winners' Cup 1990-91. Super Cup 1992. FA Cup 1990, 1994, 1996, 1999, 2004. League Cup 1992. Charity Shield 1990, 1993, 1994, 1996, 1997, 2003.
Personal: Knighted 13 June 1999.
Premiership Manager of the Year: 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 1998, 2000, 2003.
Leading scorers: Brian McClair 126; Ryan Giggs 123; Andy Cole 121; Paul Scholes 116; Ole Gunnar Solskjaer and Mark Hughes 115; Ruud van Nistelrooy 110; Eric Cantona 80.
And an extract from a piece by The Indie's Nick Townsend:
When he arrived, appropriately enough at the Manor, for his first game on a November Saturday in 1986 he was perceived as a dour renegade from across the border, the antithesis of his predecessor, Ron Atkinson, a character whose jewellery box was perceived to be larger than Tutankhamun's. Then plain Mr Alex Ferguson, he wouldn't have even contemplated donning gold bracelets. But the then 44-year-old manager, who had travelled south following his championship triumph at Aberdeen, the granite city, no doubt reflected that life would have been a good deal easier initially if he had been bequeathed a Manchester United team composed of ostentatious riches.
United then were anything but, despite an FA Cup victory the previous season. Three wins from 13 matches had deposited them in 18th place in the old First Division. Even their opposition that day, Oxford United, were in a less embarrassing plight. It was not an auspicious beginning, either: a 2-0 defeat by a team managed by the most modest man in football, the late Maurice Evans, on the first day of what has long since stopped being an era, and has instead become an eternity, did not bode well.
But then this squad was decidedly un-Manchester United-like. It contained character, in the shape of Paul McGrath, Kevin Moran and Frank Stapleton, but boasted little of the exotica that were to be cultivated in the nursery in the form of David Beckham, Paul Scholes, Ryan Giggs and the Neville brothers, or those of the calibre of Eric Cantona, purchased from outside. Together, these would be nurtured and allowed to flourish in the years that ensued.