In an in-depth interview with GQ, former Manchester United chairman Martin Edwards has revealed that Arsène Wenger was earmarked as the man to succeed Alex Ferguson around the time he first mulled retirement during the 2000-2001 season.
The common story that has been known is that Sven-Goran Eriksson was strongly considered but according to Edwards, that was only after Wenger decided to reject them. But that was only after several meetings where the possibility was explored.
Wenger did show a little bit of interest, enough to want to meet with both Peter Kenyon and me at his home in London to listen to what we had to say. In fact, we had a couple of meetings with him and for a while we thought there was a possibility of him joining us.
But I think Wenger felt a loyalty towards David Dein. He was very close to David, and that was the reason he gave us in the end for turning down United. He felt that he had started something with Arsenal and that his attachment to the club was too great, he didn’t want to break that bond.
The ripple effects would, of course, have been huge had the leading figure in English football rode off into the sunset and the next biggest figure, jumped ship to replace him.
It adds further credence to Wenger's claims that he has been very loyal to Arsenal when you consider this as well as his rebuttal of Florentino Perez's advances to take over Real Madrid in 2009.
Whatever you may think of him and his seemingly declining ability to manage successfully at the highest level, he has been a great club man. This is something which is very much a dying breed in football.
The whole interview is worth a read as some other more surprising titbits emerge. For one, tapping up isn't solely a modern phenomenon.
This is evident in Edwards' not all that well conceived plan to lure Ferguson away from Aberdeen.
I couldn’t very well get on the phone to Aberdeen and say, ‘Hello, this is Martin Edwards from Manchester United. Can I speak with Alex Ferguson? It was (United director) Mike Edelson who suggested putting on a fake Scottish accent and claiming to be Alan Gordon, Gordon Strachan's accountant.
When the receptionist started asking personal questions about his wife and family we thought we might get rumbled, but Mike eventually got through to Alex, explained who he really was and passed the phone over to me.
Yet it worked. And a vastly successful era at United was ushered in. There were moments of tension behind the scenes though. Edwards highlights the time after Arsenal had beaten United to a league and FA Cup double in 1998 as one such moment.
In a very interesting insight considering Ferguson is widely believed to have forced David Beckham out of the club because he had developed too much of a celebrity lifestyle away from football, Edwards explains that he had similar views of the Scot at times.
In our view, outside forces, such as his celebrity status and his recent interest as a racehorse owner, had impinged too much on his time, to the detriment of his duties as manager of Manchester United.
The impression from the interview is that while Edwards raised such concerns with Ferguson, they never concerned him all that much as he would plough on regardless with his outside interests.
And ultimately, who can blame him when you look at the results? It's not as if it adversely affected his ability to do his job.
It is, however, an interesting slant on Ferguson who could be accused of having a do as I say and not as I do approach in his style of management.
