While Alex Ferguson did fall out with quite a few players during his long tenure at Manchester United, he did mostly get it right when it came to managing the personalities in the Old Trafford dressing room.
With United usually possessing very deep squads during his time in charge, it often meant that some top quality footballers struggled for minutes at one time or another. This meant that Ferguson had to keep those players on side, ones who could go on to play a key role at later stages of the campaign.
Sometimes that meant striking a player's ego in order by giving rather off explanations as to why they are not playing.
READ HERE: 15 Big Name Players That Were Eligible To Play For Ireland
Keane Reveals Ferguson Gave Mad Excuse For Leaving Out Man United Star
Manchester United had a number of squad players that played major roles in their success down through the years, with Alex Ferguson usually managing such first team members incredibly well, even if it meant giving them bizarre excuses as to why they were not playing as much as they would have liked.
Speaking on The Overlap in partnership with Sky Bet, Roy Keane recalled one particular excuse Ferguson gave to Nicky Butt as to why he was not in the Manchester United team.
A manager's job is trying to stroke people's egos, you have to leave people out in big cup finals. There is that constant tension there at a big club.
That's what great managers do, they do manage that. Whether they do it rightly or wrongly sometimes, but the majority of times they get it right.
The situation you were having, that was going on with other players at the club. The strikers we mentioned that were sitting here, [Andy] Cole was talking about his stuff with Ferguson. All that is going on...
The lads have told stories about when they were left out of big games, [Nicky] Butt has told me stories, [Steve] Bruce. The stuff the manager has told then on why he was leaving them out, you're scratching your head.
I'm not just talking about Man United, but managers almost have to lie to players...
Butt had a great one. Remember, Butt is an England international. [Ferguson] said to Butt 'I'm leaving you out at the moment, I want to save you for when the pitches get really heavy, for when the pitches get really heavy in the winter'. Butt always said that.
That's certainly an interesting excuse.
Nicky Butt would play a big role for Manchester United during his time at the club, meaning the way he was treated by the manager clearly did the trick.
SEE ALSO: Should Heimir Hallgrimsson Be Worried About Ireland's Goalkeeping Situation?
