Martin O’Neill picks Man Utd favourite as best player he’s ever coached, Sir Alex ‘would have done anything’ to keep him

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Manchester United fans are getting used to a sobering reality that the current crop of players is nowhere near good enough, which hurts even more because the legacy they follow is glittering.

There hasn’t been sustained success at the club since the 2012/13 season when Sir Alex Ferguson walked off into the sunset with his final Premier League title.

Sir Alex rebuilt the whole squad multiple times over his 26 years at the helm which means multiple generations of world-class players and legends who formed the spine of these teams.

Legendary Northern Irish manager Martin O’Neill has now chosen one of those former Man Utd men as the best player he’s ever coached.

Sir Alex Ferguson is on record saying how he would have done anything to keep him at the club for longer than he did.

Martin O’Neill’s best player he ever coached

Often, it’s not about how long a player was at the club but it’s more about what they did during their time. That is true at Old Trafford too.

Somebody like Diego Forlan will forever be an icon for his heroics against Liverpool at Anfield, even though his general spell was underwhelming.

The opposite is true for Carlos Tevez, a key contributor to a thrilling United attack who is forever a villain for the red side of Manchester.

Martin O’Neill named the best player he’s ever coached while speaking on The Overlap and his choice was a player who had a short but sweet stay at the club.

O’Neill picked the legendary Swede Henrik Larsson, who he managed to record-breaking goalscoring spells in Scotland with Celtic.

He said: “The best player I ever coached? The one who pulled me out of trouble the most was Henrik Larsson, the sheer number of goals. Lots of great players but if you’re talking about goalscoring…Henrik Larsson.”

Henrik Larsson, a Man Utd favourite

Larsson, of course, had a fateful three-month loan at United at the start of 2007 where he managed three goals in 13 appearances.

However, the true impact of his stay was way beyond his raw stats, with his professionalism, dressing room presence, leadership, and attitude rubbing off on a then-transitioning United squad.

Sir Alex was so impressed at the time that he publicly claimed he would have done anything to keep him at the club for longer, but Larsson had given his word to his parent club.

He had the best years of his career at Celtic, under Martin O’Neill too, where he scored goals for fun as Celtic ran roughshod over the league.

However, it’s a testament to his character that even a club like United, with legends and icons galore, claims him as one of their own despite just 13 appearances in a three-month loan spell.