Not a bad title, eh? I mean, it has got it all. Football, a touch of “The Da Vinci Code” and the promise of secret knowledge.

Football always gets a bit of a kicking on the Raccoon Blog (do you see what I did there?). But this week Sir Alex Ferguson retired after 26 years in charge of my club, Manchester United. By any standards it is an extraordinary achievement. 26 years at the helm of what, back in 1986, was a Miss Havisham of a club, trading on past glories, and is now a global “brand”, and a multibillion business.

I met Sir Alex once, when he was plain old Alex Ferguson, in about 1989. It was at one of those so called “sportsmen’s dinners” at which men who don’t play sport pay to have a roast dinner with men who used to play sport and to hear them tell jokey anecdotes. It was a small scale affair, not more than 70 people, at an old Victorian Hotel in the North West. All proceeds for charity, so it had a purpose. There were a couple of “celebs” in the form of actors from Coronation Street, and the now Sir Alex was there too, and about on a par with them in terms of celebrity. As in, he had been on the telly, and that is about it. I spoke briefly to him, but I cannot truthfully say what about. I do, however, recall going home afterwards and being asked what he was like. I have never forgotten my reply. “Ah well,” I said “he was very nice. Much too nice to succeed at United.”

36 trophies, including 13 Premier League and 2 Champions League titles later, he stands as a living statue to my error of judgment.

Ferguson is worthy of discussion and debate on this most august of blogs because, if for no other reason, the psychology of someone who achieves that level of achievement, and for so long is worth considering. As is well known, Ferguson is the latest in a cadre of super managers who come not just from Glasgow but from an extremely narrow area of Glasgow. Busby, Shankly, Paisley and others all hail from the coal mining and ship building working classes of Glasgow. All had a fierce work ethic, and I have to wonder if that is a product of Presbyterian fierceness or a Darwinian effect, in that only the most determined, the most driven to escape the dark mines and the shop floor would make it. There have been many tributes to Ferguson’s personal warmth and kindness this week, and as my own meeting illustrates, he undoubtedly had that side to him. But I think it would be impossible to deny that he had a darker streak, a ruthless and even malevolent side that players, press, and referees have all felt.

Ferguson was never, in my book, a master tactician. His teams were built on will power, desire, and drive more than managerial brilliance, although he has had many brilliant players under his command. At the European level he was often found out tactically, and his successes were won be sheer perseverance and grit. But perhaps the measure of Ferguson’s achievement can be thrown into perspective by yesterday’s dramatic FA Cup Final win by Wigan Athletic against a lacklustre Manchester City side. Ferguson creates a mentality within his players which has often been described as “us against the world”. Whatever name you put upon it, they are elite, highly paid professionals with a common cause. To take an analogy, they are like the Foreign Legion. They may all be from different backgrounds and with different issues, and fighting in the cause of a foreign country, but they are a cohesive whole with an independent esprit de corps and collective do or die ethic, who will go into battle for their general. Manchester City is a club comprised of elite, highly paid professionals who are mercenaries. It is subtly different.

Whilst one can ponder the psychology of Ferguson, it is also the case that his reign has provided the background or “soundtrack”, as it were, to my professional life, and his resignation has provoked me to look back and reflect. There were many memories in which there was a coincidence of a football event and a personal moment of significance. Some seem inconsequential. Watching a night game in my local with a quiet pint of Robinsons ale in a local pub as United played in their, then ground breaking, sinister all black kit was a moment of peace and gentle happiness I shall not forget. Then there was being with a woman I loved beyond words on the night of the Champions League final in 1999 and her feminine incomprehension as I danced and yelled at the dramatic last minute dénouement. And, more poignantly, shortly afterwards selling my beautiful house because of the travelling commitments seeing her incurred. On the night United paraded their treble of trophies through Manchester, I walked around the emptied house in which I had been so happy, and wept. Deep in my heart I know this was wrong, and the sale – just before house prices surged – was to have a disastrous effect on my financial fortunes.

And so the departure of Sir Alex has prompted me to reflect on what lessons I have learned over those 26 years. Many, but these are some.

First, that there are wicked people in the world, and they need to be dealt with very firmly, albeit not cruelly.

Second, that you must be very careful what you allow yourself to think about, dwell upon and speak about, because these things tend to be drawn into physical existence.

Next, trust your instincts.

There are in fact many things I have learned. I have learned that it is wise not to trust noisy, showy people. I have learned that it is wise to have a budget and stick to it and to have a nice tie and nice shoes. But above all, I think I have learned this. I have also learned how to make a fine casserole, and that is important. But more importantly, I am compelled by some inner instinct (see above) to write these words.

Your goal in life is to find peace. Your purpose in life is to express compassion. I nearly wrote “love” but the British in particular have a problem with that word, which seems a bit “gooey”. But if you bear both these matters in mind, and express true compassion in your work and in your life, things will be OK.

Here endeth the lesson.

Gildas the Monk

GildasTheMonk
May 12, 2013 at 12:00

The joke if the week on Twitter is that the crowd at today’s final home game for Ferguson will all rise to applaud him in the 98th minute.
Forgot to add that in!

Bill Kenny
May 12, 2013 at 12:53

Bob Paisley from Glasgow, really?? Dont mean to be too nit picking however could you also tell me where the coal mining areas are in Glasgow?

Anna Raccoon
May 12, 2013 at 13:19

“Could you also tell me where the coal mining areas are in Glasgow?”

I believe the coal lives in the bath – baths being somewhat scarce in those parts, I guess you might not have noticed.

Elena ‘andcart
May 13, 2013 at 00:05

You beat me to it. And I actually witnessed such, during my days as a Clippy out of Ibrox Garage.

Ex-Liverpool Docker
May 12, 2013 at 18:22

Think Bob Paisley was from Hetton-le-Hole in County Durham, a real coal mining area. They’re also a tad less mouthy than the Glaswegians….

Robert
May 13, 2013 at 12:46

Bob Paisley
6 league championships
3 league cups
3 European cups
All in 9 years.

Jonathan Mason
May 12, 2013 at 13:11

Shrewd comments on Ferguson.

He really screwed up in the recent match that Man. Utd. lost against Real Madrid. Perhaps that is why he has now retired.

His team were leading by one goal when one of his players, Nani, was sent of, rather unfairly, perhaps, for lifting his foot too high. Instead of immediately producing Plan B to defend a lead with only 10 men, Ferguson went on a rant against the referee, trying to incite the spectators at the injustice of it all. Meanwhile his more nimble younger rival Jose Mourinho, manager of Real Madrid, quickly made substitutions to exploit the new gaps and immediately seized two goals and a lead that won the match. Oh, Alec, is that what twenty six years of experience taught you?

Football Dunce
May 12, 2013 at 13:51

Wot’s this Gnosticism thing? Is it a 4-4-2 formation with a sweeper or something?

Fat Steve
May 12, 2013 at 15:27

In so far as it is not insolent for a layman to suggest a Catholic author to a man of the cloth such as yourself, with your perception of the world (not of soccer though interestingly you might see his academic background and your critique of the determined Gaswegian as having some link) you might enjoy the works of Teilhard de Chardin. My apologies if you are already familar with his work. Try his quotes available on many web sites to see if he interests and then see his academic background

Ted Treen
May 12, 2013 at 15:43

” I nearly wrote “love” but the British in particular have a problem with that word, which seems a bit “gooey””

Perhaps now, Gildas but it wasn’t always so.

As the word “love” has been somewhat debased into “Luurve” in popular culture, so has its meaning, or rather the mental image it conjures, been similarly debased. And if you accuse me of being a linguistic luddite and a grammatical curmudgeon, then I confess: ’tis so.

I do know that languages develop, or we would all be speaking the language of Beowulf, but there is change and there is change.

Football Widow
May 12, 2013 at 16:15

I don’t think Fergie’s reputation ever really recovered from the toe sucking incident – or was it toe curling? But then curling is a Glasgow sport isn’t it?

Moor Larkin
May 12, 2013 at 18:43

I’m afraid my abiding memory of Ferguson will be as the man who took the most incredibly promising piece of raw football beef I had seen since Gazza and instead of cooking up a cordon bleu steak menu to remember, Ferguson’s football factory just ground Rooney up and churned out a rather expensive and somewhat tasteless sausage, instead.

Jonathan Mason
May 12, 2013 at 18:48

More of a dumpling, I would have thought.

Belsay Bugle
May 12, 2013 at 19:37

What happened to the woman you sold the house for?

binao
May 12, 2013 at 20:56

Your conclusions Gildas are unarguable.
Peace and contentment can take many forms and it’s a sight easier when we can live within our budget, however meagre. Also every kindness we do is a gain and bearing grudges is never going to lead to contentment; as my late wife said ‘always forgive, never forget’.
And love, gooey or not, I still can’t believe the chance encounter that led to meeting my late wife, and that she could want to spend her life with me.
It all puts winning the lottery into shallow perspective.
I don’t do football.

Penseivat
May 12, 2013 at 22:41

All he did was manage a football team which had a succession of millionaire and billionaire owners – and that includes those cretinous Americans. He didn’t save any lives, he didn’t bring about world peace and he didn’t even know who shot JR, so just what good was he? He didn’t enrich the people, apart from those overpaid prats who worked for him – plus that lawyer who used a deviously clever way of getting him off a motoring offence. A man who had no ability to see the other person’s point of view or acknowledge that he was not perfect. He’s retired. Oh dear, perhaps there will be another messiah who will take that football club to further heights. If not, the world will still keep revolving, the rest of the cast of Coronation Street will be discovered to be a witches coven where young children are sacrificed daily in Roy’s Rolls and Matt Baker and that Welsh woman will learn they are twins separated at birth. Going for a lie d