Given how much you liked playing with him and how big an influence he was on you, how did you feel when that did blow up to such a proportion that he was forced to leave the club?

“Yeah, I was absolutely devastated and it affected everybody, including Sir Alex Ferguson. How much everyone respected and loved and admired and learned from this great player. Forget about leadership. What an unbelievable player! The best first touch you have ever seen and an unbelievable passer of the ball. People talk about talent and, first, they think about skills on the ball. Talent is epitomised by Roy Keane. He didn't do fancy tricks or that sort of thing, but he was the most dominant player on the pitch, ran the game with his personality and his heart and desire, would run through a brick wall, unbelievable passer of the ball, unbelievable stamina, unbelievable first touch, who controlled and dictated the tempo of a game. That is what you call talent. That is what you call talent in a long sentence, without trying to be too specific. People throw away comments about talent, like when you see somebody do a trick or a fancy bit of skill, and they say 'he is really talented' but it means nothing if you don't have those other things. I think all of that has been forgotten about now, without a doubt. Of course it has. We are in a generation of Twitter and YouTube and 12-second clips. Nobody watches a game for 90 minutes anymore and how somebody can control and dominate a game, and almost impact a game with their personality and will. We didn't just have Roy Keane who could do that, we had a whole team who could do that and, for me, that is why we had the best and most talented team around.”

Listen to the full episode of UTD Podcast with Darren Fletcher from Tuesday, on Deezer and all of your favourite podcast apps.