For a footballer with a glorious past at Old Trafford, Paul Ince returns to Manchester United on Saturday as Reading manager, and a man trapped on the wrong side of history. Since he last played for United, he has captained Liverpool: indeed his penultimate goal for Liverpool was an 89th-minute equaliser against United in 1999, which might have cost them the treble. Some don’t celebrate when they score against their former clubs. Not Ince. As he later remembered: “I went bananas in front of the Kop.”
If Ince has long shown a tendency to create enemies – West Ham fans never forgave him for posing in a United shirt before his move to Old Trafford was sealed – a status as the United talisman who crossed the great divide is not entirely his fault. “They sold me and broke my heart,” Ince later said. Sir Alex Ferguson recalled he was “Public Enemy No 1” for getting rid of Ince in 1995 – to Inter Milan, not Liverpool – but it proved a move that cemented his own legend. It was Ferguson’s greatest gamble, and led to his greatest triumphs. Alan Hansen infamously pronounced that United could not win anything with kids; they promptly won the double whereas Ince’s final two games brought disappointment in the Premier League title race and the FA Cup final.
