Kevin Moran reveals how Sir Alex Ferguson told him he was being released by Man Utd in 1988

Moran could have left earlier if Sexton had got his way, when the Coventry boss approached Atkinson about doing a double deal to be reunited with his former players.

“Immediately, there was a kind of a sense of who’s going to be around?” recalled Kevin. “Who’s staying? Who’s going?

“I was linked then with leaving. I remember Dave Sexton left and went to Coventry City and he came in to buy Mike Duxbury and myself. But somebody, I don’t know who it was, said to Ron Atkinson, ‘just hold on to the two guys for a second’. I think he was willing to almost take the money and let us go and look for other players then as well because he wouldn’t have known too much about it.

“And then, in the end, both Mike and myself stayed on a lot longer than maybe expected.”

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