Several people have criticised this current Manchester United team and said they are not as good as our previous title winning squads.

Sir Alex Ferguson has dismissed those claims and pointed to the huge points total we have amassed, insisting that it is nostalgia which leads people to believe this team doesn’t have the quality of others.

“I think it’s dead easy to say that,” he shrugged. “Nostalgia plays tricks on people’s minds, without doubt. You do it yourself. How many times have you said: ‘Ah, when I was a boy, things weren’t the same’? Put it in context: we’ve now got 84 points with four games left and we’ve never done that. We’ve won most of our games, drawn three, lost four and the goal [van Persie’s second] tonight… it doesn’t matter where you place that in terms of all the great goals we’ve scored, from David Beckham, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, Eric Cantona… That pedestal is there, the players have joined that pedestal. We’ve got some young, exciting players – you’ve seen how De Gea’s improved over the season into an outstanding goalkeeper, young Rafa, you saw Jones tonight… arguably the way he’s looking, he could be our best ever player.”