Here are some of his most memorable
quotes:

On his mission after being appointed to the
post:
"My greatest challenge is not what's
happening at the moment, my greatest
challenge was knocking Liverpool right off
their f***ing perch. And you can print
that."

On Manchester City's emergence as a
Premier League force:
"There has been a lot of expectation on Manchester City and with the spending they have done, they have to win something. Sometimes you have a noisy neighbour and have to live with it. You can't do anything about them."

On Jose Mourinho: "He was certainly full of it, calling me 'Boss' and 'Big Man' when we had our post-
match drink after the first leg. But it would help if his greetings were accompanied by a decent glass of wine. What he gave me was paint-stripper."

On Arsene Wenger: "They say he's an intelligent man, right?
Speaks five languages. I've got a 15-year-old boy from the Ivory Coast who speaks five languages!"

On Rafael Benitez: "I think he is very concerned about his CV, he refers to it quite a lot."

On his bust-up with Newcastle boss Alan Pardew: "The press have had a field day. The only person they have not spoken to is Barack
Obama because he is busy."

On the infamous incident during which
former midfielder David Beckham was
struck on the head by a flying boot: "It was a freakish incident. If I tried it 100 or a million times it couldn't happen again.
If I could I would have carried on playing!"

On the mind games employed by Italian
teams: "When an Italian tells me it's pasta on the
plate, I check under the sauce to make
sure. They are the inventors of the
smokescreen."

On AC Milan striker Filippo Inzaghi: "That lad must have been born offside."

On seeing Ryan Giggs as a schoolboy: "I remember the first time I saw him. He was 13 and just floated over the ground like a cocker spaniel chasing a piece of silver paper in the wind."

On Wayne Rooney's decision to sign a new contract: "Sometimes you look in a field and you see a cow and you think it's a better cow than
the one you've got in the field."

On Real Madrid's hopes of signing Cristiano
Ronaldo: "Do you think I would get into a contract
with that mob? Jesus Christ, no chance. I
wouldn't sell them a virus."

On United's dramatic Champions League
final victory over Bayern Munich in 1999: "Football, bloody hell."

On retirement: "The decision to retire is one that I have thought a great deal about and one that I
have not taken lightly. It is the right time."