FERGIE & KENNY: Mick Duxbury was present at very start of two of the greatest managerial reigns

They are two of the most remarkable reigns in Premier League history, and Mick Duxbury was present at the very start of both.

Duxbury may have never played in the Premier League, but the defender was there on the day that Ferguson walked into Old Trafford in 1986, then on the day that Dalglish swept into Ewood Park five years later.

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If there is one frustration for Duxbury, it is that he never won the league himself during his professional career.

A desire for regular football saw him depart both clubs before their glory days truly took hold.

“I could have been a bit of a catalyst, I left United and they went on to win things, and I left Rovers and they went on to win things!” he laughs now.

Duxbury - now a PE teacher at Bolton School - will tell the story of his career in his autobiography, due to be released in October and entitled ‘It’s Mick, not Mike’.

“I’ve always been called Mike Duxbury but if you speak to family, it’s always been Mick,” the 55-year-old explains.

“Maybe a journalist wrote Mike one day and it just stuck. But it doesn’t bother me, I’ve been called worse so Mick or Mike is not too bad!”

Born in Accrington and a pupil at St Mary’s College in Blackburn, Duxbury was signed by United after impressing for the Blackburn town team.

He had made his debut in 1980 and won the FA Cup twice by the time that Ferguson arrived, as a replacement for Ron Atkinson.

“I didn’t know too much of Sir Alex at the time,” Duxbury recalls. “Obviously he’d done well with Aberdeen, breaking the Celtic-Rangers dominance and winning the European Cup Winners’ Cup as well.

“His first day at United was a bit manic. You’ve got the press around and he was wanting to impress.

“He knew a few players but not all of us. He impressed on us that he was going to be his own man, that he had his own ideas and he was hopefully going to carry those through.

“He came across as very pleasant and mild-mannered, but there was another side of him and one or two players mentioned, ‘You haven’t seen that yet’.”

In 27 years at Old Trafford, Ferguson became renowned for his authoritarian approach - including the infamous ‘hairdryer’ treatment, when he was said to shout at players from close range in the dressing room.

“I think Mark Hughes named it the hairdryer,” Duxbury says. “I don’t think it came too early, he did take his time to make changes at the club.

“What changed and made him snap, I don’t know. But it wasn’t too often, and he’s not the only one who does that. Nobody is going to argue with the record he had at Manchester United.”

Ferguson’s methods were hugely successful, as United would go on to win an astonishing 13 Premier League titles under his management, the first in 1993.

Duxbury says: “Right at the start it was hard to imagine he would have such success, because we had a period of struggling in the league.

“There was no cup success and in those first three years it’s been well documented that if he hadn’t won the FA Cup in 1990 he might not have survived.

“There was certainly a lot of pressure at that time, but luckily we won it in 1990.

“That was my last involvement with United.”

Duxbury had provided a crucial assist for a late winner in a fourth round win at Hereford in that cup run, although he missed out on a place on the bench in the final.

“I was gutted,” he admits. “It would have been a nice way to finish but Sir Alex always said that sentimentality never came into his decisions.

“I had an idea I was leaving. He had told me, ‘You can stay but you probably won’t play as many matches’. I’d had a great time there so it was probably the right time to go.”

Duxbury signed for Blackburn Rovers after getting in contact with manager Don Mackay.

“I was going to sign for Wolves but we didn’t want to move,” he said. “I just got in touch with Blackburn and Don Mackay, we met up and I signed for them.

“There was no mention of Jack Walker at that time but they’d done well, they’d had the two promotion chances before that and just missed out in the play-offs.”

Duxbury admits though that after 14 years at United, he struggled to settle in at Ewood.

He said: “From it being not a job, I’m not saying I didn’t enjoy it at Blackburn but it became a little bit more work. Maybe it was an age thing, maybe it was the wrench of leaving United.

“It wasn’t the best that first season at Blackburn, we weren’t anywhere near getting into the play-offs.

“We went to Stirk House and had a celebration that we’d avoided relegation. Jack Walker was there saying, ‘Well done lads, you’ve avoided it this time’.”

But things would change dramatically early in the 1991/92 campaign, when Mackay was replaced as Rovers manager by Dalglish.

Duxbury played in Dalglish’s first two games at Rovers before injury ended his involvement.

“Kenny came in and Ray Harford, and I can remember training under them and enjoying it,” Duxbury says.

“It was great when Kenny arrived with all the hype, and the backing of Jack Walker.

“I don’t think he made too many major signings early on, he made one or two very good ones in good positions and that helped them through. But you could see things. With Jack’s influx and the money, done right, success was going to happen.

“For me though I got this injury, a broken bone in my ankle. I had to get that done and then things didn’t really get back into place after that.

“Then they had the momentum for promotion, I went on loan to Bradford and made a decision to get full-time football there.

“When I went there I was hoping to try to play every single game of the season and it didn’t happen, probably with age.

“I didn’t show them what I should have done through one reason or another.

“That was a disappointment to myself, but it wasn’t through lack of trying.”

Duxbury had departed by the time that 1991/92 season reached its conclusion, with Rovers beating Leicester at Wembley to secure promotion. Dalglish’s side would win the Premiership title only three years later.

Are there any regrets about leaving United and Rovers just before success took hold?

“I could have stayed at United and been part of winning the Cup Winners’ Cup the year after,” he said. “I might not have got to win the league, but who knows?

“Then at Blackburn I could have stayed and not played but been part of it, but is that what I wanted? I just wanted to play football.”

Tomorrow: Beating Brazil at the Maracana, THAT John Barnes goal, and how Gazza’s dentist chair incident overshadowed Duxbury’s final match