The legendary striker has followed in Ole Gunnar Solskjaer's footsteps by quickly generating a wave of positivity at Old Trafford after a grim period

If nostalgia is a drug, then Manchester United are addicts. Every aspect of the club is consumed with the past. The Old Trafford faithful chant about Andy Cole and Eric Cantona each week, and it has been said that some players are upset that supporters only want to sing about the former greats rather than members of the current squad. Their merchandising department also know that United fans can't get enough of days gone by, recently launching a new range of adidas Originals celebrating George Best, after reissuing the 1991-92 home and away kits with great success.

The players who were a part of United's greatest eras are all too happy to oblige, and media companies roar them on. Amazon Prime made a three-part series about the 1999 treble win this year and Disney is in discussions with the club about making more documentaries about the good old days. Gary Neville and Roy Keane are on the Overlap every week telling well-worn tales from the dressing room and about Sir Alex Ferguson's fiery temper, and the shows are immensely popular (1.3 million views for a recent episode with Peter Schmeichel).

The recruitment department have also binged on nostalgia, getting Ole Gunnar Solskjaer back as interim coach in 2018 and then handing him a long-term contract, before signing Cristiano Ronaldo in 2021. They indulged their love for the past again in 2023 by signing Jonny Evans. The arrival of Sir Jim Ratcliffe and INEOS was expected to put a stop to this indulgence, but even the new co-owners could not resist and sanctioned Erik ten Hag's appointment of Ruud van Nistelrooy as assistant coach.

And now Van Nistelrooy is the club's head coach, albeit only for a few weeks before Ruben Amorim takes charge. With chants of 'Ruud, Ruud, Ruud' echoing around, Old Trafford has been transported back to the mid-00s. And boy does it feel good.

Getty Images SportEuphoric start

Van Nistelrooy looked destined for the top job at Old Trafford as soon as he joined Ten Hag's staff in the summer and even though he is relatively inexperienced and left his last role with PSV Eindhoven after just one year, there was great enthusiasm from fans on social media when he was named interim coach. The enthusiasm turned into euphoria after the Red Devils crushed Leicester City 5-2.

It was the archetypal performance from an out-of-form team who have just parted with their manager and it looked like a real burden had been lifted. Having missed a series of glaring chances in Ten Hag's last game against West Ham, everything United touched turned into goals. It brought back memories of United's 5-1 win at Cardiff City in Solskjaer's first game as interim boss following the sacking of Mourinho.

Everyone at Old Trafford – save for the travelling Leicester fans – was grinning ear to ear, including Ferguson. Van Nistelrooy said "it's always great" to see his former manager, who had wished him luck before the game. He was conveniently glossing over his bitter fallout with the Scot 18 years previously after being left on the bench for the League Cup final, but this was not a night to bring up bad blood. It was a love-in, a celebration of United's rich past that was just the tonic after a grim last few months, if not years, under Ten Hag.

AdvertisementGettyBeware the nostalgia trap

The positive vibes felt a lot like the early days of Solskjaer's reign, when United won eight games in a row in all competitions and the Norwegian rode a wave of optimism, healing the wounds from Jose Mourinho's tense final weeks in charge. The mistake United made was to misinterpret that incredible run as a sign that Solskjaer was a genuinely gifted manager and not just the right man at the right time. Instead they fell right into the nostalgia trap by making Solskjaer Mourinho's permanent successor,

The wheels were already starting to come off when Solskjaer signed his permanent contract on March 28, 2019, suffering a first Premier League in three months by losing at Arsenal and then getting knocked out of the FA Cup by Wolves. Having won 14 of their first 17 games under Solskjaer, they went on to win just two of their next 12, losing eight times.

Solskjaer did go on to guide United to back-to-back top three finishes, something no other manager has done since Ferguson, but it was clear he was largely being kept on due to his ties to the club as a player and the fact he had won them the Champions League in 1999. The Norwegian talked a good game when it came to United's history and identity, but he was a poor in-game coach.

Buying a 36-year-old Ronaldo, who Solskjaer had played with, was the ultimate nostalgia trip. "It felt so right but turned out wrong," was how Solskjaer put it. Within two months of Ronaldo's return, the Norwegian had been sacked. Little more than a year later, Ronaldo was gone too.

Getty Images SportFree hit

The good thing about United's arrangement with Van Nistelrooy is that it is certain to only be temporary. The Dutchman's presence restores a feel-good factor to the club but this time the club hierarchy cannot get carried away by good results. Amorim is on his way at the end of the month regardless of how the former striker fares and the next three games, all at Old Trafford, are a free hit.

Win them all and Van Nistelrooy will boost his chances of joining Amorim's coaching staff or getting a permanent job elsewhere. Even if he loses the next three, it will not damage his status among fans and the onus will still be on Amorim to clean up the mess.

Amorim was the only candidate United interviewed after deciding that they would sack Ten Hag and a club source emphasised that the 39-year-old represents "a notably different profile" to the other United managers that have sat in the Old Trafford dugout. That could be interpreted as a message that the Portuguese, who was also described as "a proven winner" and "the best young coach in Europe", is at the cutting edge of modern coaching and will be able to successfully diagnose United's problems while creating a winning formula.

Getty Images Sport'We'll be a team'

Renowned for always playing a 3-4-3 formation and using wing-backs, Amorim will play a very different style of football to Ten Hag and to Solskjaer. His fresh eyes should serve the team well and Diogo Dalot believes he will be a great fit.

"He's obviously a fantastic coach, young mentality but he knows what he wants," the full-back told . "Very demanding, that's what I can expect and I think that's a perfect match for a club like this. The standards are really high. I hope it can be a really good match and I wish for us to win together. We are going to be a team. We have to work with each other and we will help him in some ways and I am sure he will help us."

Dalot's words could be interpreted as a dig at Ten Hag, whose authoritarian tendencies rubbed a few players up the wrong way. United did indeed look like much more a team in Van Nistelrooy's first game, even though the tactics and ideas were rather similar to what Ten Hag had offered. That is no criticism of Van Nistelrooy, who had just two days to prepare for the game and knows he will not be sticking around for very long.