Sir Alex Ferguson told Harry Redknapp to stop playing Gareth Bale during the Welshman's notorious winless run at Tottenham Hotspur.
Bale retired from football in January last year, after a legendary football career involving stints at Southampton, Tottenham, Real Madrid and Los Angeles FC. While he went on to win trophy after trophy after his record breaking £85.3m move to the Bernabeu, Bale's career threatened to spiral in his early years at White Hart Lane.
He endured a now notorious winless run of 24 matches, which saw Tottenham fail to win a match when he was on the field, either as a starter or a substitute. With all of the media attention and stick from opposition fans he was receiving. Bale was playing under huge pressure.
Redknapp arrived at Tottenham while the then left-back was enduring this difficult spell. He persisted with deploying Bale on a regular basis.
However, during a conversation with the legendary Manchester United manager, Ferguson told him to stop picking Bale, as he was evidently an unlucky presence within the team. Redknapp decided to ignore the Scotsman and put his trust in the ex-Wales captain. It proved to be the perfect decision.
Speaking to Mirror Football while visiting Kellogg's Football Camps – a UK-wide summer football programme for local kids – Redknapp said: "When I first got to the club, he had played 20 odd games and had never been on the winning team.
"I remember Alex [Ferguson] saying to me: 'I wouldn't pick him, Harry, he is unlucky' because he had played around 24 games and had never ever been on a winning team, since he had been at Tottenham, which is an incredible record.
"Not that it was his fault, it was just the way it had worked out. If he came off the bench, they didn't win, and if he started they didn't win.
"Eventually, we broke that voodoo and never looked back. His confidence grew and he became an amazing footballer."
Bale's career trajectory skyrocketed after Redknapp moved him from left-back to left-wing. In one of his most memorable performances in a Spurs shot, Bale scored a second half hat-trick against Inter Milan, soon after 10-man Spurs had gone in at half-time 4-0 down.
Looking back on that evening Redknapp said: "Over that period, he was the third-best player in the world, behind Messi and Ronaldo.
"He destroyed the best right-back in the world. Maicon was arguably the best right-back in the world at the time and Gareth almost finished his career.
"We brought them back to White Hart Lane and he destroyed them again. Maicon never recovered from that. Gareth just went on and got better and better. The whole world saw him that night and realised what a player that was."