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Sir Alex Ferguson’s impact on English football is unmatched, and it is more layered than it may seem at first sight.

Manchester United won 13 Premier League titles during Ferguson’s 27-year reign, along with two Champions League crowns and a huge haul of domestic cups. The Red Devils were feared for years, and almost everything they touched turned into silverware.

Under the surface, Ferguson also played a major role in shaping a generation of managers. Many of them had played for him at Old Trafford, while others had not. His readiness to offer advice and direction to managers trying to establish themselves in the game has become the stuff of legend.

Sean Dyche was one of those recipients. After a brief spell in charge of Watford, where he had also been a player, Dyche was appointed by Burnley in 2012 and went on to spend the next 10 years in charge at Turf Moor.

Ferguson was happy to extend that same generosity to the new manager.

“It started very quickly,” Dyche said on The Good, The Bad & The Football, in partnership with Midnite.

“I went to a charity gig just after [taking] the Burnley job and, to be fair, to his credit, [Ferguson] came straight over and gave me his number.

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“It was not really mentoring, because that would have suggested he was calling me all the time. It was not like that.”

The Clarets have a proud record of success, but Dyche was the man behind their biggest achievements in the modern era, taking them to the Premier League in 2014 and then again, as Championship winners, two years later.

“He did give me a brilliant bit of advice,” Dyche said.

“When we were pushing for promotion the first time at Burnley and we got to around March, I was thinking, ‘How much longer can we keep this [promotion charge] going?’

“I was worried it was going to hit the wall. So I rang him and I said, ‘What do you think?’

“He said: ‘Tell everyone how fit you are, how strong you are, and how relentless you are going to be this season. I said that about Manchester United and I had no foundation – I just put it out there. Keep saying it, and saying it, and saying it.’”

Driven by Dyche and helped by 21 league goals from Danny Ings, Burnley secured automatic promotion in second place behind Leicester City, ending the 2013-14 season on 93 points and finishing eight points ahead of third-placed Derby County.

They lost only two Championship matches after the turn of the year, both at home, and began 2014 on a run of 15 league games without defeat.

“We just kept winning, and winning, and winning,” recalled the former Burnley boss.

Dyche’s side were relegated from the Premier League the following season, but they won the Championship again in 2015-16, once more finishing on 93 points. They stayed in the top flight until 2022 and went down weeks after Dyche was dismissed.

Burnley have been either promoted or relegated in every season since then.

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