A promise made to Sir Alex Ferguson kept Warren Joyce at Manchester United despite a barrage of offers from elsewhere.
Two months after finally cutting his ties to join Wigan, he finds he is on his way back to Old Trafford in the fourth round of the FA Cup.
It will be a special moment for the 52-year-old Lancastrian, even if he will shun the spotlight and insist it is all about his players. With Joyce, it has always been about the players.
That was the reason he refused to abandon his work with United's Under-16s, twice a week in the evenings and on Sunday mornings, after accepting a role as caretaker player-manager of Hull City, who were adrift at the bottom of the fourth tier.