Solskjaer, who announced his retirement earlier this week, has been recruited as forwards coach by manager Sir Alex Ferguson and has already started work.

After just two goals in United's opening four league games, Fergie said: "It was interesting, because as soon as I told Ole I wanted him to help us with coaching, in particular with the strikers, he said 'It's okay, I've got all the DVDs'.

"He'd got our sports science department to get him all the DVDs of all the strikers - Carlos Tevez, Wayne Rooney, Paul Scholes, all of them. So right away he was into it, which is fantastic."

Fergie admitted Solskjaer's decision to retire had not come as a surprise. The Norway striker had to concede defeat in his four-year battle against a knee injury.

"It had become a bit inevitable, watching him try to come back from his latest operation," said Fergie. "He realised he had given everything he could.

"Ole always understood a coach's job in terms of the difficulty of picking a team. He always understood why I sometimes left him on the bench. I never needed to explain why.

"When we played Spurs on Sunday, I told Chris Eagles and Dong Fangzhou, two of our young subs, to watch the game and I'd rap their knuckles if I caught them talking.

"They watched the game, concentrated on everything that happened, which is what Ole used to do. That's the legacy he's left us."