Coach Rene Meulensteen has conceded that he was keen to keep his role with Manchester United, even after David Moyes had taken charge of the club earlier this summer.

The Dutchman had spent 12 years at Old Trafford, spending the last five with the first team alongside Sir Alex Ferguson.

However, following Ferguson's departure at the end of last season and the subsequent arrival of Moyes from Everton, the 49-year-old was told that his services were no longer required.

Speaking about Moyes's decision, Meulensteen believes that he should have been given at least 12 months to prove that he could have been an asset to the new regime.

"I felt very strongly that the picture painted to us [by the club] was not the one that came out in meetings with David Moyes," Meulensteen told The Telegraph. "I said to him: 'David, with all due respect, you've done a fantastic job in the Premier League with Everton but do you realise you're going from a yacht to a cruise ship?' Ferguson, the captain, had a good crew with coaches like me.

"I felt David wanted familiar faces which he is entitled to but it would have been absolutely no problem if he said: 'I definitely need Jimmy Lumsden as a sounding board but, hold on a minute, this cruise ship has been sailing successfully with this crew for the last five years so I might as well sail along with them for a season and see how it goes.'

"It saddened me leaving. I had the best job in the world there. I loved every aspect of working with those top players. I know the team inside out, the club inside out."

Meulensteen recently spent 16 days as manager of Russian side Anzhi Makhachkala before he was sacked as part of owner Suleiman Kerimov's budget cuts.