sport news Marouane Fellaini departs Manchester United for China with plenty of respect

Like the slow-burner action movie or the novel impenetrable for the first 100 pages, it took quite some time to properly make sense of Marouane Fellaini.

Gangly, gauche, fuzzy-haired, all flailing limbs and sharpened elbows, the Belgian was, at face value, the complete antithesis of a Manchester United footballer.

A paradox, too, because although Fellaini became something of a totem for United's decline post-Sir Alex Ferguson, he became in the end indispensable to the first three managers unfortunate enough to succeed the great Scot.

He had already won the admiration of David Moyes when he became something of a desperation deadline day signing from Everton in the summer of 2013 after United missed out on Toni Kroos, Cesc Fabregas and Ander Herrera.

Following his appointment in 2014, Louis van Gaal told Fellaini he was 'not my first choice, not my second, nor my third' yet the utility man soon won the Dutchman over to become a regular.

And in Jose Mourinho's first season, Fellaini actually made more appearances than ever before and would end up playing the entirety of the Europa League final win that returned United to the Champions League.

Yet it isn't really a surprise that Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, in seeking to restore the standards of Ferguson's time to Old Trafford, has jettisoned the 31-year-old, who is now bound for Chinese club Shandong Luneng for £10.4million.

Fellaini always divided opinion among the Old Trafford faithful but was largely the victim of circumstances and misapprehensions that were no fault of his own.

It wasn't Fellaini's fault that he was an eleventh-hour deadline day arrival - and an expensive one at £27.5m when Everton dug their heels in - after Ed Woodward's bungling in the market saw United miss all their primary targets.

That seemed to get him off on the wrong foot with fans, who saw his signing as seriously underwhelming. His inadequacy for the United shirt seemed to be confirmed when he was outclassed by Yaya Toure in a 4-1 derby drubbing at City.

When Moyes departed after just nine months and United finished down in seventh, Fellaini unwittingly became the symbol of United's brutal reality check post-Fergie.

And it wasn't Fellaini's fault that he was used for some time as United's shameless Plan B or even Plan C when the going got a bit tough.

Summoned from the bench for yet another salvage mission with United trailing, Fellaini's sole instruction was to trigger chaos and confusion.

Whether used in his familiar midfield position or as an auxillary striker or defender, Fellaini would willingly throw his weight around, swing his arms about and make things awkward for a tiring opposition. Often, it worked as well.

He was successful because he was so different to the slick, creative, tactically astute modern midfielder that rivals didn't quite know how to deal with him.

As Wayne Rooney pointed out, Fellaini was 'the best in the world at what he does.' 

Liverpool's Steven Gerrard, a regular rival, just said: 'He's horrible'.

While United purists squealed with disgust, those in the know behind the scenes came to admire Fellaini's professionalism in training, his extra hours in the gym, his loyalty to managers and his dedication to the cause.

In truth, his Old Trafford exit has been some years in the making but his loyalty to managers on a hiding to nothing like Mourinho has delayed it until now.