Manchester United were drifting towards mid-table obscurity on the morning of Nov. 26, 1992.
Six months after capitulating in the final weeks of the season, when three defeats in the space of six days saw the club surrender their chance of a first league title in 25 years, Alex Ferguson's team sat eighth in the Premier League, one point above Coventry and nine points adrift of leaders Norwich.
A 1-0 defeat at home to Wimbledon on Oct. 31, in front of just 32,622 fans at Old Trafford, saw United booed off.
Out of Europe, a first-round UEFA Cup exit against Torpedo Moscow, Ferguson had also lost striker Dion Dublin to a broken leg and the Wimbledon defeat was the moment when he realised that something had to change.
So he picked up the telephone and tried to sign David Hirst. And failed.
Not even a £4 million offer, which would have made him the most expensive player in British football, could persuade Sheffield Wednesday manager Trevor Francis to sell his star striker, so Ferguson was back to square one until Leeds United chief executive Bill Fotherby called Martin Edwards, his opposite number at United, to enquire about Denis Irwin, the Old Trafford full-back.
The rest, as they say, is history. Ferguson rejected the interest in Irwin, but instead asked whether Leeds would sell Eric Cantona.
By the end of Nov. 26, 1992, Cantona was posing for pictures at Old Trafford having completed a £1.2m move from United's bitter rivals at Elland Road.
United would never look back. From that point on, their fortunes took an upwards trajectory.
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Cantona would score nine goals in 23 games to inspire United to the inaugural Premier League title and the club's first since 1967. A year later, they would win the League and FA Cup double, sparking a dominance of English football which would deliver an avalanche of trophies for the next two decades.
The Frenchman would become the first superstar of the commercial age, with his image dominating posters and advert campaigns. United also cashed in on their global recognition, with Cantona at the forefront of their domination on and off the pitch, with his reputation for controversy also proving there really is no such thing as bad publicity.
But with Sunday marking 25 years since Cantona walked through the doors of Old Trafford to become the catalyst for Ferguson's first great team, how important was his signing?
"I think everyone at United at the time would agree that Eric was the final piece in the jigsaw," former United captain Bryan Robson told ESPN FC. "We had won both domestic cups, won the European Cup-Winners' Cup, but had just fallen short in the title race the season previously, so we were already a good team.
"But Eric made us a very good team, he was a big-game player, somebody who could win games out of nothing.
"Lots of top-class players had a major impact at United in the years after Eric, great signings like Rio Ferdinand, Nemanja Vidic, Cristiano Ronaldo, Patrice Evra, but Eric is right up there as the best of signing of the lot during Sir Alex Ferguson's time as manager."
Cantona's impact off the pitch at United was just as significant as his contribution on it, however.
"Eric would do his own warm-up before training," Robson recalls. "We had top calibre players at the time, and brilliant foreign signings such as Peter Schmeichel and Andrei Kanchelskis who all raised the standards, but Eric just did things differently.
"He would also do a warm-down after the training, which is something none of us had done before, but it became a part of our routine and the young lads, especially, saw Eric as a real inspiration."
Mike Phelan, a title-winner in 1992-93 and later Ferguson's assistant manager, admits that Cantona was a transformative figure.
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"He changed the mentality of the place," Phelan said. "He was a quiet lad, maybe even reserved, but he walked into a dressing room full of stars and immediately felt at home.
"Lots of players would do extra work on their technique after training back then, but Eric would always stay out on his own, doing a bit more and that rubbed off on the young lads coming through like Paul Scholes, David Beckham and all the others.
"They looked at Eric and realised what you had to do to climb to the next step, so they all followed his lead.
"And in the team, he just gave us an extra dimension. He galvanised us, made the difference, and the bond he formed with the manager -- a trust I had never really seen before -- was the key to his success at United."
Cantona's success at United saw him win four Premier League titles and two FA Cups before retiring at the age of 30 in May 1997.
His feats became synonymous with the club's iconic No.7 shirt, but Robson admits he made him wait for the right to call it his own.
"When he signed Eric, Sir Alex asked if he could take the No.7 shirt and I said 'no,'" Robson said. "I'd worn it for 12 years at United and didn't want to hand it over.
"I had started to wear it at West Bromwich Albion and was quite superstitious about it.
"But at the start of the following season, United had signed Roy Keane and I knew that my role would largely be as a substitute, so I told the manager Eric could have the 7 as long as I could have No. 12.
"Eric went on to wear it with distinction, as did David Beckham and Cristiano Ronaldo, so it is nice when people now talk about the number and mention my name too."
Source: espn.co.uk