If fate had dealt him a kinder hand, Ruud van Nistelrooy could have been reflecting this week on his first anniversary as the most expensive recruit in Manchester United's history. As it is, his British record £19 million sterling transfer yesterday comes at the end of his very own annus horribilis.

It is a year ago, almost to the day, that Steve McClaren was driving Van Nistelrooy to Old Trafford for what should have been his first news conference as a United employee. Just a couple of miles from the ground, the Dutch striker took a call on his mobile telephone. "What I was told made me feel sick," he later said.

To learn that the deal had been scuppered by the results of his medical was bad enough. But as Van Nistelrooy pondered his future in Geldrup's St Anna Hospital a couple of days later it was not so much whether he could resurrect the transfer which was weighing on his mind but whether he had any future in football at all.

In those dark hours, waiting to hear whether the operation to repair the cruciate ligaments in his right knee had been a success, he did not know whether he would be able to kick a ball in anger again. "For the deal to fall through, then to suffer such a bad injury doing something as innocuous as jumping for a header in training, it felt as though nothing more could go wrong," he says. "I just lay there thinking to myself: `What can I possibly have done to deserve this? What have I done wrong'?"

In such an emotional state he could easily have drowned in a vat of self-pity. Instead, he set out with utter determination to rehabilitate himself with hours in the swimming pool and on the training pitch. PSV appointed a personal trainer and he started making steady headway on the long road to recovery. Every three or four weeks Alex Ferguson would ring to check on his progress and wish him well.

He has scored four times in his six comeback games and Louis van Gaal's decision to include him in the Dutch squad for tomorrow's World Cup qualifier against Cyprus, little more than a month since his return to competitive action, is testament to his powers of recovery. "Van Nistelrooy is back for one reason and one reason alone," said Van Gaal. "Because his form dictates as much."

So, what are United getting for their money? With a reputation as one of the most prolific strikers in European football, Ferguson will have a simple answer: good value.

Van Nistelrooy was the Dutch player of the year in 1999, scoring 30 goals in 34 games in his first season at PSV, and at least a dozen big clubs wanted him on their books.

"Marco van Basten was more of an all-round striker but Van Nistelrooy is more of a decisive finisher," says Rinus Michels, Holland's coach for their European Championships triumph in 1988.

"They are both excellent players but different. Van Basten had better control, perhaps, but Van Nistelrooy is excellent at going towards goal, very speedy and very dangerous."

Tomorrow Van Nistelrooy is expected to win his 11th international cap, probably as a substitute, and then United will finalise details for a press conference at Old Trafford later in the week: this time there should be no newspaper pictures of an empty chair.