We will never know. We will now never know what David Moyes might have built at Manchester United.

We will never know if Moyes in season two, or season three, could have constructed a team with the attacking vim and personality associated with those of the club’s past. We simply won’t know how well it could have turned out.

We won’t know because Moyes could not squeeze a convincing, committed performance from his inherited squad at his former home, Goodison Park, on Sunday, a performance that would buy time. We won’t know because Moyes was unable to begin the countdown to a miserable season with a winning run which might bring hope that, next season, things could only get better.

And we won’t know because football culture has changed and broader society has changed. We are forever seeking individual culprits for collective and systemic failings. We inhabit a short-term world, where ten months in the turbulent slipstream of a legend is deemed enough.

If there was one quality associated with Manchester United under Alex Ferguson, it was endurance, persevering until the last minute of added time. The club have just cut the chord on that. They have gone against the evidence of their own history.

In uncertainly following Ferguson, Moyes has been derided as too small, too nervy, too old- fashioned. Any merit he had a year ago has been wiped away. Manchester United’s problems may be various, stemming from the debt-leveraged ownership by the Florida-based Glazer family and stretching to a back four ageing together, but only one man has paid the price. The club even made a mess of the announcement of Moyes’ departure. But those in power above and around Moyes remain.

If there were concerns early in Moyes’ time at Old Trafford - and there were - were they addressed by the hierarchy? Is it not possible to rectify a problem from within, or must the chosen option always be nuclear? These are management questions for boardrooms. In turn, was Moyes flexible?

Moyes and Manchester United had specific issues, but the escalating panic within Premier League football in particular has seen United become the ninth club to change manager this season. Fulham are onto their third - Felix Magath having replaced Rene Meulensteen who replaced Martin Jol.

Add the changes made to Chelsea, Manchester City and Everton at the end of last season and only seven of twenty clubs have the same manager as this day last year. It is an avalanche of dismissals and all these decisions cannot be correct, not least because so many, such as Fulham’s Meulensteen appointment, are overturned within weeks - ten in that case.

It is easy to say money lies behind this, and of course that is true, but there is also a quick-fix mentality, a lack of long-run application and self-belief.

Clubs strive for strategy then make erratic decisions such as naming Roberto Di Fanti director of football at Sunderland. West Bromwich Albion earn a name for themselves as a thinking club, one which rejects the knee-jerk, yet West Brom swept away Steve Clarke after 18 months, six months after their highest finish since 1981.

Clarke’s first game in charge, in August 2012, was a 3-0 win against Liverpool. That was Brendan Rodgers’ first game too and it didn’t go well, nor did the next four. After five games Liverpool had two points and were in the relegation zone. West Brom also beat Liverpool at Anfield, in February.

That left Liverpool ninth, the fanbase was unconvinced by Rodgers and the board could have acted negatively. Had they done so, Rodgers would be a footnote, a man-of-the-moment appointment such as Michael Laudrup might have been his replacement. We would not have known about this season’s version of Rodgers and Liverpool.

And we won't know about next season's version of Moyes and United. What we do know is that when he was given time at Everton he took a team bound for relegation in March 2002 to one qualified for the Champions League in May 2005.

May 2005 brought United’s second consecutive third-place finish. They were 18 points adrift of Chelsea. There were rumblings around Ferguson with plenty examining whether he should stay. Five league titles and a European Cup later, Ferguson had again proved the power of perseverance.

Those were special trophies for late-Ferguson United. They reminded people of his early days and early struggles. Had the club not shown faith in a man who had organised Aberdeen to beat Real Madrid in a European final, United’s Premier League dominance would not have unfolded the way it did.

Moyes did not possess Ferguson’s European pedigree but he had experience from Everton and a Glaswegian manager’s reputation, which obviously appealed to Ferguson. But in his era at Goodison Moyes also grew another reputation, as a ditherer. ‘Dithering Dave’, agents would say, would want to buy a certain player at 9am but not at 5pm. An element of that appears to have occurred in the on- off-on Marouane Fellaini transfer.

It will be intriguing to hear Moyes’ opinion on transfers, on where for example he thought the potential purchase of Gareth Bale was when Bale joined Real. Peter Reid, who knows Moyes like an Evertonian, said yesterday that Moyes thought Bale was joining United. Reid said that Moyes also thought a deal for Cesc Fabregas had been completed. Was that naivety from Moyes, or was he let down by those above him?

Those would have been transformative transfers, the successful conclusion of one of them would have altered views of Moyes within the building.

But neither happened and after what seemed like initial goodwill - Ryan Giggs joked: “David Moyes had just resigned” after Ferguson’s last match, the 5-5 draw at West Brom - there were tales of cooling relationships as autumn ended.

Moyes had brought his own management team with him and, from the perspective of a United insider such as Giggs or Rio Ferdinand, that group of coaches started to resemble a faction. “Are Everton in today?” was a United training ground question that came to be asked, an anecdote that emerged yesterday.

Phil Neville was supposed to be the bridge between new and old, but there were stories of Neville not being listened to. He has stayed on with Giggs; Moyes has gone, along with chief assistants Jimmy Lumsden and Steve Round.

They all, including Phil Neville, had strong Everton histories, which made Sunday so painful. But there was another game that also hurt, the 3-0 home defeat by Man City on March 25th. United were wretched and afterwards Paul Scholes reflected on the difference between the Ferguson era - "we could be two or three down but we never felt we were beaten" - and this match - "I never felt United were going to get back into the game."

This was gently put but it was serious criticism. And if Scholes was prepared to say that on TV, imagine his private comments.

Scholes was saying that United had lost their powers of endurance, and he was right. They’ve lost it in more ways than one. This is not just the end of the brief Moyes episode, it is the definitive end of the Ferguson era. The Glazers no longer have Ferguson as their shield and while they may think they have righted a wrong with the Moyes decision, they have not fully addressed matters closer to home. United’s downturn season was not all about David Moyes.

PREMIER LEAGUE MANAGERS CHANGED THIS SEASON

Current League position in brackets

(6) Tottenham Hotspur - Andre Villas-Boas replaced by Tim Sherwood (December)

(7) Manchester United - David Moyes sacked (April)

(11) Crystal Palace - Ian Holloway replaced by Tony Pulis (November)

(13) Swansea City - Michael Laudrup replaced by Garry Monk (February)

(16) West Brom - Steve Clarke replaced by Pepe Mel (January)

(17) Norwich City - Chris Hughton replaced by Neil Adams (April)

(18) Cardiff City - Malky Mackay replaced by Ole Gunnar Solskjaer (January)

(19) Fulham - Martin Jol replaced by Rene Meulensteen (Deember); Meulensteen replaced by Felix Magath (February)

(20) Sunderland - Paolo Di Canio replaced by Gus Poyet (October).