I could not stand the thought of Mason Greenwood wearing the Man Utd shirt

It took them long enough — six months and counting. It might well have involved a U-turn so rapid the scorch marks will be visible on the Old Trafford forecourt for months. But finally Manchester United have made the right decision about Mason Greenwood. And for someone who has been supporting the club for more than five decades, what a relief it is that he will be attempting to revive his career elsewhere. The very thought of seeing him back in a red No 11 shirt was enough to turn the stomach.

For a while last week it looked as though Richard Arnold, the club’s chief executive who was leading the investigation into the player, was minded that he be reintegrated. That made me and many a United fan feel decidedly queasy. I may not have had the certainty of the Countdown numbers whizz Rachel Riley – who announced on social media that if he were to play for the team again she would return her season ticket. I probably would have carried on watching. But with a heavy heart. Because seeing him play from the Stretford End would have challenged everything I believe the club should be about.

An unrepentant sexual bully is not exactly who I wish to represent collective history. A bloke whose unmistakable involvement in a video so ugly and sinister it haunts the sleeping hours of all who heard it, is not the player I want to see turn out in the colours of Bobby Charlton, Lou Macari and Marcus Rashford. These were heroes who understood the power and responsibility of their position and applied it for the good. When standing on the shoulders of giants it is not right to wear sharpened studs.

I do not for a moment suggest I speak for every United fan when I say I am delighted that Arnold has now decided Greenwood will not play for the club again. This is a fanbase that can barely agree on Saturday afternoon kick-off times, so it is unlikely there will be a consensus on this issue. The online Greenwood fanboys have already moved into action, blaming the women’s team for affecting the decision, shouting that charges were dropped against him and he is an innocent man, above all fulminating that the team need his goals and that should be all that matters. And it is true, I was at Tottenham on Saturday, I saw that this is a side crying out for his cold-eyed certainty in front of the net.

But thankfully the club has recognised that it should be about more than the immediate. It may sound ridiculous when predatory venture capitalists have been in control of the place for the past 15 years, squeezing it for every last drop of financial possibility, but it is my belief that United is an institution that retains an indelible cultural meaning. This is a place with a moral compass. When the Manchester United Foundation engage in their extraordinary social work in the community, they use the power of the club’s name to open doors to invaluable health and welfare programmes. And that name should not be tarnished by association with someone whose attitude to women appears to be driven by perverted self-gratification.

Besides, the very thought of taking my grandchildren to their first game at Old Trafford, trying to inculcate in them the same pride and passion I have long invested in the place, and out there on the pitch was someone who I would feel uncomfortable being within two hundred yards of my daughter is enough to chill to the bone. What if one of them sees him scoring a goal and then wants a Greenwood replica shirt? How do I explain that playing for a club I love is a man whose attitude to women would have been considered ugly in the Stone Age? Heroes should not come with asterisks.

For sure there have been bad lads who have played at United in the past. Drunks, bullies, assorted ne’er do wells: whole libraries of books have been written about their shenanigans. Greenwood supporters will doubtless insist he was different only in as much as he was unhappily exposed on social media. And even then context is all. Criminal charges were dropped and in the club statement, Arnold insists the internal investigation found he was not guilty of the claims made about him.

But that is not the point. Still that tape exists. And still its menace chills to the bone. To have him back would send a message to every young boy that that sort of behaviour towards women is apparently reckoned acceptable by the club they love. Whatever the goals, United is better off without him.