Patrice Evra has revealed Liverpool chairman Tom Werner recently wrote to him to apologise for the incident nine years ago when Luis Suarez was found guilty of racially abusing him.
The then-Liverpool forward racially insulted the left-back in 2011 when United played Liverpool in the league at Anfield.
The FA charged Suarez and he was found guilty and given an eight-game ban plus a £40,000 fine. Despite the ruling Liverpool came out in support of their player and the squad wore T-shirts supporting the Uruguayan.
Last year Jamie Carragher, who was part of the Liverpool side during the incident, apologised to Evra when they were both on punditry duty for Sky and the left-back has revealed that he has also received an apology from the club – nine years on.
“In the end, he admitted it and he was banned for eight games, and he had a massive fine. I remember after that, Liverpool played a game and they all wore the T-shirts saying ‘support Suarez’. He had been banned for racist abuse, had been fined and they support him that way. I was confused and upset,” Evra told the official Manchester United podcast.
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“But, when I did the punditry on Sky and Jamie Carragher apologised after eight years, I was so surprised. He said they made a big mistake that day and he apologised. It really touched me and now I will respect Liverpool as a football club because, when this happened, I was really disappointed with the club.
"I received an email from the chairman of Liverpool apologising for what happened nine years ago. He said I was welcome to come to Liverpool if I need anything. It really touched me because it’s better late than never, but I was surprised that Liverpool supported that kind of attitude.”
Evra, who won five Premier League titles during his eight years at Old Trafford, also revealed that he didn’t let hard feelings about what had happened during the incident get in the way as he voted for Suarez for player of the year during that campaign.
He said: "When you have those kind of problems, people around you just think you are crying. Even when I said: ‘You will see the report’, people thought I was still talking about it.
"I wasn’t still talking about it - I even named Suarez as Player of the Year that year. I could evaluate Suarez on the pitch and know the person he was. It was a tough, tough, tough time.
“I will never call Suarez a racist person, because I don’t know him personally. Even when we played in the Champions League final, when I was playing for Juventus, I shook his hand in the corridor and spoke to him. I forgive really fast.”
