Is Fergie feeling OK?

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oakiecokie

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6 January 2012, 7:17
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Ferguson: City are not going away

Sir Alex Ferguson has warned Manchester United's fans they will have to get used to scrapping for honours with their "noisy neighbours".

Ferguson famously used that description to assess Manchester City two years ago, at the start of their £1billion quest to reach the top.

The summit is now in reach, certainly in England given City are three points clear of United in the Premier League and are favourites to advance from an eagerly-anticipated FA Cup third round tie at the Etihad Stadium on Sunday.

It is the third time the two clubs have met in cup combat in the past three seasons.

United emerged triumphant in a thrilling two-legged Carling Cup semi-final in 2010, only for City to gain revenge at the same stage of the FA Cup last season.

"The way we, and our supporters, should look at it is that we may as well get used to it because they are not going to go away," the United boss told Inside United.

"We played them in a semi-final last year and the year before, we're both in the Europa League this year and now we are facing them in the FA Cup.

"So we have to get used to the fact that City are going to be challenging for competitions along with us.

"There's every chance we're going to meet at some point - maybe not every year but on average it's going to be pretty regular.

"It's a hard FA Cup draw for us, but it will be hard for them too."

United will be attempting to avoid equalling an unwanted 11-year-old record.

Not since the end of the 2000-01 campaign, when the Premier League had already been won, have Manchester United lost three successive games.

Yet that is the fate that awaits at City if Ferguson cannot cajole a better performance out of his injury-hit team than they produced at Newcastle on Wednesday.

"It is obviously a big game against City in the FA Cup," said Ryan Giggs.

"The atmosphere will be good, we'll take a load of fans there and hopefully we can get back to winning ways."

Ferguson's continued insistence he does not require at least one addition to his squad during this month's transfer window is baffling considering how tough United are finding things at present.

And victory this weekend against opponents who recorded a scarcely believable 6-1 win at Old Trafford on their last meeting and have now opened up a three-point lead in the Premier League following their dismantling of Liverpool on Tuesday, will be extremely tough.

Sorry if already covered.
 
Re: Is Fergie feeling OK ???

oakiecokie said:
6 January 2012, 7:17
comments ()

Ferguson: City are not going away

Sir Alex Ferguson has warned Manchester United's fans they will have to get used to scrapping for honours with their "noisy neighbours".

Ferguson famously used that description to assess Manchester City two years ago, at the start of their £1billion quest to reach the top.

The summit is now in reach, certainly in England given City are three points clear of United in the Premier League and are favourites to advance from an eagerly-anticipated FA Cup third round tie at the Etihad Stadium on Sunday.

It is the third time the two clubs have met in cup combat in the past three seasons.

United emerged triumphant in a thrilling two-legged Carling Cup semi-final in 2010, only for City to gain revenge at the same stage of the FA Cup last season.

"The way we, and our supporters, should look at it is that we may as well get used to it because they are not going to go away," the United boss told Inside United.

"We played them in a semi-final last year and the year before, we're both in the Europa League this year and now we are facing them in the FA Cup.

"So we have to get used to the fact that City are going to be challenging for competitions along with us.

"There's every chance we're going to meet at some point - maybe not every year but on average it's going to be pretty regular.

"It's a hard FA Cup draw for us, but it will be hard for them too."

United will be attempting to avoid equalling an unwanted 11-year-old record.

Not since the end of the 2000-01 campaign, when the Premier League had already been won, have Manchester United lost three successive games.

Yet that is the fate that awaits at City if Ferguson cannot cajole a better performance out of his injury-hit team than they produced at Newcastle on Wednesday.

"It is obviously a big game against City in the FA Cup," said Ryan Giggs.

"The atmosphere will be good, we'll take a load of fans there and hopefully we can get back to winning ways."

Ferguson's continued insistence he does not require at least one addition to his squad during this month's transfer window is baffling considering how tough United are finding things at present.

And victory this weekend against opponents who recorded a scarcely believable 6-1 win at Old Trafford on their last meeting and have now opened up a three-point lead in the Premier League following their dismantling of Liverpool on Tuesday, will be extremely tough.

Sorry if already covered.
Click to expand...

Sniggers

"Along with you" I don't think so my bacon faced chum
 
Re: Is Fergie feeling OK ???

Bouncy%20Castle.jpg
 
My first post here, and I can't start a topic, but....

Even better than that piece about Baconface, the first 'Fergie Out' murmurs are appearing in the press:-
http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/footba...ferguson-to-quit-old-trafford-86908-23683567/

Manchester United 'crisis': Is it time for Sir Alex Ferguson to quit Old Trafford?
Jan 6 2012 By David McCarthy

Is it time for Alex Ferguson to step down from the limelight like fellow Scot Walter Smith?

THEY say the Old Firm are only ever two defeats away from a crisis. Well, Ally McCoist and Neil Lennon should try standing in Sir Alex Ferguson’s shoes.

Manchester United have suffered two reverses on the spin to slip three points behind Manchester City in the Premiership and already the knives are out for Fergie, despite leading the Old Trafford side to 12 of their 19 championship crowns.

The injury-hit English champs were demolished 3-0 by Newcastle on Wednesday night, hard on the heels of their 3-2 home defeat at the hands of Blackburns at the weekend.

Those results, allied to early exits from the Champions League and Carling Cup, have placed the 70-year-old Scot – celebrating his 25th year as manager – under more pressure than he’s faced since 1990 when an FA Cup Final victory Crystal Palace ended four trophyless years since moving from Aberdeen.

The emergence of super-rich neighbours City – whom they face in the FA Cup on Sunday – has heightened the anxiety of United fans but their team trails their rivals by just three points and have accumulated 45 points, only three fewer than at the same stage last term.

And that comes against a backdrop of injuries that has decimated Ferguson’s hopes of fielding a settled side.

However, Fergie’s decisions to play some of his stars in roles alien to them – Michael Carrick at centre-half, Phil Jones in central midfield and Antonio Valencia at right-back are some of the examples – have prompted criticism from former United, Celtic and Scotland midfielder Lou Macari, who believes continuing to place square pegs in round holes will hand the title to Roberto Mancini’s City.

Macari said: “City are a good team and anyone who thinks they’re not is wrong. That’s why they are top and why it will be tough for United to overhaul them. It’s going to be difficult. It was a bad result against Blackburn and it was probably the worst I’ve seen them play.

“If you’re playing players out of position you won’t overhaul Man City to win the title. People are saying United will win the league because they’ve got the experience. But that experience counts for nothing if you’ve not got your full squad available.

“If you’re playing players out of position you won’t win the title so the priority is to get everyone back fit.”

Ferguson is generally reluctant to make new signings in January, preferring to do all his business in the summer, but Macari feels his hand may be forced this year.

He added: “The injury list is so bad he’ll certainly be looking for one or two players. I don’t know if he’ll get them but I don’t see that there are two or three young players at the club ready to go in and play week in, week out.”

Ferguson has had a public spat with Roy Keane over criticism of United this season and yesterday another former player, keeper Mark Bosnich, had a go at the manager – claiming allowing the Scot’s 70th birthday celebrations on Hogmanay to overshadow preparations for the Blackburn game cost the club dear.

The former Australia No 1, who had a short stint with United in 1999, said: “I know a lot of people are too scared to say it but it starts with the manager.

“That singing of ‘Happy Birthday’ before the Blackburn game is too much self-indulgence. I know he’s in his 25th season and so forth but he’s got to start doing what he does best and that’s manage the football team. I don’t think he’s got anyone around him any more, or that any of the players are strong enough to challenge the decisions he’s making and what he’s doing.

“If it goes on like this, they’re already out of the Champions League and they could go out of the FA Cup, they’ll end up winning nothing. Someone close to him needs to tell him.

“He’s got to pull his finger out if they are going to win anything. He’s very fortunate that Man City lost those points against Sunderland, when they could have won by 10, because that’s what’s keeping them in the title race at the moment.”

Ferguson, who announced on Hogmanay he plans to remain at the club for another three years if his health holds up, has also come in for unprecedented stick on United fans’ forums.

And while there are plenty of supporters still willing to back the veteran manager’s judgment, there are those who believe it is time for him to step aside and allow a younger man – Jose Mourinho and Pep Guardiola are the overwhelming choices – to take the club forward.

Typical of the disillusioned was one contributor calling himself “Sir Roy Keane”, who wrote: “By Fergie’s own admission, ‘the game has changed’. Trouble is he hasn’t.

“He looks tired now and bored and treats the squad as a experiment for himself to gamble on. He deserves all the plaudits for what he has done [in the past now] but his time is up.

“If the Glazers really care about the club they should dispense with these dinosaurs in a dignified way and we shall begin a new era.

“I strongly doubt Mourinho or anyone would wish to retain the services of our coaching staff but I fear Fergie’s influence will still cast a shadow over the club long after he has gone. We are heading the Liverpool way I am afraid.”

However, despite the mounting criticism, one of Ferguson’s closest allies at Manchester United, fellow Scot Paddy Crerand, believes he won’t let any of it to deflect him from trying to retain the title.

Former Celtic and United midfielder Crerand, now a pundit on the club TV station, said: “I’m sure Fergie isn’t too bothered about what people say. He has done such a great job at United so nobody can point the finger at him. He will ignore the criticism because it’s just not right.”

Maybe so but a third defeat in a row, particularly against City in the FA Cup on Sunday will lead to more questions about the future of a man who only a few weeks ago was seen as untouchable at Old Trafford.
 
It was one of those wonderful pieces of theatre which will be so missed when Sir Alex Ferguson has packed up his tracksuit and gone.

Someone had asked him whether Manchester United will ever go into a derby match as underdogs and for 15 seconds or more he eyed his inquisitor, the hint of a glint in those narrow eyes, and you wondered whether that individual or Manchester City would be on the receiving end of the full force of his opinion. "What time is it?" he said, at last. "I think it is time for me to leave." And as he clambered from his seat, an answer to that question... "Not in my lifetime."

It was such a measured and excellent response, a match for all the cool insouciance which has made Mark Hughes the winner of the phoney war which has been raging across Manchester all summer, that a part of you hoped that no-one would remind Ferguson that he couldn't leave the table just yet because there was another round of interviews to get through. They did. Back to the table he came.

Before the smart pay-off line, there was more of the evidence that Ferguson, for all attempts to infer the opposite, really does see City as a threat and really does resent the departure across town of Carlos Tevez, a touchstone for the rivalry which makes tomorrow's arguably the most keenly contested Old Trafford derby of them all. Tevez remains a major doubt, but he bore the full force of Ferguson's ire and was told not to expect a hero's welcome at Old Trafford. "He will get a surprise. It is a different culture nowadays," Ferguson snarled.

There was worse to follow for the Argentine. A suggestion that he was not worth the sum City paid for him - whatever that might have been. Would Ferguson rather Tevez was missing? "It doesn't bother me one bit," he replied. "Their best player is not playing. [Emmanuel] Adebayor has been their star player, no question about that. He has scored in every game and [his suspension on Sunday] is a loss really."

Here was a dig which begged more questions than answers. Why, if Adebayor is so effective, did United turn down his agent's attempt to take the player to Old Trafford this summer and settle for Michael Owen, who is yet to flourish. The two strikers' fortunes offer a paradigm for their respective managers' seasons – City generally impressive; United convincing in a few brief bursts – the second half at Wigan and after going behind at Tottenham.

Ferguson was abruptly up and out of his seat before the Adebayor issue could be put, though there was no lingering doubt about which opposition, Liverpool or Manchester City, he relishes most. "Liverpool will always be the derby game because of the history," he said. "When I came down here they were the king pins of England they had won four European championships. They had won quite a few league titles in that period from Bob Paisley, Joe Fagan to Kenny [Dalglish]. My aim was to do well against them. To try and turn that round. It's hard for me to go against history. The history is there with Liverpool."

It was eloquence of a kind only Ferguson, with his vast footprint over three decades of the English game, can offer among managers. But when Hughes sat down to speak later – his and Ferguson's discussions of the game were each precisely 18 minutes in length – the contrasting outlook was unmistakable. While Ferguson drew on the past, Hughes wanted to talk of future hierarchies. "For too long the top four or six has been set in stone and we're trying to change that," was the cornerstone of his case. "Maybe we should be given a little encouragement in that regard." To the neutral, there is something liberating about the notion.
 
I refer him back to 2009 & his "not in my lifetime" comment....................

http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/...y-be-top-dogs-not-in-my-lifetime-1789944.html

It was one of those wonderful pieces of theatre which will be so missed when Sir Alex Ferguson has packed up his tracksuit and gone.

Someone had asked him whether Manchester United will ever go into a derby match as underdogs and for 15 seconds or more he eyed his inquisitor, the hint of a glint in those narrow eyes, and you wondered whether that individual or Manchester City would be on the receiving end of the full force of his opinion. "What time is it?" he said, at last. "I think it is time for me to leave." And as he clambered from his seat, an answer to that question... "Not in my lifetime."

sorry cyclops u beat me to it!
 
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