Ferguson: 'I can win even more trophies with this team'
Sir Alex Ferguson always wanted to 'knock Liverpool off their perch'. Today he can equal their 18 titles – and he says he's not finished yet
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So here it is then, the day which Sir Alex Ferguson has travelled through many dark footballing moments for, and it is unlikely that his mental images of how it would be to knock Liverpool "right off their fucking perch" and match their 18 titles, as he probably will today, included the rain hammering down on Carrington from the blackest of skies as he put in place the final preparations.
Neither did Ferguson probably expect, while running so many, many gauntlets at Anfield down the years that when the magical 18th stood just one point away, the 19th would actually seem far more important. That's how it is though, for football people like Ferguson; individuals who can never settle with what they have. "I'm not looking at equalling anyone," he reflected yesterday, ahead of Arsenal's arrival this lunchtime.
"The prospect of winning more titles with this team resonates with me far more than that. More titles can mean anything, but this team is young enough to win more. I'm sure they can do it." Such is the energy of an individual who looks like he has two years or more ahead of him at least. And who can blame him for feeling that way?
The new generation he has assembled at United gives Liverpool fans far more grounds for gloominess today than the fact that Ferguson – the man whose club trailed theirs by 16 championships to seven when he first walked into Old Trafford 23 summers ago – has finally reeled them in. Any satisfaction at putting one over on Merseyside was "a fan thing," said the United manager, preferring to dwell instead on those players, none older than 22, whose collective emergence has been a genuinely unexpected part of United's evolution this season.
Danny Welbeck, Federico Macheda, Darron Gibson, Jonny Evans and Rafael da Silva all earned an honourable mention. None, as Ferguson acknowledged, has yet proved beyond doubt that he can offer what the "dinosaurs" like Ryan Giggs and Paul Scholes have done. But Evans looks like a United legend in the making and that Da Silva, Welbeck and Macheda have shown such potential at a level of football which, as Ferguson acknowledged, is "higher and harder" than that which Giggs, Scholes and Gary Neville cut their teeth on, offers grounds for substantial hope.
That is for another day though, whatever Ferguson chooses to say. Who can possibly believe that he "hadn't even thought about" equalling Liverpool's titles until "you lot mentioned it" – his claim to the press yesterday. The 2-0 defeat to Liverpool which handed Leeds the title at the death 17 years back, Liverpool fans outside the stadium asking for Ryan Giggs and Paul Ince's autographs, then tearing them up in their faces, lives with him still and when his work is finally done at Old Trafford he can say that he has placed United alongside them in days when there are Russian oligarchs around the corner and when every relegation-threatened side is fighting multi-million pound stakes to survive. Not the kind of preoccupations to have kept Shankly and Paisley awake at night.
"If you go back two years, our challenge was to catch Chelsea and I had to find the best way to do that," Ferguson said, of an achievement far greater than any nominal total of titles which might have been attained by mid-afternoon. "That will be the case when anybody challenges – how we cope with it, no matter who it is. That's what we do here. And no doubt it's more competitive. Teams have been taking points off teams that they wouldn't normally take them off." Fitting, of course, that the side against whom history might be made is Arsène Wenger's, who clinched the double at Old Trafford in 2002 but whose strangleholds on the English game have been fleeting. The latest deference from Ferguson told you he has seen them off, too. "They have had some injuries and you can't get the best results when your top players are injured. I'm afraid it's a fact."
The Champions League semi-final, as much as the 18-point gulf between the sides, demonstrate the chasm that exists, with Ferguson able to blood his new young group at a time when the last, assembled amid the Chelsea challenge (Cristiano Ronaldo, Darren Fletcher and Wayne Rooney among them) is reaching its fullest potential. Too often, Wenger's youngsters have been left to sink or swim.
Only one of Ferguson's 10 titles has been won at Old Trafford so all the more incentive to avoid complacency today, with Jonny Evans probably deputising for Rio Ferdinand, whose calf injury should be cleared up in time for the Champions League Final on 27 May, Ferguson said. "They've not so much a point to prove but in a way will want to register their abilities on a day when everyone expects United to win the title," Ferguson said of Arsenal.
But in the season when Rafael Benitez's personal challenge and the humiliating 4-1 Old Trafford defeat to Liverpool still threatened his place alongside them, Ferguson is the one with the point to make. His old footballing nemesis has been prodding at him to the bitter end, with Steven Gerrard beating his own players to the Football Writers' Association Player of the Year award this week. But he can brush that aside now. "The more important thing for us is what we actually win as a team. That's far better and more rewarding for us."
Six unsung heroes: United beyond the superstars
If United take the point needed to clinch a third successive title today, it will represent a triumph for perhaps the greatest squad effort in Sir Alex Ferguson's 23 years at Old Trafford. He described last year's squad as his "greatest ever" though that was in a season when Cristiano Ronaldo, with his 41 goals, dominated utterly. Not so this season, in which injuries have been a greater factor and the unsung have offered much more. Total outlay on these players: the £4m paid to PSV Eindhoven for Park Ji-Sung five years ago.
Ji-sung Park
Only the massed South East Asian ranks in the United press room crave his name on the team-sheet but the South Korean has quietly increased his first-team role, starting more than double the 14 games he started in last season's title-winning campaign and adding goals (four) to his physical midfield presence. The opening goal, and his best United performance, in the Champions League tie at the Emirates, makes him a good bet for the starting XI for the final in Rome, having missed out on the squad for Moscow last time.
Jonny Evans
Ricky Sbragia has described him as a future United captain and Ferguson can delight more in Evans than any of his young players. Distinguished himself temperamentally with cool assurance in some major fixtures – his full league debut came at Stamford Bridge last September, he deputised comfortably for Ferdinand against Chelsea at Old Trafford and contributed in the goalless draw at Internazionale. Already seems to have seen off nervousness displayed against Porto at Old Trafford and has a youthful maturity.
John O'Shea
By no means United's most secure right-back, where he has deputised often this season, but so depleted has Ferguson's back four been with injuries to Rio Ferdinand, Gary Neville and suspensions for Nemanja Vidic and Patrice Evra that only four players have started more games than the Irishman this season. Ferguson has cited his contribution often in the past six weeks and his spectacular Champions League winner against Arsenal was reward for reliability.
Darren Fletcher
Seemingly the only man who could score for United in August – he hit two of their three goals before the visit to Anfield on 13 September – and has been three times more prominent, starting 35 games against 11 last season, in Owen Hargreaves' prolonged absence. Form in recent weeks has been as good as at any time since breaking into United's ranks through the academy. The man of the match in the challenging Champions League game at Celtic Park in November; so, too, in the semi-final second leg and in the derby against City, rendering his Rome suspension all the more annoying.
Rafael da Silva
It was his Champions League performance in Aalborg in September which underlined his ability as a right wing-back of huge potential and though he looks, at times, less secure with the greater pace of the Premier League – Luka Modric was better than him in United's torrid first-half against Tottenham last month – he will present a challenge to Gary Neville, if the United captain does make it back again, and Wes Brown next season. Injuries have denied Ferguson a closer look at his brother Fabio.
Federico Macheda
A fleeting presence whose two league starts render him ineligible for a title medal. But he has had a major role in this success. The injury-time winner against Aston Villa at Old Trafford last month was, looking back now, a watershed. Without that and the winner at Sunderland as United stumbled through early April United would have been just two points ahead of Liverpool today, giving the run-in a very different complexion. Ferguson's masterstroke was to deploy the striker off the bench against Villa on the back of a hat-trick for United's reserves three days before.
One point away: Season by numbers
22 clean sheets
Manchester United have kept the opposition out 22 times in the league. Edwin van der Sar registered 14 consecutive clean sheets en route to a record 1,311 minutes without conceding.
18
Cristiano Ronaldo has hit 18 top-flight goals this term to lead the scoring charts again. The midfielder has scored 26 in all competitions.
3 blanks
United have failed to score just three times in the league - against Aston Villa, Tottenham and Fulham, all at their opponents' grounds.
5
Five players have seen red this season, Nemanja Vidic (2), Paul Scholes, Wayne Rooney and Cristiano Ronaldo.
44
Wayne Rooney, Cristiano Ronaldo, Dimitar Berbatov and Carlos Tevez have collectively scored 44 league goals, compared with Dwight Yorke, Andy Cole, Teddy Sheringham and Ole Gunnar Solskjaer's 43 when United won a third successive title in 2001.
67 goals
Scored by United in the Premier League this season, compared to Liverpool's 72. No player hit a league treble this season.
4
Defeats in the Premier League this season. Liverpool have lost just two.
5 goals
United's biggest winning margin has been by five goals - beating Stoke (h) and West Bromwich (a) 5-0.
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Comments
The only statistic that matters now is the post 1992 fact that MUFC have won 11 Premier titles, Arsenal 3, Chelsea 2, Blackburn Rovers 1. Liverpool don't seem to have won the title in the modern era.
Anyway, I doubt I'll be the only one to say this but Liverpool were playing good football of the kind you regualrly see today before United decided to get their act together. The game may indeed be quicker these days, but the more important factor is money - particularly after the Abramovich 'revolution'. United's and Chelsea's current sqauds cost almost twice as much as the entire Liverpool first and reserve teams, and far more so than Arsenal's. That, more than anything else, is the difference between the two teams and the respective eras in which they were (and are) dominant.
Not only is he the originator of the famous quote 'knocking Liverpool off their f*cking perch', itself a clear indiciation of his sentiments towards the club, he takes every opportunity to destabilise the team by taking sidewards jabs at its manager, Rafa Benitez, and attempting to put his weight and de facto authority behind a number of, mostly incorrect statements. He recently claimed, for example, that Liverpool have spent 'far more' money than United on players since Benitez arrived in 2004, and that the Spaniard has no interests in youth development: assertions so preposterous they couldn't escape the irony that Benitez actually started his career in youth development at Real Madrid, had purchased the entire spine of the Liverpool XI under the age of 23 (Reina, Skrtel, Agger, Alonso, Mascherano, Torres), and had to rebuild an entire squad (of which only Gerrard and Carragher remain - alongside the outgoing and fourth-choice Sami Hyppia), while United enjoyed the benefits of having such players as Christiano Ronaldo, Ruud van Nistelroy, Rio Ferdinand, Paul Scholes and Ryan Giggs already on the books.
Despite all this, despite the proverbial mountain that Liverpool have had to climb, Benitez has *still* spent less money than Ferguson on players; and yet the media continue, in keeping with their love-affair with the man (the Scotsman that is), to describe him as a wasteful manager. He has rebuilt his entire team, and results considering, has done a damn fine job at it, in the face of advertisity that includes in-fighting between owners and the delay of the vitally important new stadium. The last thing he needs is a fellow manager, England's 'most successful' according to received wisdom, publicly lambasting him before he signs a new contract.
Ferguson, in sum, does everything he possibly can to undermine what's left of the 'level' playing field in the EPL, making it as unfair and as predictable as possible by giving United advantages on and off the pitch. In the past 4 years, United have done everything imaginable to enforce league dominance: from the purchase of 30 million pound players who then spend entire seasons on the bench, to installing heated chairs in the dugout, employing sports scientists and hiring psychologists to help players sleep at night and adminster drugs where appropriate.
Thus, while his achievements as a manager are certainly to be lauded - managing all those resources and doing it well requires a particular kind of intelligence and talent - as a person he is nothing more than a swaggering bully, a person far removed from the famed 'socialist' he claimed to be in Glasgow. The man, to use his own words, is a dinosaur.
Please let's observe the situation with quotes from very famous Liverpool managers:
Manchester United are the Champions of England - "Fact"
Liverpool are second - "First is first, second is nowhere"
Even Hansen on the BBC has recited the latter but apparently Liverpool are exceptional circumstances so will definately win the league next year - although second is supposed to be nowhere: mind.
So once again just for all Liverpool fans (and reciting from your bible)
"Next year will be our year"
Or
Will that be the year after that or after that - get the drift
Swallow in the fact that you cannot handle the fact that your time is well and truly over. Ten minutes later every United fan was looking forward to winning the premiership next year. We've had our fun for this year and already we look on. That's the difference between us. Get it?
First off, this is not an 'excuse'. I didn't mention the league once did I? Do you see paragraphs upon paragraphs lamenting the fact that we lost the league today? No, you dont. What you do see - but what you for some reason *fail* to see - is an attack on the character of Alex Ferguson. Sorry, 'Sir' Alex Ferguson.
Secondly, I don't subscribe to this imaginary Liverpool 'bible'. Unlike you and seemingly every other Manchester United fan on the planet, I enjoy a small modicum of free will. You see, it's not too hard to actually think for yourself for once in a while! I think you'll find it tends to be quite liberating.
Thirdly, you may find this a shock but what you've said has been said before. Not only has it been said before, it's developed into a mildly nauseating chant - as thick as it is dull, as ubiquitous as it is thick. If I had a penny for every time I heard a United fan wax lyrically about the essential 'winning mentality' of Manchester United - all the while ignoring the fact that the single most important aspect of the club's rise to power has been money - and lots of it, I'd be a millionaire by now.
Finally, in keeping with the previous points, I think I should add that what you've said actually has no meaning in relation to the present discussion. We're not discussing the league here, are we? What you should be saying, and what we should in effect be discussing, is the relative merits of my comments vis-a-vis your own opinion, perhaps with the added qualifier: 'I'm going to address what you've said and show you that you're wrong'.
But you can't do that, can you? You can't do that because you don't even want to *consider* the possibility that what I've said is true. You'd rather spout off some meaningless and belligerent rant about United fans being 'winners', than accept that fact that Alex Ferguson, your esteemed manager, is a gaping arsehole of a person.
And as for being 'winners', that's not the impression I got on March 14 this year. Remember the day? I do - clearly. It was gloriously sunny and a sell-out crowd at the Theatre of Dreams (promptly renamed thereafter the 'Theatre of Empty Seats'), as 40,000 of your fans left their own stadium, cap in hand, whilst your bitter rivals knocked four past you on your home turf.
That, my friend, is a measure of character and all the money or success in the world won't disguise the fact that your fans, the great portion that fill up Old Trafford every week, are as petulant as their idols.
Your hypocrisy has no bounds - your bitterness is to come to what terms then if it's not related to Liverpool loosing and Manchester United winning - doesn't everything boil down to who wins the premiership? You need to check that out
Have some medicine then:
I don't need to gloat and in my post I haven't even tried. Your attack on my gaffer whilst defending your gaffer is by far the most comical notion of your writing. You and those like you cannot stand him and therefore cannot stand MUFC. It's as simple as that - and just look at the way you've responded - it should tell you how much you despise the fact that after everything, Rafa could not win the premiership - even beating Utd TWICE and being seven points ahead at one time.
Tell me then what excuse are you making now when liverpool were on top of the league and playing football worthy of champions? Are you implying that Sir Alex brainwashed Rafa and Liverpool fc into slipping up? What a load of rubbish - for the record a team that was seven points ahead in the first week of January fell apart because of the very manager you and those alike are trying to defend. The truth is he should have trusted his team to do their job and do the talking on the pitch. The fact that he got a list out on a bleak winter's day tells you everything about the man - that he didn't trust his team and that he thought he could win a war of mind games with MUFC just when it seemed safe enough to do so.
That is and solely will be Rafa Benitez's fault and you should know it too.
Secondly you don't need to subscribe to the Liverpool Bible. Your free will is your free will, therefore you are in no position to lecture me when I subscribe to my Bible "let's do it again." If you see that as arrogance, then you do not apply the same rights to me that I apply you.
Thirdly the winning mentality of Manchester United speaks for itself. I do not have to repeat that nor do I have to gloat about it. The fact that as a supporter I have a right to be happy that my team has won it's 11th Premier league title and therefore it's 18th league title (equalling yours by the way) gives me the right to be proud of it. The fact that, that bothers you makes me happy. It also justifies your hatred and your stupidity when your make an excuse again of how we have managed to get to this point. Again if you have a moment. When AF walked in through the doors at OT - MUFC was a broken club far behind you lot. The fact that one man has built it to where it stands today gives me great pleasure in reading your pathetic comments that imply "that Utd only buy trophies." Yeah so if Liverpool were to win the premiership trophy I guess Rafa will go one further than Arsene and throw 11+7 home grown players onto the pitch for 38 games and prove to the footballing world that you don't have to spend a penny to win the premiership. Until Rafa or Liverpool do that - lecture me accordingly. Plus just to add to your knowledge - the Neville brothers, Scholes, Giggs, Butt and Beckham came through the ranks and laid the foundations of where the club is today - of which three are still at the club. None on them were bought. Not a penny and guess what, one of them who came for free has stood the test of time and won all of Utd's eleven titles. You were talking about money and power and influence were you? - well Rick Parry is finally going or shall I say Rafa has finally got rid of so let's see then if one man Rafa can control the clubs resources better shall we?
But I guess it's okay Rafa to be a control freak responsible of the clubs millions but not Sir Alex. Do I detest a high level of hypocrisy in your comments - I sure do
'We're not discussing the league here, are we? What you should be saying, and what we should in effect be discussing, is the relative merits of my comments vis-a-vis your own opinion - perhaps with the [an] added qualifier: 'I'm going to address what you've said and show you that you're wrong'.'
Second, and on the basis of that, I have never 'defended' my 'gaffer'. I 'attacked' your 'gaffer'. There is a difference you know?
Third, this has nothing to do with Liverpool's supremacy during January. In fact, it has nothing to do with Liverpool's season at all. It has everything to do with Alex Ferguson's comments on Liverpool (hence the title and content of this thread).
Fourth, I know full well the merits of having players like Scholes and Giggs developed through your youth academy, in addition to clever buys like Yorke and Keane: Michael Owen and Robbie Fowler anyone? Steven Gerrard and Jamie Carragher? How about Sami Hyppia for 2 million? Not once did I say Alex Ferguson was a bad manager, and you'll actually find that I said the exact opposite in my first post.
What I did say - but what you for reasons of delusion can't seem to accept - is that the league, these days, is bought. You'd have to be a moron of meteoric proportions not to see it - not to see the fact that, since the Abramovich revolution, the team with the most expensive squad *has* won the league each year since Mourinho arrived.
And finally, as for your comment on money being no object in the rise to power of United, did you know that, before United won the league under Ferguson, he spent twice as much as Liverpool on players during the five years it took him to do so? Benitez has a squad that cost half as much, has averaged a league position of third (in contrast to Ferguson's 8.6), and yet here you are, oblivious of the mind-numbing stupidity of your own argument, pissing in the wind like some careless ignoramus.
United fans queued up outside Old Trafford to demand Ferguson's sacking. Can you believe that? I suppose not, given that the world is black and white for you and every United fan is a 'winner'. Furthermore, your own fans were ridiculed by their very own manager the season before last. Remember that? I do - he claimed there was no atmosphere in the stadium, and he was right to do so.
The man is jealous (as is Arsene Wenger, and whichever manager currently runs Chelsea) of the atmosphere a small stadium like Anfield can generate. Instead of sucking up to him, instead of gleefully proclaiming Alex 'I'm a Sir' Ferguson to be the saviour and Lord Divine, you need to start thinking critically about exactly where United are today, and exactly why money has put them there.
Are we not discussing the league then? What are we discussing? Rafa Benitez is manager of Liverpool football club who play football. SAF is manager of MUFC who ironically play football too. The sole purpose of Rafa Benitez as required by the clubs board and supporters is to win the premier league and anything on top. The sole purpose of SAF as required by the clubs board and the supporters is to win the premier league and anything on top too. The sole purpose of Rafa was to stop MUFC winning the league and visa versa. Your guy failed for this year, my guy won for this year - putting it to you as simply as I possibly can. Are you aware that you are making no sense whatsoever. Are you aware that you are ridiculing yourself, your own argument by ridiculing my gaffer for the success he has achieved at MUFC? The same success that you would like implemented at Anfield? After all the nonsense you throw at me for not being man enough to handle the fact that your manager is a sweet little lamb comparing mine to a fox, you then throw a tantrum and call my manager "a gaping a****** of a person." Did you say that because you don't like him winning and therefore Utd winning and therefore Utd fans like me celebrating my team winning, or did you say that because really deep down Rafa is a complete idiot and if only one bleak winter's day he had kept that list in his pocket and his mouth shut and so let his football club do the talking on the pitch by therefore winning your 19th title and thus us not winning our 18th? Can you consider that possibility for a second because I maybe true? Maybe you might have spouted some meaningless and belligerent rant about Liverpool fans having the divine right to always believe that they are the chosen ones and not having enough to accept the fact that Alex Ferguson (SAF to me) is really an esteemed manager and that yours is well just a gaping rant-a-mouth of a person. You see I didn't even have to be rude unlike you!
As for being winners, yes you thumped us, thank you for doing that - thank you for brutally reminding us on March the 14th that glorious summer day - that we had not won the title and that we would have to pick ourselves up and dust ourselves off and prove to you that you might have won a battle, but we will win the war - like we have done. May I point - and it's a very remarkable point that you have lectured me about the fact that it's not about the league yet there you are above in your post saying otherwise. Conflict of interests I consider. Are you sure now that it's not about the league because apparently and if I may again - and of course not to confuse you - you are very descriptive in reminding me what winning should actually mean - however that's not what you were saying or was it what you were saying?
As for empty seats no, it's never happened at Anfield. Oh are you sure?
That my friend is a measure of your character, and all the rants and the false accusations and the petty mind games won't disguise the fact that you and your fans and especially your manager, your lord, your prophet, your spirit, will remain bitter for what SAF or AF has achieved for MUFC - the club that disgusts you - the club that you cannot even second anymore. As for MUFC fans being petualnt as their idols, so you are saying that those Liverpool shirts worn by your fans that bear the names of Gerrard your God and Torres your wonder boy and Carragher your saint - and all the rest, that those are petulant Liverpool fans who idolize their petulant players? If you are saying that then you can stick with the comment above. If you are not saying that then you really don't know what the hell you are on about. Roll on number 19 Yeeeeeeeeeeeeehaaaaaaaaaaaaaa : )
'Did you say [...] winning our 18th?'
I have no problem with success. Like every other sensible person, I feel it should be rewarded. I do not think Alex Ferguson is a poor manager. On the contrary, I think he's a very good manager. I also, however, think Rafael Benitez is a very good manager, for reasons that I have listed above in response to your first comment.
So does this mean we're comparing managers like you have done for the past 1000 words? No! This is a debate about Alex Ferguson; and what I, as a debater, am saying - and believe me, this is getting very tiring and dull - is that he's an arsehole of a person.
'Maybe you might [..] have to be rude unlike you!'
I was rude because you waded into this debate with some swaggering arrogance. What was that you said? Oh yes, it was [something like]: 'We're winners, you're losers. That's the difference between us. Get it?'. No I don?t 'get it'. And I specifically told you I'd address your belligerence in a way befitting of its tone - hence the vulgarity of this debate.
'false accusations'
Don't just say it - prove it! You can't jump up onto your high horse without actually providing any reasons - and the fact that you've spent most of your time deflecting criticisms of Ferguson onto Benitez illustrates that you don't actually have any!
'As for empty seats no, it's never happened at Anfield. Oh are you sure?'
Not in my experience, no. I remember being 5-1 down to Arsenal last season in the Carling Cup. What happened? The entire stadium erupted in a chorus of ?You'll Never Walk Alone?. Hardly something we'd see from your faithful is it?
What we'd probably see is calls for Ferguson's sacking (which happened again, incidentally, during the period of Chelsea's dominance a few years ago, in which a great portion of the Old Trafford faithful believed he'd 'passed it' because they hadn't won anything) - as well as boos at the end of the game from the 10,000 or so that actually stayed to see off the end.
This is something you've never had for all your talk of 'success'. Football is more than just titles you know? It is about camaraderie and social bonds, working class solidarity and traditionalism. Typical of a United fan, a child of the Ferguson era, to see only the gold, silver and brass that lines the trophy cabinet...
Anyway, finally - by 'petulance' I mean throwing a strop, the kind of behaviour frequently exhibited by Christiano 'I never get substituted' Ronaldo and Wayne 'I throw balls at referees' Rooney.
The most remarkable thing about this tendency of United players (which, incidentally, stretches back to the days of Eric Cantona and beyond) is that Ferguson actually encourages it!
Whenever the prima donna that is Ronaldo gets away with the footballing equivalent of murder (he's kicked out while on the deck three times these season, and been booked twice - despite it clearly being violent conduct and red card offence in all three occasions), the great Scotsman takes to the podium like a helpless old codger, excusing it on the grounds of the 'terrible' treatment Ronaldo apparently receives.
When the opposite occurs, when other players kick out at United players (as happened against Stoke this year with Mathew Etherington), he takes to the stands like some moral crusader, claiming such behaviour is a 'straight red'.
Talk of hypocrisy? Take a look closer to home mate - Ferguson massages the already inflated egos of Old Trafford to the point that they lose their heads when things go wrong. He's like an army drill instructor barking orders into boys who soon become greedy, feckless drones, victims of thier own hype.
So I'll say again, for the last time, the man may be a great manager but is an arsehole of a person, a big gaping arsehole. You can keep your glory if it can be so called. I'll keep the part that counts: the taking part.
One: He was manager of football clubs long before United and he achieved a status with Aberdeen that is folklore in Scotland. But you are blinded by your hatred which speaks volumes of you.
Two: SAF is not a bad manager to you, but one that just makes your blood boil. That is hypocrisy in the making. Your comment in itself smacks of arrogance and a level of stupidity that I have never read before.
Three: Jealous of Anfield? Never, your own sweet darling Rafa wants your next football stadium to be bigger to generate more money to compete with United. Yet you lecture me that SAF is the money mad man. You're a fool and you know it.
Four: Money has apparently put Liverpool where they are today too. For example: 23 million for Torres is nothing right? Will Rafa spend another penny again on another player? I bet he will in order to buy the premiership. Wait he spent 20million on RKeane - a player he didn't need and then shipped out! but apparently Rafa and Liverpool don't spend money in order to buy the Premiership? You argument is based on water which you have provided. You have no argument and you know it and your bitterness is astounding.
You may find this hard to believe but Liverpool were renowned, simply renowned, for buying 'nothing' players in obscure divisions and turning them into super stars. Towards the end of their period of dominance, they did purchase some big-name players (Kevin Keegan was one of them, as was John Barnes) but on the whole, were doing what Arsene Wenger has been doing for the past 15 years at Arsenal.
That 'philosophy' of managing a club is honourable - partly because it doesn't rely on the excesses of 20th capitalism, partly because it retains a sense of sporting achievement, and partly because it produces quite simply the best football to watch. Arsenal, on song, are after the all the best passers of the ball in this country; Barcelona, another club with a famous academy and entirely owned by its fans, offer the best football on the continent and possibly the planet.
There is a great difference between this style of management, however, and, say, that which you see at Chelsea and United - which although are clubs known for developing youth talent, make their prime acquisitions first-team players or players old enough (18 and above) to be positively sure that they have a future at the top level.
I can think of three players in the current United squad that cost around 30 million, and a host of others that cost in or around 20 million. Before Liverpool purchased the services of Fernando Torres, their biggest signing had been Fernando Morientes, 12 m. When we buy a centre-back, we don't pay 30 million for him; we've only ever paid 6 million for a defender, and have to sell before we can buy because our stadium doesn't provide the requisite return to match the wage bill of a large squad.
That, combined with the obvious lack of financial muscle we have in other areas of the game, makes this competition a farce - and is the single reason why I positively loathe Alex Ferguson, amongst others, for pushing it in the direction it's been going for the past ten years.
And I've never said that Liverpool, today, aren't themselves implicated in the money game - after all, you have to mirror the tactics of your competitors in a league in which money and sound management are the only guarantees for success; and I can see parallels between your owners and ours and the reactions to takeovers at the respective clubs.
What I am saying is that the tendency to bloat squads with multi-million pound players was introduced by Manchester United, not my club, and then taken to a new level by Chelsea thereafter. While it makes the quality of football on display absolutely fantastic - the top four in England plus Barcelona are the five best teams in Europe - it is unsustainable and generally contrary to the values of a 'level' playing field.
More to the point, it is utterly unfair. Paying (or not) 30 million pounds for Carlos Tevez and then sticking him on the bench for the majority of the season just because you can afford to piss money away, is a blight on a league severely suffering from a dearth of strikers. Playing most teams with over 50 million worth of players on your bench (in addition to your academy prospects), makes a mockery of 80% of the teams in the league - teams that often don't have first teams worth 50 million pounds!
The only reason you don't see this is because your team currently sits at the top of the pile. It would be a different matter, I assure you, were you currently languishing in mid-table without the financial clout of a billionaire to elevate you to someplace else.
Five: Again SAF is a good manager but you don't like him? I can't for the life of me understand what the bloody hell you are on about. Eitheir you like the man or you don't. For you to stop in that shade of grey is insulting. You want Sir Alex to respect Rafa but Rafa cannot come to respect SAF. Cue today. He cannot congratulate the manager and the team for winning the Premiership. Yet Hiddink can, yet Wenger can. They are men enough, they are class enough, they are opposing managers who maybe don't like another manager winning the title, but they are humble enough to give respect where it's due without no strings attached. Yours can't, I wonder why - is that because he might be a middle class spanish man basked from the warmth of Iberia that believes strongly that a working class man from dirty gloomy Govan is no match to him? Well he's not even fit enough to be in his shoes yet and when he wins what that man from Govan has won then you can talk and he can talk. I also argue with you, Shankly and Paisley would never had disrespected Ferguson for what he has achieved, just like SAF never talks ill of Shankly and Paisley. They all had the same genetic make up, the same drive the same history to make their clubs outstanding beyond reach. Your rant is all the more pathetic because you can't just come to respect. AT least by drawing on Shankly and Paisley - I can.
Six: You need help. I said we are winners for this year and you are loosers for this year. That's not insulting. That can change next year. So you can't even understand what I'm saying but in your fit of anger you can twist anything to suit your advantage.
Seven: Petulance - Gerrard is full of it. What did Gerrard do not so long ago in a league match? Oh but you didn't see that because he is of course your God, and God can never be seen in another light. How many times has Gerrard dived for a penalty - do you deny it? Oh the best one - Gerrard had his head turned once by Chelsea - have you forgotten that too? I am talking hypocrisy and you should look at youself, your team and your manager.
Rafa is a good manager, tactically uneven, very attack minded, defensively questionable, very questionable in the mind games department, and most importantly to the point that he cannot come to terms that the better team won because just like you, the UTD manager might be great but you despise him nevertheless because he has what you don't. And for that you cannot handle the jist of it. You can keep the taking part with you my friend because you choose to want that more than anything. I want my glory and long may it continue. The hypocrisy in all this is pretty simple. You don't like SAF because he has built UTD with money. Yet to win the premiership Rafa has too do the same. One debunk. You don't like SAF because he has created a team through his image. Yet to do the same Rafa is doing the same to Liverpool. You respect that because you call that standing up against United? No, that's where you are wrong. That's where your weak point is. Why do you have to stand up against us? We don't do that to you. We just want to win - it's a mental thing as much it is a physical thing. What does Rafa and Liverpool have to prove to United? We don't have to prove nothing to you. We want our manager, we want our stadium, we want our glory. For you to imply that the way we do it infuriates you and Rafa, is down right hatred of the highest order. To do the same, firstly Rafa and Liverpool need a bigger stadium (as said by Rafa yesterday and today). It's all about the money. Rafa and Liverpool need to generate money in order to buy the premiership too. For you as a writer and Liverpool fan to come here and accuse me, my manager and my team for buying the premiership or glory as you put it, is nasty and cheap when you have to do the same. Now do you get it or you want some more?