On the eve of the replay, shortly before the players assembled to hear the manager name his team and outline how they would play, Ferguson had an individual meeting with Leighton, who was so upset by the decision that he not only declined to listen to the manager’s explanation and left the room but thereafter had little time for Ferguson until, after spells on loan at Arsenal and Sheffield United, the lugubrious keeper returned to Scotland in February 1992 to join Dundee, moving from there to Hibernian and back to Aberdeen and recovering so well that in 1998, when just short of his fortieth birthday, he went to the World Cup in France.
With Sealey between the posts, but well protected, United survived some hair-rising Palace tackles and won the FA Cup through a second-half goal from Lee Martin, whose shot on the half-volley flashed between Nigel Martyn and the near post after Webb, with a fine angled pass, had rewarded the twenty-one-year-old left-back’s enterprising run from the back. It had taken three and a half years, but Ferguson’s United had a trophy.
In the Wembley dressing room afterwards, the celebrations were diluted by Leighton’s tears. So plainly upset was he that Sealey offered his medal as consolation. At the reception in the banqueting suite, Leighton’s wife glared at Ferguson, who stared back: an unwise decision, for Mrs Leighton, far from backing down, kept her contemptuous eye on him while raising two fingers in a gesture unlikely to have been referring to United’s victory.
Because of Leighton’s long-held silence on the matter, we may never know if Ferguson had received the treatment he had given the Dunfermline manager, Willie Cunningham, in 1965: ‘You bastard!’ To give Ferguson his due, he had at least accorded Leighton the courtesy of being informed in advance. Not that Mrs Leighton was in any mood to appreciate the distinction.
At any rate, Ferguson could now use that first trophy as a stick with which to beat those who had criticised him. Not that he had been too reticent before. I had taken a bit, even though I had tried to be balanced in reporting his perceived crisis. Any notion that this, or a long acquaintance with Ferguson – on the way back to Aberdeen from Gothenburg in 1983, I had quaffed my share of champagne from the Cup-Winners’ Cup – would be taken into account was proved misguided when he told me to fuck off shortly before the original semi-final against Oldham.
The main stand at Maine Road had an internal layout that journalists enjoyed, because through the large lobby passed all classes of people, including directors, players and managers. And, surprisingly – for few clubs could bear to countenance members of the press at close quarters, even then – us.
Ferguson had been addressing his troops in the dressing room below, preparing them for battle, when he walked past me, delivering his waspish advice as he went. I knew how Ferguson and other members of the Scottish football community talked. Four-letter words could often be used as terms of endearment. This was not such a case.
While I gaped, he said it again, adding, with a stab of a finger, that I was a cunt, and strode on. On the Monday, I rang his office. The phone went straight down. I left messages that were not returned. I wanted to ask him why he’d gone public when a private word, however blunt, would have done, but most of all I was curious to know what had annoyed him. The assumption that an article had caused offence left me bewildered; I was a wholehearted Ferguson admirer at that time, often in the face of scepticism from journalistic colleagues who underrated his achievements in Scotland or doubted that he could replicate them on the bigger stage. But he clearly had no wish to waste any further energy in explaining.
A few weeks later, as the League season drew to a close and United turned their thoughts to Wembley, I arrived at Elland Road for a midweek Leeds match, looking forward to watching Strachan, McAllister and the rest and assessing their chances in the top division the following season, and walked straight into Ferguson, Knox and Brian Kidd. Again the red mist descended – but on me! From somewhere came the temerity to tell Ferguson he owed at least the courtesy of a reply. ‘After all the times I’ve supported you!’ I even swore, albeit adjectivally, before flouncing away from the startled trio and their silent faces.
The point was made. But as the summer came and wore on – it was the Pavarotti summer of ‘Nessun dorma’ and Gazza left the World Cup in tears – it dawned on me that Ferguson’s first trophy had given United a place in Europe, which had reopened its competitions to the English, and when they were drawn against the Hungarian club Pécsi Munkás in the Cup-Winners’ Cup my paper asked me to travel to Budapest for the second leg. We were in the team hotel the evening before the match and, upon hearing that Ferguson was heading for the bar, I drank with a curiosity verging on nervousness.
In came Ferguson, grinning, greeting everyone in sight and, when it came to my turn, asking what I was having. Once a row with Ferguson was over, it tended to be forgotten, as long as neither side had done something naughty. And telling a cunt to fuck off certainly didn’t come into that category.
What had riled him? Someone suggested I consult a particular article I’d written for the Independent. It included a passage to the effect that ‘matters at Old Trafford’ had been ‘ebbing out of Ferguson’s control’. Of course! To question Ferguson’s control; that would have been unacceptable.
UNITED: STEPS TO GREATNESS
Beating Barcelona
Acouple of months before Ferguson’s first trophy, United engaged Michael ‘Ned’ Kelly, a former SAS man who had built up a security company. One of his duties was to arrange, through his network of stewards, the exclusion from Old Trafford’s bars and lounges of unauthorised ex-players and other freeloaders. Another was to act as ‘minder’ to the manager on match days. There were plenty of fans who still wanted Ferguson out and they could become quite heated, especially when United lost.
Nor was the tension in the air totally dispelled by the FA Cup triumph. According to Ned Kelly, a lingering insecurity impelled Ferguson, upon hearing rumours that Bryan Robson was being lined up to succeed him, to summon the captain, who looked him very steadily in the eye while intimating that, if it had been true, he would have been the first to know. So the battle for hearts and minds went on. There had to be another trophy and it turned out to be the Cup-Winners’ Cup: United followed in Aberdeen’s footsteps by beating one of the Spanish giants, in this case Barcelona, in the final.
Wrexham, like Pécsi Munkás, had been beaten home and away, and after drawing 1-1 at Old Trafford with a Montpellier team featuring Laurent Blanc, United won 2-0 in France, Bryan Robson delivering a masterclass in leadership. The final was reached with a comfortable 4-2 aggregate victory over Legia Warsaw and the ensuing triumph, with Hughes outstanding against his former club, testified to momentum. ‘By then we knew,’ said Martin Edwards, ‘that a special team would be created. It was just a matter of time.’
Bruce, Pallister, Hughes and Ince were joined in that 1990/91 season by Denis Irwin, an understated but highly accomplished full-back who had impressed Ferguson with his performances for Oldham and cost a mere £650,000 and was to become a champion of England – seven times – and Europe with United before leaving at the age of thirty-six on a free transfer. At Wolverhampton, he was to enjoy promotion and a further season in the Premier League during which Old Trafford gave him a standing ovation. At left-back was Clayton Blackmore, another of those who had come through the ranks in the Atkinson era, making the most of young Martin’s back problems, having perhaps the best season of a career that owed much to versatility.
Attendances generally edged up, assisted by hooliganism’s abatement, and United led the way with an average of nearly 45,000. The board’s confidence in Ferguson was expressed with a new four-year contract and a £50,000-a-year pay rise. Among the manager’s other pleasures was the League debut he gave to his son: Darren came on as substitute for Bryan Robson at Sheffield United and was to start a couple of matches as well. Another morsel of food for thought, during the mid-season victory over Tottenham at White Hart Lane, was the dismissal of Gascoigne after a foul-mouthed
outburst at the referee.
A few weeks earlier, Ferguson had noted the resignation as Prime Minister and Conservative leader of Margaret Thatcher. Having been undermined by a challenge from the pro-European Michael Heseltine, she gave her support to John Major and it was he who took the keys to 10 Downing Street. Major had been Chancellor of the Exchequer. He was keen on sport, above all cricket, and his sympathy for football (he supported Chelsea) may have conspired in tax relief that helped clubs to rebuild their stadiums after Hillsborough.
Another football enthusiast was climbing the political ladder. Tony Blair had been adopted as Labour candidate for the safe seat of Sedgefield in County Durham, where he had spent part of his upbringing and developed an allegiance to Newcastle United, after a meeting on the night Ferguson’s Aberdeen won the Cup-Winners’ Cup; the selection committee had insisted he sit down and watch the match before his interview, and he had been happy to comply. Blair was a member of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament and a proudly declared socialist but, being young and good on television, found himself being nudged by Peter Mandelson to the forefront of the Labour reformation. On the night Ferguson’s United won the Cup Winners’ Cup, he was in the Shadow Cabinet, red rose having replaced red flag. Those eight years had been put to good effect and only another five were to pass before Blair became Prime Minister at the age of forty-three.
Over the League season, United rose from thirteenth to sixth. But there was plenty of stuttering along the way. They lost 4–0 at Liverpool and 1–0 at home to Arsenal in the match recalled less for Anders Limpar’s goal than that twenty-one-man brawl (only David Seaman, the Arsenal goalkeeper, was not involved as either an aggressor or peacemaker), which prompted the FA to dock Arsenal two points and United one. The ultimate League position of neither club was affected. Arsenal took their second title under Graham, having lost only one of thirty-eight matches. Among those above United were Manchester City. Leeds came fourth and Gordon Strachan was Footballer of the Year.
At least Liverpool and Dalglish had slipped off their perch – even if Arsenal and Graham now temporarily occupied it. The recession of Dalglish’s powers was not as Ferguson would have wanted. Their managerial relationship had never been as bad as the baby incident made it look and they went back a long way, to when Dalglish was a kid hanging around Ibrox and being teased by the professionals; later they even played against each other in an Old Firm reserve match when Dalglish was a Celtic teenager and Ferguson out of favour with Davie White. But gradually management had worn away at the happy-go-lucky personality of the younger man.
The burdens of Hillsborough had added to the stress of striving to maintain the most successful institution in a century of English club football. Skin rashes and irritability with his family were among Dalglish’s symptoms and he decided to resign. This was before an FA Cup replay with Everton that ended 4-4; while Tony Cottee, an Everton substitute, scored twice, Dalglish made no changes. And the next morning he told the board he was going. The championship Liverpool had won under his management the previous season would be the last to come to the club for many years.
But United, still seeking the consistency with which Graham had endowed Arsenal, were successful only in Europe. Their hopes of retaining the FA Cup were dashed by Norwich and the most domestic excitement was caused by a run to the final of the League Cup in which Liverpool were beaten at Old Trafford and Arsenal thrashed 6-2 on their own ground, Lee Sharpe completing a hat-trick. Through Sharpe the width Ferguson craved was coming, at least on the left (and he was to obtain plenty from Andrei Kanchelskis on the right). United overcame Leeds in the semi-finals to earn a Wembley meeting with Sheffield Wednesday, managed by Ron Atkinson, but lost to a goal from the midfielder John Sheridan, a Mancunian and United fan.
By then they were heading for Rotterdam and another final in which a measure of the full fluency and swagger football had come to expect from United since the rise under Busby was displayed.
It was not the greatest of matches and the poor turnout by Barcelona supporters – the dank night and empty seats may have reminded Ferguson of Gothenburg eight years earlier – did nothing for the atmosphere. But United deserved to beat Johan Cruyff’s team.
Steve Bruce scored nineteen goals in all competitions that season – an extraordinary total for a central defender, even if eleven were penalties – and it would have been twenty had Hughes not touched over the line his header from a Robson free-kick midway through the second half. Minutes later, Robson slipped Hughes through and, although in evading the sprawl of Barcelona’s goalkeeper, Carlos Busquets, the Welshman appeared to give himself too demanding an angle for a shot, the force and accuracy with which he struck it left helpless the two defenders striving to cover.
With ten minutes left, a thirty-five-yard free-kick from Ronald Koeman went through the United wall and was touched by the diving Les Sealey against a post, from which it cannoned off the unlucky goalkeeper into the net. United held out – and partied for forty-eight hours, with Ferguson a keen participant. He had even been emboldened to cavort on the pitch, conducting the fans as they belted out a new anthem, Monty Python’s ‘Always Look on the Bright Side of Life’.
As Robson swigged champagne, Koeman swallowed disappointment. The Dutchman had only a year to await consolation, for at Wembley another of his renowned free-kicks beat Sampdoria’s Gianluca Pagliuca to make Barcelona champions of Europe for the first time and earn Cruyff’s players (including Pep Guardiola, who was to manage Barcelona against Ferguson’s United in the 2009 final) membership of a celebrated ‘dream team’.
Dreaming On
For Ferguson and United, the dream was about England and the title that had last been claimed in 1967. In the summer, Ferguson was dismayed to lose Archie Knox, who went to Rangers, but promoted Brian Kidd to assistant manager and received some benefit in the sense that his behaviour towards referees improved.
This, at least, was the recollection of David Elleray, a leading whistler who later served as chairman of the FA referees’ committee. ‘Brian did a lot to keep Alex out of trouble,’ said Elleray. ‘Once I saw him take Alex and drag him down the tunnel away from my dressing room. He knew Alex well enough to arrive just as Alex was waiting for you in the tunnel, ready to give you a volley of abuse, and get him out of the way.
‘I remember once chatting to Brian and asking him where he liked to spend his summer holidays. “The other end of the world from Alex Ferguson,” he replied. But he was good with Alex and I think Alex respected him. I think Alex is always better when he has a strong assistant.’ Clearly Knox was strong. ‘Yes,’ said Elleray. So had Knox been able to moderate Ferguson’s behaviour? ‘No,’ said Elleray. ‘He was as bad. In fact he was worse.’
With Kidd at Ferguson’s side, the wait for the title seemed certain to end after a neat quarter-century, for the 1991/2 season saw United top for long periods. They collected another trophy, the League Cup, and yet it may have been their success in making themselves the hurdle over which Leeds fell in both that and the FA Cup that enabled the Yorkshire club to pip them at the post in the big race.
Again Ferguson had strengthened his team. Sealey had left the club (he was to die of a heart attack at forty-three) and the likes of Phelan and Blackmore become squad players, as specialists of true quality were brought in.
A right-winger of electric pace, only twenty-one years old, had been brought from the Ukrainian club Shakhtar Donetsk towards the end of the previous season and Andrei Kanchelskis was to prove a significant buy at £1.2 million rising to £3 million if he were sold at a profit (he went to Everton for £5 million eventually, being replaced by David Beckham).
Paul Parker, another quick player, an England defender who cost £2 million from Queens Park Rangers, would have been more significant but for injury problems that surfaced soon after his arrival.
But the biggest buy, in every sense but one (he cost just over £500,000), was the cheapest: Peter Schmeichel became a giant, a hero of the Fer
guson revolution as well as his native Denmark and a worthy United captain on the night in 1999 when the club regained the European title.
Foreign players still verged on the exotic when Ferguson engaged Kanchelskis and Schmeichel; at the Premier League’s inception (as the FA Premier League) a year later, there were only about a dozen in it. Leeds had Cantona. Arsenal had the Swedish winger Anders Limpar and Sheffield Wednesday his compatriot the full-back Roland Nilsson. Schmeichel apart, Denmark was represented by another hero of the European Championship campaign, John Jensen, who joined George Graham’s Arsenal. The Oldham right-back, Gunnar Halle, was Norwegian.
Quite a Scandinavian presence, you will notice – and it was the agent responsible for most of those moves, and more, who had helped Ferguson into the forefront of the English game’s new internationalism. His name, Rune Hauge, was to become almost synonymous with the backhander or ‘bung’ habit which had been perennially discussed in the game but seldom proved.
In 1991, Ferguson recalled, Hauge had visited Old Trafford notionally representing a perimeter advertising company but had asked if he needed any players and, upon being told that something right-sided would be handy, sent a video of Kanchelskis. Ferguson and Martin Edwards saw the fleet, powerful winger play for the Soviet Union against Germany in Frankfurt and soon concluded negotiations with Kanchelskis’s three agents.
One was German, another Swiss – ‘We were beginning to think we were in a John le Carré novel,’ said Ferguson – but the main one, Grigory Essaoulenko, was the most interesting, as Ferguson was to have confirmed in 1994 when, after Kanchelskis’s contract had been generously renewed, the United manager received an unsolicited gift of £40,000. And rejected it. Ferguson also pointed out that Hauge, who had been ‘peripheral’ to the Frankfurt negotiations, only ever mentioned money to him once, and ‘in a roundabout way’, and never brought up the subject again.
Football – Bloody Hell! Page 19