1. The decision to accept "MJ" (1986)
The phrase “Manchester United - a great club” was far from indisputable by November 6, 1986, when Alex Ferguson appeared in Manchester. At least, the MU trophies won by the brilliant team of Matt Busby had managed to get dusty by then. The Red Devils have not won the championship of England since 1967 and even managed to find themselves in the second division for a year. Old Trafford's average attendance dropped to 40,000 people per match, the team was in the relegation zone, and the dear newcomers to Manchester United, a club traditionally wealthy, did not play even half their price. Moving to Manchester United did not give Alex Ferguson any financial benefit - in Manchester he was offered a little less than 120,000 pounds per year that he earned in Aberdeen. “My family was categorically against this move,” Ferguson will write in his autobiography. “But for me, Manchester United is not just a new job. This is the mission. ”
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2. The use of "hedgehog gloves" from the very beginning (1986-1987)
Ferguson dispensed with the “honeymoon” with the new team, on the move, proceeding to tighten the screws. After the first match (defeat from the “Oxford” 0: 2), he set up in his locker room his famous carnage in England. This was followed by a ban on the use of alcohol - harsh for England at that time. The following are the strictest regulations regarding punctuality, diet and dress code.
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3. First cleaning (1989)
The third season of “Manchester United” with Ferguson finished in 11th place, which did not meet the claims of the coach and the club and led to a sweeping cleansing of the ranks of the team. To the disappointment of the fans, Gordon Strakan, Norman Whiteside and Paul McGrath were expelled from it. “Not lacking in talent, these players did not allow Manchester United to eradicate their drinking habits,” Times wrote. Players bought for a substitution were the first transfer successes of Alex Ferguson: Paul Ince and the most expensive British football player (2.3 million pounds) Gary Pallister at that time.
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4. Successful exit from the “corkscrew” of the 1989/90 season
Three out of Ferguson’s first four seasons at United ended up at the bottom of the table. The fourth of them was the hardest for the coach - they say that Ferguson was not fired from Manchester United just because the club directorate did not manage to find a suitable replacement for him. After the defeat in the Manchester derby (1: 5), “Bye-bye Fergie” was sung in the stands and a banner was posted: “Three years of excuses and it's still crap” (“Three years of excuses, and the team still crap”). Ferguson’s fate was decided in the quarterfinal match of the FA Cup against Nottingham Forest, one of the best teams of the time. Manchester United won 1-0 thanks to a goal from Mark Robins, Ferguson kept his job, and at the end of the season he raised his first Manchester trophy - this same Cup. And then he promised new ones.
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5. The acquisition of Eric Canton (1991)
Autumn 1991 didn’t ask MJ: the problems in the attack and the injury of lead striker Diane Dablin by November threw MJ into 10th place. Ferguson's transfer searches were limited by a modest budget at that time. However, it was unimaginable enough to lead Eric Canton from Leeds, to pay attention to which the then trained French national team Gerard Houlier advised the Scot. For 20 years at Manchester United, Ferguson spent over 300 million pounds on manning, but the million that was paid for Canton gave the most significant dividends. “Eric inspired and transformed the team,” Alex will say at the end of the season. Celebrating the first Manchester United Championship in 26 years.
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6. The acquisition of Roy Keane (1993)
The 22-year-old Nottingham Forest midfielder, bought for a record £ 3.7 million then for England, has long become the pivotal character of the Red Devils. And, of course, he took part in all the achievements of the new season, one of the best in the history of United. Manchester United won the 1993/94 championship with an 8-point lead over Blackburn and destroyed Chelsea in the cup final - 4-0.
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7. Preservation of Eric Canton (1995)
Erik Canton’s 8-month suspension for hitting a Crystal Palace fan seemed to mark the end of his Old Trafford career - at least in terms of the club’s press and directorate. But Alex Ferguson insisted that the French striker remain in the team. The most difficult thing was to convince Canton himself, who, after the obstruction arranged for him, sat in Paris. Modern British sports literature describes the decisive meeting with Eric in one of the Parisian restaurants in pathetic details: Alex (then not yet sir) arrived there at Harley-Davidson.
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8. Second cleaning (1995)
“When Ferguson decided at once to get rid of Mark Hughes, Paul Ince and Andrei Kanchelskis, they accepted it with surprise. When Ferguson said that he was not going to buy anyone in their place, with serious suspicions of his mental illness, ”the Times wrote. Back then, few people, like Ferguson, believed in the open youth team of Manchester United Ryan Giggs, David Beckham, Paul Scholes, the Neville brothers and Nikki Butt. “The growth of young talents, when it happens before your eyes, is the main beauty of football,” Ferguson will say at the end of the season. Celebrating another take.
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9. Transfers of summer 1998
At first, they did not seem successful to anyone but Ferguson. Ferguson paid PSV 17 million euros for Yap Stam (the then world record for defenders). And the outstanding, it seemed, striker "Villa" Dwight York cost 12.6 million pounds. To make the second of these transfers, Ferguson had to overcome the serious opposition of the club leadership, who was planning to buy the money from the stupid Welshman John Hartson, - they even say that the trainer, insisting on his own, threatened to resign. Both transfers worked - at least in the short term. York drew a percussion tandem with Andy Cole and for two years in a row was the team's best sniper. And Stam cemented the defense of Manchester United for the next three seasons, after which he was resold to Lazio. Not without scandal, but with a profit for the club.
EFFECT: ++
10. Substitutions for the Nou Camp (1999)
Wednesday, May 26, 1999, Barcelona's Nou Camp Stadium, 10:07 local time. Manchester United in the absence of disqualified Scholes and Kina lose the final of the Bayern Champions League and have no special chance to recoup. Ferguson picks up Sulscher and Sheringham from the bench - and in the time compensated by the referee, they drive two goals into the gates of Oliver Kahn. At the post-match press conference, Ferguson, barely able to clothe his emotions in some kind of verbal form, gives out the most cult of his phrases: “Well, football, huh? A hell of a thing. "
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11. Refusal to perform in the FA Cup (1999)
As European champions, Manchester went to Brazil for the FIFA Club World Cup, which they lost safely. However, this profitable tour was not mounted in any way into the already saturated English calendar. Manchester United sensationally refused to participate in the FA Cup, which at that time had it, which the club is still blamed for.
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12. Waiting for Ore van Nistelrooy (2000-01)
The agreement with PSV on the acquisition of van Nistelrooy broke due to a player’s knee injury. However, after waiting for the year necessary for the Dutch striker to recover, Alex Ferguson returned to this deal, for which Van Nistelrooy paid him 150 goals in 219 matches.
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13. Application for resignation at the end of the season 2001/02 (2000)
No matter what they say about the true motives of Ferguson’s statement (the popular version says that it was a form of protest by the coach against the modest salary offered to him by the United directorate), the Scot eventually got his way. The prolongation of the contract of “Manchester United” and Ferguson brought the club new titles, and the coach - much more substantial earnings.
EFFECT: +
14. Refusal to resign (2001)
At Christmas 2001, Ferguson made a gift to the MJ worshipers, announcing an extension of the contract. And he planted a pig for the England team: Sven-Heran Ericsson, as was supposed at that time, was to head not her, but Manchester United.
EFFECT: +
15. Acquisition of Juan Sebastian Verona (2001)
The most unsuccessful of MJ transfers under Alex Ferguson cost 42.6 million euros. The Argentinean hardly won back even a third of this money.
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16. The Horse Saga (2002)
The main shareholders of Manchester United John Manier and JP McManus somehow gave Ferguson half of the rights to the best of the British horses named Gibraltar Rock in a fit of emotion. “He costs less than Beckham or Verona, but runs better than them,” the Scot was enthusiastic about the jumps. But, given the consequences, this horse turned out to be quite Trojan. After several tournament failures, the relations between the co-owners of the club and the head coach cooled, and Manye and McManus refused to recognize Ferguson's right to a share in the champion offspring of a horse whose value exceeded 100 million pounds. In the midst of the conflict, Manye and McManus increased their stake in Manchester United and, despite the curses of the fans, almost survived Alex Ferguson from the team. He was supposed to be replaced by Martin O'Neill. Only in 2004, the conflict was settled (Ferguson was satisfied with paying him 2.5 million pounds). And a year later, the Irish co-owners of the club, unloved by the fans, lost the action of Manchester United to the completely hated American Malcolm Glaser.
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17. The break with Beckham and its sale in Real Madrid (2003)
The relations of the coach and the player, which Beckham himself compared with the relations of father and son, were heated during the last champion season of the Red Devils. And they finally got spoiled after Ferguson threw the boot into the most expensive face of world football in a fit of rage after one of the matches. Selling Beckham to Real for £ 25 million is not the worst way out of this family quarrel.
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18. Conflict of Interest (2003)
Before the “horse saga” and “Beckham’s case” had calmed down, Alex Ferguson again became the hero of the scandalous chronicle. It turned out that the youngest son of Sir Alex Jason, a co-owner of a sports agency, assisted in getting transfer commissions by agents of United football players when arranging transfer operations. In particular, it became known that in the first three years of the new millennium, the club paid agents representing Jason Ferguson's company 13.4 million pounds (or 8.5% of all its transactions over this period), while the usual commission of agents does not exceed 5 % As it turned out, Alex Ferguson did everything so that football players, especially young ones, were acquired through the company of his son. So, an amount of 300,000 pounds was transferred to her account for the transfer to the “MJ” of Wigan goalkeeper Roy Carroll, which almost exceeded the transfer fee of the football player, who became just a spare in the new team. As a result, the directorate of Manchester United refused to cooperate with the company of Ferguson Jr. and demanded the strictest control over agent commissions.
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19. Buying Wayne Rooney (2004)
The decision to spend almost the entire transfer budget of the next two seasons (£ 27 million) on the Liverpool child prodigy is a definite plus in Ferguson’s Manchester career. Although fully utilized, probably only the successor of the Scot.
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20. Expulsion of Roy Keane (2005)
Kina’s glorious 12-year career at Manchester United ended in 15 minutes, which he confessed to in front of the MUTV club channel camera. This interview, in which the captain of the club was harsh as never before regarding his partners, was not broadcast - but Ferguson still considered it unacceptable. For all its controversy, this decision had no clear negative consequences. Keane’s position in the center of midfield was closed in turn, all the way to Rio Ferdinand, and was successfully closed. Manchester United managed to finish the season pretty well. And from Roy Keane, as well as from Strakan and Hughes once exhibited by Ferguson, perhaps a good coach will now come out.
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21. Expulsion of Ore van Nistelrooy (2006)
The last of Ferguson’s significant staffing decisions was again perplexing. The catastrophe, thanks to a good game of Saa and outstanding - Cristiano Ronaldo, did not happen. But sometimes the attack, “Manchester United” can not do anything to protect opponents like “Copenhagen” or “Southend”.
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Dmitry NAVOSHA, Andrey KARNAUKHOV