www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2022/05/06/alex-ferguson-rant-manchester-united-audio-idiots/‘YOUSE
ARE
F
ING
IDIOTS’
‘Youse are f------ idiots’: Listen to Sir Alex Ferguson’s most infamous rant – 20 years on
Sam Wallace reveals how it felt to be in the room when Sir Alex Ferguson launched his infamous X-rated rant 20 years ago
By
Sam Wallace,
CHIEF FOOTBALL WRITER
6 May 2022 • 7:00am
Telegraph Sport presents the never-before-heard audio of one of the former Manchester United manager’s most famous outbursts to a small group of reporters at the club’s Carrington training ground, on its 20th anniversary – one that was reported in part at the time and which spawned one of Fergie’s most oft-quoted lines.
Listen to the full audio below. If using Android, please plug your headphones in (warning: explicit content)
Read the transcript below
The mythology around Sir Alex Ferguson’s temper became a useful part of his armoury in the Manchester United manager’s most productive years, whether it was directed in private at his own players, at referees or, as was often the case in the days before every word was caught on camera, football journalists.
Yet, there are very few examples of Ferguson’s temper in action – the anger, the industrial language and the determination to crush a dissenting voice. As Ferguson once famously said of his profession: “The manager can never lose an argument”.
On that day, the trigger for Ferguson’s fury was a question about the Argentine talent Juan Sebastian Veron, who had been bought the previous summer for a then club record fee of £28 million having been considered in Italy the most talented midfielder in Europe. But he had struggled to make his mark in the United team of serial winners.
Veron and Ferguson
Sir Alex Ferguson angrily defended Juan Sebastian Veron against 'carthorse' jibes CREDIT: Shaun Botterill / Getty Images
The previous November at United’s AGM, in an era when the club was publicly owned, Ferguson had angrily defended his player against one shareholder’s accusation that Veron was “a carthorse”. Six months later, as questions about Veron’s form persisted, Ferguson’s temper reached boiling point. The Scot famously erupted with the immortal line: “He’s a f------ great player! Youse are f------ idiots!”
The Fergie rant tape
Reader, I was there. In those days, Ferguson spoke to newspaper reporters separately, away from cameras and radio mics but not, as he may have sometimes forgotten, journalists’ tape recorders. I had assumed the details of that five-minute press conference were lost forever. But a recent house-move turned up a box of micro-cassette tapes. There, on the side of one (pictured), was a memorandum scribbled from 20 years ago: “Fergie goes mad”.
Twelve months after this explosion, Veron was sold to Chelsea, newly wealthy under the ownership of Roman Abramovich and able to offer United the kind of money that allowed them to cut their losses. Back on May 6, 2002, however, Ferguson did not see it that way. The Manchester-based correspondents were at Carrington to hear his thoughts ahead of what was already threatening to be a dark day for Ferguson: the visit to Old Trafford of Arsenal, where victory would seal Arsene Wenger’s second Premier League title.
Alex Ferguson and Arsene Wenger
Arsene Wenger got under the skin of Sir Alex Ferguson more than any other manager CREDIT: Getty Images
In that era, Ferguson’s briefings took place in a small room off the reception at Carrington. Relations were strained, to say the least, between the famous manager who had won seven Premier League titles by that point – three in the last three seasons – and the reporters covering United for the national papers. Bans were often issued to some newspapers, including at that time the Daily Mail. There were others, too.
On this occasion, Ferguson’s main target was The Sun’s long-serving Manchester correspondent, Neil Custis. The story Ferguson blamed Custis for on this occasion, however, was misattributed – as Custis was at pains to point out. It was the Sunday Mirror which had alleged that a row had occurred between Veron and unnamed team-mates. That had followed United’s elimination at the Champions League semi-final stage to Bayer Leverkusen a week earlier.
Sunday Mirror back page
The 2002 Sunday Mirror back page story which provoked Fergie’s ire
The Bundesliga club, a tiddler compared to the colossus that Ferguson had created at United, had prevailed on away goals, with a 2-2 draw at Old Trafford and then a 1-1 draw in Germany. For Ferguson it proved a grave disappointment: the other finalist was Real Madrid and the final was to be in his hometown of Glasgow at Hampden Park, where as a teenager in 1960 he had watched the great Real side of the era win their fifth straight European Cup final, 7-3 against Eintracht Frankfurt.
Five days after the 2002 semi-final second leg, the Sunday Mirror alleged Veron had returned to Rome and sought a move back to Lazio. The newspaper would later, under pressure from United, retract the story in print but only after Ferguson had raged at this separate group of reporters seeking clarification on the issue.
In the past, Ferguson had been a keen reader and contributor to newspapers, especially during his playing career in Scotland. His seminal 1999 autobiography Managing My Life includes many newspaper articles chronicling his days as a player. As a child he even wrote to his local paper to apologise for a below-par performance in a schoolboy representative match. As a 21-year-old he was delighted to be contacted by the press the day after his famous hat-trick for St Johnstone against his boyhood club Rangers in 1963, that kickstarted his career. That 1999 book was ghostwritten by the great sportswriter Hugh McIlvanney and later, in 2013, Ferguson would publish a volume ghosted by another great writer on sport, Paul Hayward, previously of The Telegraph.
ALEX FERGUSON
‘Your f------ stuff is a disgrace to journalism’
READ TRANSCRIPT+
Powerful and successful, Ferguson increasingly resented press conferences in which he claimed to see little value. As the reporters he had known since his arrival in Manchester 16 years earlier moved into retirement he became less tolerant of the new generation. “You just want a f------ story” was one of his lines on this day, which neatly summarises the cross-purposes at which both sides found themselves.
He would later refuse to speak to the BBC for seven years despite the broadcaster paying handsomely for the Match of the Day highlights package. He did so in protest at the way one of his sons Jason, then a registered agent, was portrayed in a 2004 BBC Three documentary, Fergie and Son.
Eventually he would refuse to attend post-match press conferences for domestic games. The Premier League could have fined him but chose not to do so. All his pre-match briefings were eventually conducted in front of camera which meant that there were none of the raw days such as this one, where the temper was short and the reporting required liberal use of the asterisk.
Ferguson outbursts were not uncommon. Tales of his rages were passed down from one generation of reporters to the next, as were the personal admonishments and cutting remarks directed at individuals. Sometimes he would lay into the entire group, sometimes he would focus on one person, and they had to be ready to stand their ground. He was once famously caught on camera chastising the BBC commentator John Motson – “you f------ know the rules here” – who attempted to defend himself by saying he had been told to ask the question. In the days when relations with the press were better, there had been a tendency for his rages to go unreported.
The front page of Telegraph Sport in 2002 after Sir Alex Ferguson's tirade at the press
The front page of Telegraph Sport in 2002 after Sir Alex Ferguson's tirade at the press
This time it was different. Along with the Telegraph sport desk, for whom I worked, then in Manchester in my first spell at the paper, we took the view that Ferguson’s outburst should be reported. It was in an era when the notion of “mind-games” between Ferguson and Wenger were discussed in all parts of the football media as a key part of the battle for supremacy in the Premier League. If ever this was a case of Ferguson losing that psychological battle then this was surely it. Others did the same.
The press conference itself is also in full below. It was brief and for the most part was a dispute between Custis and Ferguson over a story the former did not write. Custis kept his eye on the ball, however, and with nothing to lose launched the all-important question: what had happened with Veron? For the rest of us in the room, there will have been a measure of relief that the nettle had been grasped.
ALEX FERGUSON
‘Absolute nonsense! You know it’s nonsense! Absolute lies!’
READ TRANSCRIPT+
My favourite moment is the late intervention from the experienced journalist Richard Tanner, then of the Daily Express and now a freelancer who works for Telegraph Sport. Ferguson has already exploded by that point – “Absolute nonsense! You know it’s nonsense! Absolute lies!” – when Tanner sizes up the situation and decides to approach the issue from a different angle. He wonders politely whether Ferguson might like to talk about Veron in general.
The response is fairly emphatic:
ALEX FERGUSON
‘He’s a f------ great player! Youse are f------ idiots!’
READ TRANSCRIPT+
In the end, Veron did start against Arsenal, coming off in the 58th minute, just after Sylvain Wiltord had scored the goal that would ensure Wenger’s team won the title at Old Trafford. Those reporting on United were not invited to another audience with Ferguson for the final game of that season.
Twenty years on, Custis, who has covered United and Manchester City for his newspaper since 1999, looks back on those years with Ferguson with great fondness. “The difference then was that there were only nine of us in a room – no camera, no radio mics,” Custis says. “He could blow up if he wanted. And I felt I could have a bit of a go back. The only occasion he had a real problem with me was when I had a go back a few years later when the cameras were there. Fergie respected people who didn’t argue for argument’s sake, but would stand up to him.”
Back in 2002, Custis took a different view from me and others who reported Ferguson’s explosion that day. His report the following day mentioned that Ferguson had been angry but not the details of what had been said and, 20 years on, he stands by that decision.
“It [the reporting of Ferguson's outburst] was the beginning of the end of those smaller press conferences where he knew us all as a group and he could express how he felt – whether you agreed or not,” Custis says. The practice would continue on pre-season tours but the Friday tradition at Carrington changed. Press conferences were conducted on stage and on camera. “I still think Sir Alex preferred the more local nature of it,” Custis says, “with people he knew in a closed environment."
When Ferguson retired in 2013, it was Custis who delivered the farewell speech on behalf of the Manchester media – proof that what Ferguson said about someone in anger never lasted for long.
Back in the summer of 2002, United broke their transfer record again to sign Rio Ferdinand and embarked on what would be the last of their low-key European pre-season tours in the Netherlands and Scandinavia.
It was suggested to the reporters covering the club that we come to the Amsterdam Hilton where United were staying and John Lennon had once taken to his bed with Yoko Ono in the cause of world peace. Ferguson seemed of a similar mindset, ordering pots of tea and chatting away amicably about how his players had lost their edge the previous season, hinting at the big contract renewals some of them had been given. By the following summer they were Premier League champions again, and the usual hostilities had been resumed.
Back to full audio
The full transcript:
Carrington, May 6, 2002, one day before United vs Arsenal and a week after United’s elimination from the Champions League semi-final to Bayer Leverkusen on away goals.
Fergie:
Right be quick, I’ve only got a few minutes. We don’t have any injuries. As such. One or two bumps and bruises from last week have all gone now, so really we have got the same squad as we had last week.
Neil Custis (The Sun):
Have you had a bit more time looking back on the European disappointment? Have you any other thoughts on it?
Fergie:
No, I’m looking forward to Wednesday. It’s the kind of game, you get to the second last game of the season and it means something, it means something to us. And we are looking forward to it. It should be a terrific game.
Bill Thornton (Daily Star):
There’s this sort of perception, isn’t there Alex, that it’s all over but it isn’t, is it?
Fergie:
Well you never know, we just have to do our job – we can only do our job - and if it takes us to the last game of the season it’s great excitement for the league and at that point we can sit back. The most important thing is we have to win Wednesday’s game. I think that’s obvious.
Custis:
Can you see Everton getting a draw on the last day? [when they play Arsenal]
Fergie:
I won’t discuss that at the moment. There’s no point discussing that at the moment.
Richard Tanner (Daily Express):
How important is it to beat them at home, Alex? To deny them winning at Old Trafford?
Fergie:
The importance of winning means that it [title race] can go to the last game. That’s all it is. And I have said that. Straightforward situation. And that’s what we want to do, we want to take the game [title race] to the last day of the season. Which would be terrific drama and just keeps the thing going.
Custis:
What are your feelings on Arsenal and what they have achieved so far?
Fergie:
Well their run in this part of the season is without question championship form. They haven’t scored [conceded] a goal in their last five, six games. I think that’s right isn’t it? [five games in all competitions]. So that kind of form, you expect, there’s no hiding place in respect of results. They have got where they are because of the results. It’s a phenomenal run and our form has been good also. We have gone to Leeds and won and gone to Chelsea and won. We have gone to Ipswich and won. We have done our bit as well as we can.
Sam Wallace (The Telegraph):
You were very upbeat after the European game. You even said you thought this year United had the best form in the country.
Fergie:
I said we played the best football. The best attacking football. That’s what I said. It tells you how many goals we have scored.
Tanner:
You have scored more goals and you could actually end up with more wins which backs up that view, does it not?
Fergie:
The winning part has been good. The area where we have been disappointed, we lost 1-0 at home to West Ham. Lost 1-0 at home to Middlesbrough. Two draws and it’s a different game. That’s the tightness of the league for you this year. Last year we could have maybe got off with those types of results, but not this year.
Custis:
You said you thought there’d been a certain arrogance in the way they [Arsenal] have been saying…
Fergie:
I’m not getting involved in that because you just want a f------- story as usual. I’m not getting involved in that. Your f------ stuff is a disgrace to journalism. You are.
Custis:
Me?!
Fergie:
The stuff that you f------ come out with.
Custis:
What about it?!
Fergie:
You are always f------ going on about this club. Always.
Custis:
It’s my job to cover this club. I haven’t done anything particularly…
Fergie:
Och you’re a joke.
Custis:
Well if you can name one.
Fergie:
Well, listen, you go on about f------ Veron. Right, you tell me what’s wrong with Veron. You tell me what’s…
Custis:
I am not the only one.
Fergie:
Well what about … you are … you’re the worst. You’re the worst.
Custis:
I don’t think he’s played very well.
Fergie:
Well, I do! What’s this thing about fights and all the rest of this s---?
Custis:
I didn’t say that
Fergie:
But you carried it on!
Custis:
I haven’t done a story about fights. I haven’t done one story about fights
[murmured anon]:
It was the Sunday Mirror
Fergie:
Sunday Mirror? Alright. Try and have a bit of respect for your f------ job. Right? A bit of dignity for your job. Try and understand what the players’ feelings are like. Right?
Custis:
Every paper has done a story about Veron.
Fergie:
Yeah but you seem to have all the time … something.
Custis:
No I’m no worse than anybody else – no different to anyone else.
Fergie:
Well anyway I am not getting into Arsenal’s arrogance. You can write about that. That’s your job. If you want to cover football then talk about their arrogance – not me.
Custis:
But I can’t talk about individual players?
Fergie:
Well you talk about their arrogance if you want. I am not going to talk about it.
Custis:
Right.
Fergie:
Okay.
Custis:
Will Veron play on Wednesday?
Fergie:
I’ve not picked the team yet.
Custis:
What about the accusations that he had a bust-up and he’s gone home and he’s not going to play again?
Fergie:
That was answered with Paddy Harverson [then MUFC director of communications]!
Custis:
I just think the fans will be interested in what you have to say
Fergie:
It’s absolute nonsense! Absolute nonsense! You know it’s nonsense! Absolute lies! I don’t believe that you write these things. Anyway that’s a-finish, on you go. Get going.
Tanner:
Could we talk generally about Veron? You’re obviously irritated by the speculation…
Fergie:
On you go! We’re no f------ talking! He’s a f------ great player! Youse are f------ idiots!
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