Talk:Alex Ferguson/Archive 1

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Content

I'm thinking that the content here looks suspiciously like a copyvio - will try to check that out in the near future. Further, I would expect that this information is better placed in the Man Utd article rather than here. violet/riga (t) 08:31, 23 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Hair dryer treatment

I've repeatedly read about the "hair dryer" treatment. I've seen Sir Alex asked about it during an interview. Yet I come to the Wikipedia article to find out what it is and it isn't here. There's a passing comment to it on this talk page where it has been labelled "trivia". For those not knowing much about Sir Alex it's a key attribute that needs explaining on the main page. -- Ralph Corderoy 09:13, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

Biased

This article is far too biased towards Alex Ferguson and reads like a eulogy. Salopian (talk) 10:33, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

Is that not contradictory? – PeeJay 10:35, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

No, definitely not. If anything, it's tautological. Salopian (talk) 11:56, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Well either way, my only problem with the content of this page is that it focuses too much on the history of Manchester United under Alex Ferguson, rather than focusing on the man himself. It really needs a massive copyedit. – PeeJay 11:58, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

You're right about that, although there's already a big section about that below. However, the article still also fawns over him horrifically. Salopian (talk) 16:04, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

To be fair, the man is probably the most successful manager in the last 25 years of English football. – PeeJay 21:37, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

So what? That means it's right to describe his successes, not that it's fine to be sychophantic towards him and ignore his failings. Salopian (talk) 09:29, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

agree 100% with Salopian and with the fact it is about Man U rather than Fergie. Quite a poor article really becasue of these two major failings. --Shakehandsman (talk) 02:41, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

This article is about Alex Ferguson not ManU

This article needs a heavy edit. To dismiss Alexs Fergusons life pre 1986 (the year he joined Man U) is unforgivable. Arguably his greatest achievement was winning the European Cup Winners Cup with Aberdeen in the pre-Champions League era. He also enjoyed considerable success in the lower Scottish leagues at a time when they were producing truely world class footballers (and managers!). Surely his colorful Govan upringing, and early non football careers of shipyard apprentice, and later, glasgow publican merit analysis.

Post 1986, Fergusons successes are well documented elsewhere and should be here as well. However, Alex Fergusons achievements are not synonymous with those of Manchester Uniteds. Additionally, the above point that the information on this area could be a copyvio seems justified.

Agree - most of the text of this article is concerned with Manchester United, rather on Alex Ferguson. An edit needs to be made to move it to a Manchester United article. - Master Of Ninja 07:02, 11 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Agree - Fergusons period as Scotland manager not covered or his declining the England manager job in 1995 and 1999. Also issues over business relationships with Man U stockholders and his son's work as an Agent and reasons for uturn over retirement in 2001. Most importantly needs some character profile for bust ups with other managers and key players.

Agree - this is an excellent recent history of United but most of this should be merged into Manchester United F.C. and History of Manchester United. It could be awkward though as those articles already duplicate each other and there'll probably be a lot of disagreement about what should go where. Some more stuff on his personal life would be more relevant here (things like falling out with Coolmore over Rock of Gibraltar, growing up in Govan etc.). If I get time I'll dig out one of his biographies and expand it a bit.

Does anyone want to volunteer to help merge the three articles? I'd like to do it but I'm new to Wikipedia and would like to hear what people think before deleting/moving large amounts of stuff. Cantthinkofagoodname 11:29, 24 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Agree - There's bugger all about SAF in here. It's all Man U. Needs to be sorted out. --El Pollo Diablo | Talk 10:47, 18 July 2005 (UTC)

I've merged the section on the History of Manchester United after 1986 with that page, and removed it from this. I also think the section on managing Aberdeen is of the same nature - focused more on the achievements of the team than the manager, and maybe this needs to be edited too. --El Pollo Diablo | Talk 22:46, 20 September 2005 (UTC)

I agree that this needs improving, but deleting it all and leaving the article with barely anything on his time at United was too much. It's better to have something on it, even if it's not great, than to just ignore the last 20 years of his career. I think it would be best to go through the article replacing/improving a part of it at a time, and leaving what's here alone until it can be improved. I've been offline for a couple of weeks (moving house) but have written a load of notes on his time at Aberdeen and earlier years at United (up to about '93) so I'll get it into the article as soon as I can.

I wrote the stuff that's in the article on his time at Aberdeen. I'll see if there's any more personal stuff I can add.

CTOAGN 23:22, 20 September 2005 (UTC)

I've trimmed the Man United stuff down quite a bit. I'll add some content that's more relevant to the article when I find the notes I wrote (just moved house so it could take a while to find them.) CTOAGN 16:46, 21 September 2005 (UTC)

Good job - the deletion was a step too far in hindsight. After a lot of time spent editing the notes for the other article, I suppose I lost some rationale lol. Definitely need something on his time an Man U here - I'll see if I can add anything myself.--El Pollo Diablo | Talk 23:03, 21 September 2005 (UTC)

I'd like to do a rewrite of the Manchester United section at some point soon, make it so it's less sectioned (periods of seasons rather than season by season), rejig more of the paragraphs so that any non-SAF bits are removed, and so on. Hopefully I can do this in the next week...--El Pollo Diablo | Talk 12:56, 20 October 2005 (UTC)

Nice one. I've completely lost the notes I made so it's all yours. If you want a hand with anything, though, let me know. CTOAGN 18:01, 20 October 2005 (UTC)

Urm should this page be moved to Sir alex ferguson, it is his official title Mutated to the limit

I see no reason to. Official titles aren't used for the links. Queen Elizabeth II is simply at "Elizabeth_II_of_the_United_Kingdom" not "Queen_Elizabeth_II_of_the_United_Kingdom" after all.

The whole article reads like a Manchester United press release. Is the author a Manchester united fan perchance? The author has glossed over the allegations of Corruption and Nepotism. There were also some allegations of downright bullying in his early managerial days that dont appear here. On the whole this article seems very POV, 194.152.93.186 13:01, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

problem with Aberdeen

It says "He fined one of his players, John Hewitt, for overtaking him on a public road,[12]" The link with John Hewitt is to a poet in the 1930s, clearly the wrong link. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Outside Center (talk • contribs) .

Fixed, and interestingly, he was the one who scored the winning goal in the Cup Winners Cup final against Real. Jastein 05:22, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Too much Manchester United?

There are slabs of text with details on ManU's season that don't mention Ferguson. A summary of what the team has achieved each season is fine but this article is on Ferguson not the club )we have others articles for that!). I should like to thin it out.

For example:

The season was characterized by highly dramatic matches. In the Champions League semi-final, United conceded two early goals away to Juventus in the second leg (after a 1-1 draw at Old Trafford in which United scored a last-minute equaliser). Inspired by Roy Keane, who would later miss the final through suspension, United came back to beat Juventus 3-2 and reach their first European Cup final since 1968. In the FA Cup semi-final, United faced close rivals Arsenal and appeared to be heading for defeat when Keane was sent off and, with the score at 1-1, Arsenal were awarded a last-minute penalty. Goalkeeper Peter Schmeichel saved the penalty, and in extra time Ryan Giggs ran the length of the pitch to score a memorable winning goal. They then defeated Newcastle United 2-0 in the FA Cup Final at Wembley thanks to goals from Teddy Sheringham and Paul Scholes. The European triumph was the most incredible of all. With 90 minutes on the clock they were 1-0 down to Bayern Munich at the Nou Camp in Barcelona thanks to a Mario Basler free kick, but in 3 minutes of injury time allowed by referee Pierluigi Collina, Teddy Sheringham, a substitute, equalised and extra time looked certain. But with just seconds left on the clock, Ole Gunnar Solskjær, also a late substitution scored the winning goal and history was made.

can become:

The season was characterized by highly dramatic matches. In the Champions League semi-final United came back to beat Juventus 3-2 and reach their first European Cup final since 1968. In the FA Cup semi-final, United faced close rivals Arsenal when Keane was sent off and, with the score at 1-1, Arsenal were awarded a last-minute penalty. Goalkeeper Peter Schmeichel saved the penalty, and in extra time Ryan Giggs scored a memorable winning goal. They then defeated Newcastle United 2-0 in the FA Cup Final at Wembley. In the European Cup Final, with 90 minutes on the clock, they were 1-0 down to Bayern Munich at the Nou Camp, but in 3 minutes of injury time Teddy Sheringham equalised and with just seconds left on the clock, Ole Gunnar Solskjær, scored the winning goal and history was made.

Thoughts, please. BlueValour 22:22, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

Absolutely. Trimming out the superflous stuff is fine. Catchpole 06:53, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

I'm a massive United fan, but I have to say that there is still too much of it in here. Good work so far, but there's more to do. I don't think that this is the place for a detailed record of transfers. I think that the season-by-season analysis should be moved to a separate article ("The Managerial Career of Alex Ferguson" with similar details for East Stirlingshire, St Mirren and Aberdeen too?), with maybe three or four abridged sections here to cut it down to a decent size. It needs to be replaced by all the stuff that is missing - racing, his personality and so on. I'll try to get to writing some of it when I have a bit of time. Arthur Markham 15:35, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

Just came here to say the same. IMHO the whole paragraphs about ManU's detailed seasons should be moved to the ManU article. There's not even a reason to keep the shortened versions like the one mentioned above. It's about AF and his achievements. And although it's extremely connected ot ManU, keep the season summaries where they belong! --perelly 11:44, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Third Para - very negative

I think the Third paragraph of this article is rather negative, to suggest that the most important information about SAF is his fallings out with a list of players who didn't like his management style is a bit awry, I'd say. Certainly this information there could/should be moved down into the main article, if it's kept at all. --Gavinio 20:23, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

I'd second that! It maybe warrants a sentence somewhere, but as it stands you could just as well list dozens of players who were happy to be managed by him for as long as circumstances allowed. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 82.70.155.252 (talk • contribs).

sir?

"Only the two highest ranks entail admission into knighthood allowing the recipient to use the title 'Sir' (male) or 'Dame' (female) before his or her name."

That's from the OBE article and this article states that Fergie is a CBE so he should therefore not be referred to as sir or is there something I'm missing? Yonatanh 21:08, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

I am confused too. There are Google results saying that he can be called Sir because he has a CBE and OBE, and that he is actually a KBE... But he was knighted in 1999, which gives the title Sir. Perhaps it is OBE that needs some correcting. x42bn6 Talk 22:19, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Sir Alex is a Knight Bachelor. I refer you to the final paragraph of the Knight Bachelor page for reasoning as to why he can be referred to as "Sir" despite being only a CBE. PeeJay 20:57, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

For clarification purposes, I have piped the said link into the article. DJR (T) 10:28, 30 April 2007 (UTC)

Taggart?

Is Taggart really his nickname? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Gavinio (talk • contribs) 14:04, 18 January 2007 (UTC).

I've heard of it before, but there are no sources that I can find that give it definitively. <http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/other_sports/horse_racing/3519567.stm

BBC SPORT | Other Sport | Horse Racing | Ferguson ends horse feudspan style="font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 8pt;">x42bn6 Talk 21:21, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

== Article ==

This is a really good article--Slogankid 14:29, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

Rock of Gibraltar

It is stated in the article that the Rock of Gibraltar dispute disrupted season preparations for 2005-2006, but it actually took place during the 2003-2004 season [1], and ended in March 2004 [2]. I have thus changed this information in the article, but if there are any disputes, please comment here. Thaurisil^t_c 10:34, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Just changed the tense of a Trivia line since July 1st, 2007 has passed. -John Jacques

Trivia (moved from article, credit to the contributors there)

• In 2005, the Collins English Dictionary included the phrase "squeaky-bum time", a phrase coined by Ferguson to describe the tense Premiership run-in in 2002/03.
• Sir Alex Ferguson has a notorious history for playing mind games with managers during close Premiership title races - notably with the likes of Kevin Keegan in 1995/96, and indisputably with Arsène Wenger all the way back since 1997/98 up until today and sometimes Chelsea manager Jose Mourinho during the closing stages of the 2005/06 and 2006/07 season.
• There are several stories mentioned in relation to Ferguson's hot temper which have nearly passed into folklore. The most notable of these stories involve Sir Alex's kicking a football boot at David Beckham, his throwing of teacups during motivational halftime speeches, and his famed "hair-dryer treatment" in which he vents his ire (and often abuse) directly into a recalcitrant player's face. That these anecdotes have seemingly served to enhance Ferguson's popular appeal is evidence of the clear niche that the manager has carved out for himself within his profession.
• Ferguson is an outspoken supporter of the Labour Party., and is particularly supportive of former Prime Minister Tony Blair.

People are welcome to merge this into the article if it has a place anywhere. Yonatan ^talk 05:04, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Scotland national team record

I know Scotland lost two games and drew one in the '86 World Cup, but does anyone know if Ferguson managed Scotland an any of the qualifiers? Jock Stein died in September of '85 and the World Cup happened nine months later. Surely there were some qualifiers during that nine month span. Well I can't find the results of them anywhere. The Managerial Stats section at the bottom of the page needs to be updated with Ferguson's Scotland record. I don't want to update it yet until I know for sure if he managed during any qualifiers. If someone could find that and then updated the table that would be great. --Tocino 7 August 2007, 05:00 (UTC)

Those statistics can be found here but I wouldn't add it until I know what dates he was in charge for.--Mas 18 dl 20:23, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

Jock Stein died during the last qualifier against Wales. Ferguson managed the playoff games against Australia (2-0 win at home, 0-0 draw there). I think he may also have managed some friendlies between then and the World Cup. Jmorrison230582 (talk) 08:01, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

Managerial stats table

The values in the table should not include a thousands separator. If we were to make the table sortable, it would not work if the separator was included. - PeeJay 19:05, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

St. Mirren

I added some info about Ferguson's sacking by St. Mirren. Basically the stuff about swearing at a woman seems to be wrong according to myself and other St Mirren supporters on the club website. I have cited a newspaper article supporting this view. Here is a discussion

http://www.saintmirren.net/yabbse/index.php?topic=8926.0

I suspect the next manager Jim Clunie was sacked for shouting at a woman but can't be sure.

--Eric144 12:54, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

Alex Ferguson to retire

According to recent reports in the Daily Mail dated 11 Nov 2007, Alex Ferguson is to retire after the 2007/08 season. If this is true, why has it not been updated yet on this page?

Because nothing the Daily Mail says can be trusted :-P Seriously, though, if anyone here had felt the source was reliable enough, they would have added it to the article. Evidently, no one deemed it reliable enough. - PeeJay 11:43, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

Height

Does anyone know his height? After all he was a player too. Both Rafael Benítez and Arsène Wenger have their height listed in their info boxes. - Culnacréann-(talk) 21:20, 14 January 2008 (UTC) Whoever put his height as 5'7" obviously has it wrong. He looks like he's at least 5'9". See here (with 5'8" Patrice Evra): http://img.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2008/05_01/EvraFergusonAN_468x371.jpg & here with 6'1" Cristiano Ronaldo: http://www.theage.com.au/ffximage/2008/05/17/FERGUSON_narrowweb__300x482,0.jpg —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.0.60.92 (talk) 02:41, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

Alec Ferguson is 5'11 and a half. Nearly 6 foot. He mentions it in a documentary on himself.

Don't judge him on walking next to Wenger. Wenger is nearly 6'5. Certainly one of the tallest football managers in the world. If not the tallest —Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.128.223.67 (talk) 15:12, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

more games in charge?

according to Sir Alex's box, he's been in charge of 1188 games (as of today) yet Sir Matt is on 1138 (obv won't change)... therefore is it not true that Sir Alex is now the longest serving manager? if so, can someone double check and then change this article to reflect this (and sir matt's, too) 194.221.133.226 (talk) 11:22, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

Sir Alex has only been in charge of United for 21 years, while Sir Matt was in charge for 25 years. No changes will be made. – PeeJay 11:59, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

Personality

I have added a Personality section, (which will probably last about 7 minutes before someone rips it out again! That's what usually happens to my edits! God, I'm so lonely!) as requested several times on the discussion page.DAAdshead (talk) 14:40, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

Can any of the stuff you added be referenced? If not, it's gonna get "ripped out again", as you put it. – PeeJay 14:55, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

*Ahem* Woody (talk) 14:59, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

it also says that matt busby has managed more games than he, though Matts stats table says otherwise —Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.129.112.205 (talk) 05:57, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

No player is bigger...

I don't know if there is one already, but I couldn't see one, so I've found a reference for his thinking that "no player is bigger than the club". It's here if anyone wants to add it. Michael Clarke, Esq. (talk) 14:27, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Why don't you do it? – PeeJay 14:37, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Ferguson's Time at Manchester United

What I'd like to do (even in the unlikely event that this doesn't become WP:MUFC's main article for improvement for August) is to completely rewrite the section regarding Ferguson's time at Manchester United. Instead of being season-by-season, I think a better way of breaking it up would be either into set periods (such as 1986-91, 91-96, 96-01, etc.) or in terms of importance (for instance, the Treble season may require its own section).

The problem is, the focus needs not to be on everything Man Utd have achieved under Ferguson (because that is or should be all covered under the History of Manchester United, but on things specific to Ferguson himself. These things could include:

• Interesting/controversial transfers: examples include selling off some of his "best" players, such as Bryan Robson, Mark Hughes, Paul Ince, Andrei Kanchelskis, Jaap Stam, etc.
• Rivalries with other managers such as Arsene Wenger, Jose Mourinho, etc.
• Particularly important on-field events, such as winning his trophies (FA Cup, ECWC, EPL, the Double, European Cup), or winning particular games, and what Ferguson or others have said about these.
• Off-field information, such as all that gubbins with the horses and the Irishmen (can't remember the details, lol), or getting caught speeding when he claimed he needed a poo.

Any other information? Maybe we could break it all down here before launching into it. I think it could probably do with a bit of planning to properly move it away from the horrendousness of the current article. Are there any good sources out there (obviously, Fergie's (auto?)biography is one of them. --El Pollo Diablo (Talk) 13:23, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I definitely agree that a structured plan is required before blundering in. I would suggest that Ferguson's United career be broken down into 1986-1990, 1990-1993, 1993-1999, 1999-2001, 2001-2006 and 2006-present sections, based on the different periods of success (or lack of) that Man Utd have had during his tenure there. 1986-1990 would cover the difficult early years leading up to the fans calling for his head prior to the 1990 FA Cup run; 1990-1993 would detail the period building up to his first Premier League title; 1993-1999 covers the most successful period, culminating in the Treble; 1999-2001 would be the three titles in a row; 2001-2006 would be the (relatively) barren years; and 2006-present would cover the two most recent title wins and the 2008 Champions League. How does that sound? – PeeJay 13:34, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

How is 2001 to 2006 a barren period? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Stakkertoo (talk • contribs) 14:31, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

Read the words, mate. I said "relatively barren". From 2001 to 2006, United won one league title, one FA Cup and one League Cup, which is fairly meagre success compared to the previous five years (1996 to 2001), in which they won four league titles, the FA Cup and the Champions League. In fact, in both 2002 and 2005, the club went completely trophyless, which is extremely barren for a club that was so successful in the 1990s. – PeeJay 14:45, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

I can't believe there is a section called 'The Barren Years.' United won the League in 2001 and 2003, and the FA Cup and League Cup during this period. Granted, Arsenal and Chelsea won titles in this time, but 'barren' means, well, NO TROPHIES. Its use here is misleading and inaccurate. 68.80.213.160 (talk) 15:37, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

What would you suggest then? – PeeJay 16:12, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

Fergie's playing stats

With the infobox limited to just league games would it be worthwhile to show a more complete picture of his playing career. CorleoneSerpicoMontana (talk) 19:18, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Certainly would be. However, since the majority of Fergie's playing career was spent in Scotland, I'm not sure where we would find such stats. I'll have a look around. – PeeJay 19:35, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Rangers stats (according to http://www.gersnetonline.net/newsite/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=58&Itemid=31)

• League: 41 games, 25 goals
• Scottish Cup: 6 games, 10 goals
• League Cup: 4 games, 9 goals
• Europe: 6 games, 0 goals
• Total: 66 games (six games more than the numbers above would indicate), 44 goals

I'll keep looking for other clubs. – PeeJay 20:07, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Alex Ferguson

This article has been chosen as this month's Manchester United Task Force collaboration. Any members, kindly help us improve this article and maybe transform this Article into a Featured one. HeLLboy2HeLL (talk) 09:16, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Improvement: Sources needed

I've begun editing the article to try to improve the discussion of his time at Manchester United. The prose needs to focus specifically on Ferguson and things to do with him, rather than on stuff which would be better under the History of Manchester United. I've made a start with the period 1986-1990, but need some sources to back up some of the things which have been said (I've left them there for now but they might have to come out if sources cannot be found):

• Ferguson's initial worries about the drinking culture at Manchester United
• The time when Ferguson's mother died - did this affect him in any way, or is it just to be mentioned with no relevance? Has he ever spoken or written about it?
• Nottingham Forest being one of the "most feared cup teams of the era" - source?
• The "match which saved Fergie's career".

Found that here, here and here (El Pollo Diablo (Talk) 13:53, 1 August 2008 (UTC))

If anyone has anything else to add to this or other sections, and you need good sources for this (for instance, I don't have Fergie's biography so am unable to know whether that has some good references in it), then please either list them here, or put them in the article (or both). —Preceding unsigned comment added by El Pollo Diablo (talk • contribs) 13:44, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

referencing managerial record

I'm about to update the manager's table to show his league record with st mirren. I'll post the sources below, but I'm not sure how best to put these sources into the article (I know how to reference, but am unsure about whether/where to).

[3] (Showing the results and dates for the season, so we can derive at what point SAF started managing during the season.

[4] [5] [6]

Give us the statistics for his three full seasons- I haven't used them but they're here if needed. BeL1EveR (talk) 19:57, 27 August 2008 (UTC)