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Last updated at 8:44 PM on 09th August 2008
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Let me start this column how I mean to continue: I hate Sir Alex Ferguson. I don't just mean I mildly dislike the man; I mean I completely and utterly detest him. And I say that with all the calm, dispassionate authority of an Arsenal season-ticket holder.
There are numerous reasons for my pathological enmity towards the Manchester United manager.
He's petty to the point of puerility; witness the pathetic on-going ban he has imposed on the entire BBC, after Panorama investigated his son's transfer dealings.
He's a hypocrite of breathtaking proportions; whining all summer about Real Madrid tapping up Cristiano Ronaldo, while conveniently forgetting his club's relentless tapping up of everyone from Eric Cantona to Wayne Rooney. He is utterly humourless, unless he is cracking the joke. When he once escaped a charge of driving on a motorway hard shoulder because he had acute diarrhoea, I sent him a box of Imodium with a note saying: 'We Gooners knew you were always full of c**p, and now we've got the proof.'
All right, it wasn't big, and it wasn't clever, but it was, transparently, a joke. Unfortunately Sir Alex didn't think so, reacting in the same calm, amused way that Saddam Hussein must have done when those US marines found him in that hole.
Sir Alex is absurdly thin-skinned. When I was Mirror editor, we bought Jaap Stam's autobiography for a paltry sum (nobody else was interested in a rather boring Dutch centrehalf's memoirs), only to discover it was a veritable treasure trove of claims likely to upset The Boss.
Stam claimed Sir Alex had illegally tapped him up and ordered United players to dive in European games, called the Neville brothers a 'pair of busy little ****s', and branded David Beckham so thick he'd never go on Mastermind.
Within a week Stam had been sold to Lazio, despite being the best defender in the world at the time, a decision that probably cost United the league that season.
He is shockingly obstinate. When he pulled United out of the FA Cup in 1999- 2000 to play in that ludicrous World Club Championships, I ran a febrile - and almost universally well-supported - campaign in the Mirror to get them to change their minds.
But Sir Alex refused to back down even when the likes of Sir Bobby Charlton implored him to. 'Tell your editor, Morgan, to **** off back to Highbury and stagnate,' he spat to one of my reporters at one stage.
I also, while I'm at it, actively dislike his puce-faced, foul-mouthed, gum-chewing, watch-checking, referee-ranting, hairdrying touchline shenanigans, his dodgy raincoats, rain-encrusted spectacles, and that horrible lop-sided smirk and cackhanded fist-pump he always does when he's just nicked another 93rd-minute 1-0 victory from the jaws of a certain 0-0 draw.
But the main reason I loathe Sir Alex Ferguson is because he's a winner. If he were a loser, I wouldn't expend another nanojoule of energy hating the man. But he loses about as often as I think of Cherie Blair in a sexual way. And that is the real reason, if I'm honest, why I hate him.
As the celebrated Indian philosopher Sri Chinmoy observed: 'You hate someone who you really wish to love, but whom you cannot love.' If Sir Alex were Arsenal manager, I would love him with a passion and ardour not seen since Tarzan first clocked Jane in her loincloths.
But he's not. He manages the enemy, and thus I must hate him with a different kind of passion - the kind Roy Keane displayed when he stood over Alf-Inge Haaland, seconds after damaging his knee ligaments, snarling various gynaecological epithets; a blind, mouth-foaming, utterly irrational malevolence.
Sir Alex has broken my heart more than any woman, and done it with an aggression, determination, arrogance, and defiant never-say-die zealousness that commands one word above all others: respect.
This summer, I have chortled long and hard at Ronaldo's seemingly inevitable transfer to Madrid, texting my United friends with endless taunting 'Bye Bye Ronnie' messages, and loving the thought of United struggling without their 42-goal-a-season superstar.
Then, of course, he stayed. And everything you need to know about Sir Alex is summed up by Ronaldo's explanation: 'I wanted to leave, but the boss heard my arguments, I heard his, and, in fact, it was settled that the best for both parties would be for me to stay.'
That's why I hate Sir Alex Ferguson. He wins.
Last updated at 8:44 PM on 09th August 2008
Comments (0) Add to My Stories
Let me start this column how I mean to continue: I hate Sir Alex Ferguson. I don't just mean I mildly dislike the man; I mean I completely and utterly detest him. And I say that with all the calm, dispassionate authority of an Arsenal season-ticket holder.
There are numerous reasons for my pathological enmity towards the Manchester United manager.
He's petty to the point of puerility; witness the pathetic on-going ban he has imposed on the entire BBC, after Panorama investigated his son's transfer dealings.
He's a hypocrite of breathtaking proportions; whining all summer about Real Madrid tapping up Cristiano Ronaldo, while conveniently forgetting his club's relentless tapping up of everyone from Eric Cantona to Wayne Rooney. He is utterly humourless, unless he is cracking the joke. When he once escaped a charge of driving on a motorway hard shoulder because he had acute diarrhoea, I sent him a box of Imodium with a note saying: 'We Gooners knew you were always full of c**p, and now we've got the proof.'
All right, it wasn't big, and it wasn't clever, but it was, transparently, a joke. Unfortunately Sir Alex didn't think so, reacting in the same calm, amused way that Saddam Hussein must have done when those US marines found him in that hole.
Sir Alex is absurdly thin-skinned. When I was Mirror editor, we bought Jaap Stam's autobiography for a paltry sum (nobody else was interested in a rather boring Dutch centrehalf's memoirs), only to discover it was a veritable treasure trove of claims likely to upset The Boss.
Stam claimed Sir Alex had illegally tapped him up and ordered United players to dive in European games, called the Neville brothers a 'pair of busy little ****s', and branded David Beckham so thick he'd never go on Mastermind.
Within a week Stam had been sold to Lazio, despite being the best defender in the world at the time, a decision that probably cost United the league that season.
He is shockingly obstinate. When he pulled United out of the FA Cup in 1999- 2000 to play in that ludicrous World Club Championships, I ran a febrile - and almost universally well-supported - campaign in the Mirror to get them to change their minds.
But Sir Alex refused to back down even when the likes of Sir Bobby Charlton implored him to. 'Tell your editor, Morgan, to **** off back to Highbury and stagnate,' he spat to one of my reporters at one stage.
I also, while I'm at it, actively dislike his puce-faced, foul-mouthed, gum-chewing, watch-checking, referee-ranting, hairdrying touchline shenanigans, his dodgy raincoats, rain-encrusted spectacles, and that horrible lop-sided smirk and cackhanded fist-pump he always does when he's just nicked another 93rd-minute 1-0 victory from the jaws of a certain 0-0 draw.
But the main reason I loathe Sir Alex Ferguson is because he's a winner. If he were a loser, I wouldn't expend another nanojoule of energy hating the man. But he loses about as often as I think of Cherie Blair in a sexual way. And that is the real reason, if I'm honest, why I hate him.
As the celebrated Indian philosopher Sri Chinmoy observed: 'You hate someone who you really wish to love, but whom you cannot love.' If Sir Alex were Arsenal manager, I would love him with a passion and ardour not seen since Tarzan first clocked Jane in her loincloths.
But he's not. He manages the enemy, and thus I must hate him with a different kind of passion - the kind Roy Keane displayed when he stood over Alf-Inge Haaland, seconds after damaging his knee ligaments, snarling various gynaecological epithets; a blind, mouth-foaming, utterly irrational malevolence.
Sir Alex has broken my heart more than any woman, and done it with an aggression, determination, arrogance, and defiant never-say-die zealousness that commands one word above all others: respect.
This summer, I have chortled long and hard at Ronaldo's seemingly inevitable transfer to Madrid, texting my United friends with endless taunting 'Bye Bye Ronnie' messages, and loving the thought of United struggling without their 42-goal-a-season superstar.
Then, of course, he stayed. And everything you need to know about Sir Alex is summed up by Ronaldo's explanation: 'I wanted to leave, but the boss heard my arguments, I heard his, and, in fact, it was settled that the best for both parties would be for me to stay.'
That's why I hate Sir Alex Ferguson. He wins.
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