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Don't get too carried away, Sir Alex, you’re still missing the X factor
The X Factor, the second biggest show on TV, started up again this weekend, and it reminded me of a conversation I once had with Simon Cowell. 'What IS the X Factor?' I asked him. 'No idea,' he laughed. 'Seriously?' 'Well, it's not easy to define exactly what it is. I suppose it's when someone has 'it', whatever 'it' is. I always know it when I see it.'
It's tempting, given the easy 5-0 victory by Manchester United yesterday, to assume they already have it in abundance. Tempting, but wrong.
Thrashing a weak, disorganised, team like Wigan means little in the general scheme of things. United will comfortably win many such games this season, of course they will. They are too rich a club, and have too many good players, not to.
But they won't win the Premier League or Champions League unless Sir Alex Ferguson gets his chequebook out and buys himself the X Factor that disappeared when Cristiano Ronaldo and Carlos Tevez left the building. And I can't for the life of me work out why he isn't.
He's got £80million in the bank from Real Madrid, enough to buy 10 good players if he wants, or four very good ones, or a couple of sensational ones. Yet, in one of his now familiar bouts of pure Glaswegian stubbornness, he insists: 'We won't be making any more signings. That's it. I have made the point, and I am sure of it. This is a great group of players.'
All growled in his usual unpleasantly arrogant manner towards a journalist who had the audacity to ask him a perfectly obvious, justifiable question. (I admire Ferguson hugely, but I do loathe how he bullies so many of my fellow hacks. If he was that rude to me, I'd tweak his bulbous nose.)
Stubbornness is usually a good thing in sport. And there's nobody in the history of football more stubborn than Sir Alex. Which is why he's been this country's most successful ever manager. He knows what he wants, and what he wants usually works. But his blunt refusal to re-invest the Ronaldo money is shortsighted and, in my view, plain dumb. Sir Alex will argue that United's excellent performance yesterday proves he's right to say this squad is good enough to maintain his extraordinary silverware streak. I beg to differ.
You only had to see what happened when United won that penalty against Burnley last week to work out where the problem lies. In the good old days, wild horses wouldn't have torn a Ronaldo, Van Nistelrooy, Beckham or Cantona from gleefully seizing the ball and marching straight to the spot. They were Top Dogs, and knew no fear.
But none of United's supposedly biggest players - Rooney, Owen etc - fancied it. So, instead, the hapless Michael Carrick was forced to shuffle reluctantly into the fray, missed, and cost United at least a draw.
This one incident showed me that Sir Alex's men are missing the X Factor. They just don't have anyone prepared, or equipped, to step into Ronaldo's shoes. And unless their boss accepts this, and goes against the habit of a lifetime by changing his mind and buying big before the end of the transfer window, then they are not going to have it back again this season.
If United want to win anything, I reckon they need a new top grade striker (Owen will score goals, but only play 20 games, and Berbatov's too lazy), a midfield playmaker and a world-class goalkeeper. Which should cost about . . . well, £80 million, ironically.
That's the price of acquiring the X Factor in the new world order of absurd, moneyspinning modern football. So, if I was a United fan, I'd stop screaming my delight at annihilating a pathetic Wigan, and start screaming at my manager: 'Stop being so damn stubborn and get your wallet out.'
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-1208388/Dont-carried-away-Sir-Alex-missing-X-factor.html?ITO=1490#ixzz0P0uZH3W9
The X Factor, the second biggest show on TV, started up again this weekend, and it reminded me of a conversation I once had with Simon Cowell. 'What IS the X Factor?' I asked him. 'No idea,' he laughed. 'Seriously?' 'Well, it's not easy to define exactly what it is. I suppose it's when someone has 'it', whatever 'it' is. I always know it when I see it.'
It's tempting, given the easy 5-0 victory by Manchester United yesterday, to assume they already have it in abundance. Tempting, but wrong.
Thrashing a weak, disorganised, team like Wigan means little in the general scheme of things. United will comfortably win many such games this season, of course they will. They are too rich a club, and have too many good players, not to.
But they won't win the Premier League or Champions League unless Sir Alex Ferguson gets his chequebook out and buys himself the X Factor that disappeared when Cristiano Ronaldo and Carlos Tevez left the building. And I can't for the life of me work out why he isn't.
He's got £80million in the bank from Real Madrid, enough to buy 10 good players if he wants, or four very good ones, or a couple of sensational ones. Yet, in one of his now familiar bouts of pure Glaswegian stubbornness, he insists: 'We won't be making any more signings. That's it. I have made the point, and I am sure of it. This is a great group of players.'
All growled in his usual unpleasantly arrogant manner towards a journalist who had the audacity to ask him a perfectly obvious, justifiable question. (I admire Ferguson hugely, but I do loathe how he bullies so many of my fellow hacks. If he was that rude to me, I'd tweak his bulbous nose.)
Stubbornness is usually a good thing in sport. And there's nobody in the history of football more stubborn than Sir Alex. Which is why he's been this country's most successful ever manager. He knows what he wants, and what he wants usually works. But his blunt refusal to re-invest the Ronaldo money is shortsighted and, in my view, plain dumb. Sir Alex will argue that United's excellent performance yesterday proves he's right to say this squad is good enough to maintain his extraordinary silverware streak. I beg to differ.
You only had to see what happened when United won that penalty against Burnley last week to work out where the problem lies. In the good old days, wild horses wouldn't have torn a Ronaldo, Van Nistelrooy, Beckham or Cantona from gleefully seizing the ball and marching straight to the spot. They were Top Dogs, and knew no fear.
But none of United's supposedly biggest players - Rooney, Owen etc - fancied it. So, instead, the hapless Michael Carrick was forced to shuffle reluctantly into the fray, missed, and cost United at least a draw.
This one incident showed me that Sir Alex's men are missing the X Factor. They just don't have anyone prepared, or equipped, to step into Ronaldo's shoes. And unless their boss accepts this, and goes against the habit of a lifetime by changing his mind and buying big before the end of the transfer window, then they are not going to have it back again this season.
If United want to win anything, I reckon they need a new top grade striker (Owen will score goals, but only play 20 games, and Berbatov's too lazy), a midfield playmaker and a world-class goalkeeper. Which should cost about . . . well, £80 million, ironically.
That's the price of acquiring the X Factor in the new world order of absurd, moneyspinning modern football. So, if I was a United fan, I'd stop screaming my delight at annihilating a pathetic Wigan, and start screaming at my manager: 'Stop being so damn stubborn and get your wallet out.'
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-1208388/Dont-carried-away-Sir-Alex-missing-X-factor.html?ITO=1490#ixzz0P0uZH3W9
), albeit I would rather we did.
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