S’ralex – the lunatic fringe view from the stands.
Alex Ferguson has been mercifully quiet since his retirement, contenting himself in the main with a seat in the stands from which to glare down balefully at the struggles of his hapless and helpless successor, David “Gollum” Moyes. It’s been a quieter and more peaceful – even saner – game without the rantings of the whisky-nosed old curmudgeon. Although Moyes’ plight has been pitiful to behold, at least some light has been shed on what was behind the success of virtually the same team last season, which looks so spectacularly inept this time around. It’s been Fergie all the time it seems; terrifying opponents, refs and FA officials alike into granting his team every advantage they could wish for. Now that he’s subsided into a brooding and impotent silence, away from the arena itself, the game seems a fairer and cleaner thing, with everyone a lot happier – fans all over Devon and Cornwall and in Milton Keynes who have Man U sympathies always excepted.
The old tyrant’s broken that silence this weekend though, deigning to pronounce upon the Premier League Title race, for which he sees a wider-than-usual field of maybe as many as six possible contenders. Pushing the margins of credibility, he includes old charges Man U among these contenders, along with the Arsenal, Man City, Chelsea and even Everton and Spurs. Notable by their absence from this select group of “Fergie’s Favourites” is Liverpool FC, a name that the Govan Gob studiously avoided mentioning, wary perhaps of bringing on an attack of apoplexy. Clearly, the purple-nosed Taggart clone still has a problem with a club he vowed to “knock off their perch” when he first slithered south all those years ago. How he failed to do that, despite all those lies, damned lies and statistics, is detailed below.
Let’s face it – Man U fans can crow all they want about 20 titles, but the evidence to confound their plastic claims is there for all to see, like some geological stratum separating the dinosaurs from the mammoths. That schism dividing the game up to ’92, from the showbiz shenanigans of ’93 onwards, stands out like a Tory at a Foodbank, exposing Man U as the wealth-backed, monopolising opportunists that they are. Seven titles in their history before Uncle Rupert bought the game for them. Thirteen in the twenty years after the game went mad for money when, aided by more riches than anyone else, combined with the threat of Fergie to cow refs and officials, the Pride of Devon all but cleaned up in what was no more or less than a game of craps played with the dice heavily loaded in their favour. And it was all done with such bad grace, another indictment of this new and joyless age we’ve been plodding through. No gentle wisdom of the Bob Paisley variety – instead we had the sour bile of Ferguson himself and now seemingly a Fergie-Lite clone in the newly growly and grouchy David Moyes. No loveable old-style hard-man Desperate Dan type like Tommy Smith – we just had the manufactured machismo of Roy Keane, a supposed tough-guy with an assumed snarl and trademark glower, whose typical party trick was to sneak up behind wee Jason McAteer and fell that not-exactly-scary individual with a sly elbow.
The comparisons could go on all day, but the bottom line is that Liverpool at their peak – and it was a hell of a peak – typified all the values of football that some of us remember from a pre-Sky, pre-glitz, pre-greed age when it really was all about a ball. Now, it’s all about money, and contracts, and egos, and snide bitching to the media if you don’t get all your own way – and lo, we have the champions we deserve – but not, it seems, for very much longer – despite the wishful thinking of a silly and deluded old man.
To apply a conversion rate which sums up the way our game has been degraded in the Fergie/Murdoch era – let’s say that each Premier League (or Premiership, or whatever else it’s been marketed as) is worth maybe half – at the very most – of each proper Football League Championship, won on a level playing field in the days when the game still belonged to us and the world was a happier and more carefree place. At that rate, Man U are still a good long distance behind Liverpool, which, on the basis of the history of English football as a whole, is precisely where they belong.
Ferguson might choose to ignore the challenge of a newly-invigorated Liverpool, but then again, football knowledge was never the strong point of the Demented One. For bullying and intimidation, he wouldn’t have had much to learn from Torquemada, but his opinions on the game can safely be set aside in favour of those from saner minds – i.e. just about anyone else. Meanwhile, it should be emphasised once and for all, for the avoidance of doubt and despite the latest nonsense from S’ralex – Liverpool are still very much The Greatest.
Life, Leeds United, the Universe & Everything 
Very good read I’m glad to see that not only Liverpool Supporters see what Fergie is like well written
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You’re right, football now is full of greedy little sods with giant egos that think they’re movie stars. Ferguson must be hating watching Liverpool ahead of them in the league and still in the FA cup, anything that annoys that miserable bastard makes me happy.
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What a fantastic well written article!
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That is a great article for sure! Well said Rob
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FERGIE has left Man U the same as Aberdeen with a aging team
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Brilliant. Needed a good laugh.cheers!
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Thank you for the recognition and respect shown to LFC, from one truly great club to another, lets have a full and public inquiry into the refereeing of Man Ure matches going back to 1992….
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That would be interesting – for which reason it’ll never happen. But the net effect of what’s gone on is that the game’s all-time honours board needs to be taken with a huge pinch of salt, as is the case in Italy with Serie A, where the path of truth, honour and level competition has historically run as straight as a corkscrew.
Fortunately, in our case, there’s a convenient demarcation between straight and bent – anyone who wants to know the real pecking order simply has to look pre-93.
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Great article I love it
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fabulous stuff. manure ‘fans’ can’t see that taggart is a selfish, self important disgrace, who doesn’t care for the club over his own popularity. he knew he had a re-build on his hands but wanted to go out on a high, so bought for now and stuff the future. he has left moyes up a gumtree. i couldn’t care less for that club and i hope it limps from one disaster to another. yet their ‘fans’ celebrate the old sot like a demi-god!?!?!? wake up freaks! he’s only interested in himself and up yours!!!
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Very well put mate, thanks..
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You have made my week end lad, get in there! I still remember when it was us n youz lot, head to head following our promotions, (a year apart wasn’t it?), jeez we had some ding-dong clashes then. Battles they may have been, but never the ‘filth’ thrown about like that from Fuck-face and The Manure Propaganda m/c since the 90s. Get up here in the Prem and lets re-establish our Pennine supremacy.
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Happy days. My first two games were Liverpool then Barcelona – 39 years ago. It’s been mostly downhill from there!
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A great read , thankyou . Now I love every shot of Fergie squirming in his seat watching his old team go down the pan .
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Just brilliant Rob.
The game is better off without him where even in retirement his fear, hatred and petulance when it comes to Liverpool shines as brightly as his purple nose. He was a corrupt and corruptible influence on the English game. The press loved and feared him and now it seems have handed their cattle prod to a Portuguese hairdresser. One day the way the EPL is run, the pernicious and destructive influence of this man, will be the subject of a book, I pray, of evidence.
http://footballisfixed.blogspot.com/2013/04/manchester-united-premier-league.html
http://footballisfixed.blogspot.com/2013/09/mark-halsey-referee-of-integrity.html
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Well I’ve got a book or two in me, I’d be happy to collaborate 🙂 Thanks for the kind words.
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Great article. The likes of Shanks, Paisley and Sir Matt Busby were the real legends, unlike that miserable get they had dignity and class. Shanks could dish it out but he was likeable and gave credit to others.
Fergie showed his true colours when he made that disgusting comment about Kenny Dalglish years ago: “Kenny doesn’t have many friends but then you only need two people to carry your coffin” – Kenny attended every Hillsborough funeral – says it all about that nasty bast*rd doesn’t it?
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It does indeed. And as a Leeds fan I falls to me to point out that Don Revie takes as proud a place as any other legend in that pantheon of greats. Ferguson is unfit to lick the boots of any of them.
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Agreed Rob.
Apologies, did mean to mention Don Revie – another legend who didn’t come across as a bullying, charmless cretin.
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No apology needed – I’m not lumping you in with the likes of Sky and the BBC! 🙂
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It’s great that even after all his time at the manc factory he still feels he hasn’t got the better of the Pool,!! It’s nice on the perch Fergie,you should climb up sometime.
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Right on … good article, but I suppose plaudits aren’t all you get – by my guess though, the dissident view will be represented by dribbling morons who can’t help but resort to obscene abuse and threats – the sort of thing you just can’t print and wouldn’t want to anyway. But it’s still most important to make these valid points you’ve made in the first place, so I applaud you. Keep up the good work!!
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You’re spot on Alf – but I do strive to protect my readership from the cretins you mention – thanks for the kind words.
It’s good to be king.
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Very good read and spot on analysis.
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