THE FIRST day of 1999 at Manchester United's Salford training ground, and Alex Ferguson is particularly chipper for a Scot who had two reasons to celebrate hogmanay (the managerial doyen turned 57 on December 31). These things are relative, however, and the goodwill came with some notable exclusions.
Ferguson's new year message included the familiar rant against referees, a volley for cheating players, had nothing but disdain for the "amateurs" of Lancaster Gate and is likely to have Arsenal seething with indignation.
On the day when the Football Association announced that there was to be an "emergency summit meeting" between Premiership managers and referees to iron out their differences, Paul Durkin, England's representative at the World Cup, was nominated by Ferguson as an honourable exception among a bunch of inconsistent inadequates. He had no more time for the self-serving schemers at the FA, and would not be holding his breath for the revolution we are again being promised after tomorrow's inevitable change of chairman.
Ferguson is not averse to a spot of Machiavellian skulduggery of his own, of course. The acknowledged master of psychological warfare goes in for more mindbenders than Wayne Fontana, and now that the phoney war is over in the Premiership, he is at it again as his team take their marks for that now traditional new year sprint.
The events of last season having identified Arsenal as the rivals to worry about - if only because they now know what it takes to win the League - it was time to turn up the heat on Arsène Wenger's Double team. They were deliberately provocative, Ferguson said. "Belligerent" was his description of their demeanour.
"I'll tell you what they do - and I've spoken to other managers about this, and they all agree. When Arsenal are not doing well in a game, they turn it into a battle to try to make the opposition lose concentration. They do that all the time. The number of fights involving Arsenal is more than Wimbledon had in their heyday."
Apart from Emmanuel Petit and Patrick Vieira (the Frenchmen Wenger described last Thursday as the best midfield partnership in the world), Martin Keown, Lee Dixon and Nigel Winterburn all "liked a scrap", Ferguson said, particularly at home. "I believe there's no ground where players are sent off more regularly than they are at Highbury."
Arsenal have had five players sent off in the League this season (two of them at home), to United's two, but United have accumulated more bookings, 38 to 37. Four players have been red-carded at Highbury, including United's Nicky Butt, but two more were sent off during Arsenal's home games in the Champions League at Wembley. Three other opponents have been dismissed in the Premiership.
Ferguson is on safer, less contentious ground with his sceptical attitude towards the changing administration at the FA. It was clear that two of the candidates to replace Keith Wiseman as chairman, Ken Bates of Chelsea and Arsenal's David Dein, had not been on his Christmas-card list, and that the others were not deemed worthy of serious consideration: "Who is going to take over? It's so absurd you could laugh. We're not talking about professionals. A lot of them at the FA have never played the game, and none of them have the faintest idea what playing eight games in December is like."
Ferguson wanted a smaller Premiership, to reduce debilitating wear-and-tear injuries from overplaying, and to improve English teams' chances in the European Cup, but it was never going to happen, he said. Greed would see to that.
"The ideology of four or five years ago, when they talked about reducing the League to 18 teams, is forgotten. The clubs are not going to have it. You're getting full houses all the time in the Premiership now, which means more money. It is a great League, and there's nothing wrong with our football when it comes to excitement or competitiveness, but it is very difficult for any English team to win the European Cup now because of the sheer number of games."
To the response that Liverpool played just as many in their halcyon years, when they were the dominant force in Europe, Ferguson countered: "The speed of the game has changed, and the physical demands are greater. There are also more players involved in international matches than ever now, so to succeed in the European Cup under the present set-up is virtually impossible. I would favour an 18-team Premiership, but when that was last suggested, Manchester United and Arsenal were the only clubs who supported it. I know our board would still back it, but who else would?"
The alternative that the United manager offered was extreme indeed. His attitude to the League/Worthington Cup in the past had bordered on the derisory, and in future he might have to "forget the FA Cup". To the relief of a capacity crowd with an appointment at Old Trafford this afternoon, it was not an option he was about to take up just yet, and Middlesbrough's visit in the third round will be treated with due diligence. There is little doubt, however, that "the most prestigious tournament of its kind in the world", as Wenger called it on Thursday, comes third on Ferguson's list of priorities.
It was asking a lot to expect United to compete on three fronts, he said, but for the time being, at least, they were prepared to give it a go: "We need to avoid suspensions and injuries, particularly injuries. The FA Cup is still special to me, because it gave me my first trophy here. And I do think it can do something to a club. If you get a run going, it can give you a momentum - even more than the European Cup. There is an excitement about it that is unique."
Ferguson had bemoaned a blasé attitude, and a consequent lack of noise and inspiration, from United's home crowd of late. He was confident, however, that he would have no cause for complaint today: "What you will see against Boro is something we don't get enough of. They are going to bring 7,500 fans and fill one end. That makes for a great atmosphere. There's nowhere better than our place on occasions like this."
United will be without David Beckham, who is suspended, but will otherwise be at full strength, with Dwight Yorke back to resume that most productive of attacking partnerships with Andy Cole.
Elimination in the fifth round last season, at Barnsley, had been one of his "great disappointments", but Ferguson insisted that he had been right to rest key players in the FA Cup, to keep them fit and fresh for Europe: "I don't have to worry about that this time, because I've got a bigger squad, and the team that plays on Sunday will be a very strong one."
Middlesbrough have lost their last two matches, dropping to eighth in the League, but they won 3-2 at Old Trafford a fortnight ago, and command respect. Gianluca Festa is suspended, and Bryan Robson gives late fitness tests to Gary Pallister, the former United defender, Paul Gascoigne and Robbie Mustoe.
"They're coping much better than they did the last time they came up," Ferguson said. "I think they learned from that experience, and now, when you look through their team - Cooper, Pallister, Gascoigne and Townsend - they've got much more experience. When they were in the Premiership the first time, they were full of players who weren't used to it. Ravanelli and Juninho were good, but they didn't have that experience."
Mention of Boro's two costly imports raised a subject on which Ferguson and Wenger, who sparred their way through last season, were in rare agreement: the "conning" of referees. When I broached the subject with Wenger on Thursday, he accepted that foreign players had brought bad, as well as good, habits with them, and that play-acting and feigning injury to get an opponent booked or sent off was a continental trait now endemic in English football. "I couldn't agree more," Ferguson said. "The foreign players have definitely brought that here."
The two men differed only in the way they would attack the problem. Wenger told me it was the duty of the players' union, the Professional Footballers' Association (PFA), to take the initiative, while Ferguson felt it was definitely the manager's responsibility. "The PFA will never address it," he said. "Only the managers can control it." Time, perhaps, for the League Managers' Association to take the lead? "No, I think it has to be an individual thing," Ferguson said. "It is up to a manager to say, 'It's all right to do this, but not that'. Some, of course, will turn a blind eye, and then complain when opponents do the same thing to them."
With the interview going well, it seemed needlessly risky to venture that one of them might be found not a million miles from Manchester.
After today - with the pursuit of the Holy Grail, aka the European Cup, on hold - it was time for one of those charges which used to burn off all-comers in the League. Last season had been a case of the biter bit. It was at this stage that United, who were seven points clear at the turn of the year, started to stutter, winning one and losing three games in a confidence-sapping run of five League matches between December 28 and February 7. Arsenal took maximum advantage, setting off on an unbeaten sequence of 18 games that included 15 wins, 10 of them on the trot.
Ferguson was looking to turn the tables with something similar: "We're well aware of the fact that this is the part of the season when we usually put a burst in, and I expect us to put a run together again. We need to, and I'm confident that we will. We've got the players and the ability, and we're clear of European commitments until March."
Until now, it had been a case of hanging in there: "Look at the fixtures we've had lately. Barcelona away, Bayern Munich, Aston Villa away, Chelsea away, Tottenham away, Leeds - all really difficult games. It's been a hell of a programme. We've had to cram in nine matches in 31 days."
Having slogged their way through that little lot, United were well placed to accelerate out of the League leaders' slipstream. Ferguson had not been surprised by Villa's success up to now, having tipped them as his dark horses last season: "For some reason, it just didn't happen for them, but the reason I fancied them then still holds good. They've got a good group of players around the right age, not thirtysomethings any more. They are fit and strong and equipped to go the distance.
"Brian Little was a very capable manager, but a new man in charge can often bring a perspective that was lacking before, and I don't see Villa as a surprise at all. They are a strong team who will last the distance in terms of fitness. What it will come down to is whether they can win enough matches when it matters. What you're seeing at the moment is a lot of shadow boxing. It gets serious from now on."
Those mind games are testimony to that.
