I’m not sure if Alex Ferguson would approve of a decision taken by one of his old clubs but East Stirlingshire, where he began his managerial career as a 32-year-old in 1974, have just taken a very controversial stand against “sporting behaviour”.

The modest club, whose major objective in the recent past was to avoid
finishing bottom of the Scottish Third Division, but are currently third in the table, have ordered their players NOT to kick the ball out of play if one of their opponents is down injured.

Coach Jim McInally has told his team to only stop playing if the referee orders them to do so. He was furious following an incident during their 2-0 win at Forfar Athletic on Saturday.

After play stopped 10 minutes from time so an East Stirling player could be treated for injury, Forfar goalkeeper Ally Brown tried to restart play with a soft pass back to East Stirling. However, Forfar’s substitute striker Calum Smith had other ideas.

With time running out and his side 2-0 down, he decided to try and pull one back and was only prevented from scoring by a save from East Stirling keeper Mark Peat.

Players from both sides started arguing which led to three of them being booked and McInally banning his side from kicking the ball out for an injury in future.

“It may seem a bit unsporting, but football is a ruthless business at times,” he explained. “If Forfar had scored, they would have had a foothold in the game and the last few minutes might have been tricky for us.”

Most fans accept the sporting convention as part of the game now and remember how Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger offered to replay an FA Cup tie against Sheffield United after his side had scored without giving the ball back after an injury. It made no difference in the end. They won the original game 2-1 and the replayed game by the same score.

Of course, there is no law against being unsporting in this respect — it is just a convention that has grown up with FIFA’s approval to make the game fairer. But is McInally right or wrong?

Is there a place for sportsmanship in the ruthless world of the Scottish Third Division — or anywhere else for that matter?

PHOTO: Arsenal’s Dutch winger Marc Overmars (R) is congratulated by his Nigerian team mate Nwanko Kanu (C) after scoring a controversial goal during their F.A Cup fifth round match. Sheffield United’s captain David Holdsworth reacts angrily, Feb. 13, 1999. REUTERS/Ian Hodgson

Please don’t try and tell me that a 4-1 defeat at home to your arch-rivals does not affect you — it must do.

At lunchtime on Saturday Manchester United knew they could probably afford to lose against Liverpool and still claim another Premier League title but does the manner of their capitulation offer hope to the chasing pack?

The lead is still four points with a game in hand and the title is still there for the taking but all talk of quintuples and the like is now looking a little premature.

Could all the superlatives have been going to their heads?

Talk had been ringing around Old Trafford about clean sheet records but their defence in the past two matches has been colander-like.

Alex Ferguson said he was ranting at his team at half-time in the Champions League against Inter and that he wasn’t happy with “these little flicks and balls into space when no one was there — back-heels and stuff”. Inter and in particular Zlatan Ibrahimovic couldn’t make them pay but Liverpool could with some clinical finishing.

I also recall that Arsene Wenger described United as “untouchables” last month. When one of your chief rivals starts offering out praise like that it’s easy to let your guard slip. They have certainly been “touched” in the past week.

Maybe it’s time for Ferguson to start dishing out a bit more of the famous hairdryer treatment

I’ll keep an eye on their trip to Fulham on Saturday. They set a very high standard the last time they went to Craven Cottage but the pressure is a bit different now. Could there be life in this league title race yet?

PHOTO: Manchester United’s Nemanja Vidic fouls Liverpool’s Steven Gerrard to earn a red card during their English Premier League  match at Old Trafford, March 14, 2009. REUTERS/Phil Noble

Manchester United manager Alex Ferguson dismissed the suggestion in his usual style.

After beating Spurs on penalties to win the English League Cup final on Sunday he was asked if United could complete a “quintuple” of trophies.

“It’s a media thing,” he shot back. “I’m not getting carried away with it. We’re keeping our feet on the ground.”

But with FIFA’s Club World Cup and the League Cup already in the trophy room and with the Champions League, Premier League and FA Cup all realistic targets, it is not just a media thing. It’s a real possibility. Throw in the Community Shield and it becomes a sextuple. Or a “double treble” — which sounds good if you are winning it or even drinking it.

Former United striker Frank Stapleton is among many who think Ferguson has assembled the best squad United have ever had – and although they failed to break Spurs down in 120 goalless minutes at Wembley, they still had the nerve, guile and experience to ease to a 4-1 victory in the shootout.

Spurs manager Harry Redknapp believes they can do it too.

“They’ve got a big chance of winning the lot,” he said after the game, “They are the team to beat, the best in Europe and have a fantastic squad.”

The fact that United’s hero was current third-choice keeper Ben Foster highlights the strength in depth of the squad. He was voted man of the match and Ferguson has tipped him to become England’s No.1 keeper in the not too distant future.

Other youngsters like Darron Gibson and Danny Welbeck looked assured next to the likes of Paul Scholes and Rio Ferdinand.

It wasn’t a classic performance by any stretch of the imagination, but the hallmark of great teams is that they win things even when they are not at their best.

They have ready replacements in every position and with confidence sky-high and the defence virtually impregnable, it will take something very special to get the better of United over the coming weeks.

Or as Ferguson also said, a deflected shot off someone’s backside that could see them knocked out of the FA Cup at Fulham on Saturday.

Barring that, the race for the High Five is on. I think they have the strength, the players and the desire to do it. Do you?

PHOTO: Manchester United players celebrate winning the League Cup final against Tottenham Hotspur at Wembley, March 1, 2009. REUTERS/Kieran Doherty

Manchester United manager Alex Ferguson has dismissed Chelsea’s Premier League title hopes, but given his side’s run of form he is perhaps being generous to Liverpool by saying they still have a chance.

“The title race now is going to be between ourselves and Liverpool,” Ferguson wrote in the programme for the 3-0 home win over Fulham that sent the champions five points clear of Liverpool and 10 ahead of fourth-placed Chelsea.

The champions look unstoppable at the moment, with Wayne Rooney scoring on his return from injury and Paul Scholes in fine fettle despite not always being a regular these days. 

Is it all over or will there be a late twist in the tale?

Ferguson thinks Aston Villa could continue to surprise.

“However I shall be keeping a wary eye on Aston Villa, who seem to have picked up the baton from Arsenal,” he said.

 Villa are third, eight points behind United, while Arsenal are fifth and 15 points off the pace.

PHOTO: Manchester United manager Alex Ferguson smiles before their FA Cup fifth round match at Derby County, Feb. 15, 2009. REUTERS/Darren Staples

Spats like Liverpool boss Rafael Benitez’s recent run-in with his Manchester United counterpart Alex Ferguson are always guaranteed attention-grabbers.

But while I find stories of polemics between football’s top figures good fun, I sometimes get the impression they’re having us on.

Inter’s Jose Mourinho gave the game away some time ago, admitting he drank wine with Ferguson after matches despite their feuding in his Chelsea days.

Ferguson, especially, strikes me as someone who’s aware that he is acting a role in a pantomime which serves his purposes and helps generate interest in the game.

He cultivates an image of being surly and aggressive, possibly so that the media, referees, players, agents etc know that he takes no nonsense. (more…)

Chelsea gear up for an easy-looking FA Cup tie at home to Ipswich Town this weekend knowing the match will be anything but given their recent form.

The crushing 3-0 defeat to rivals Manchester United recently was just one of a string of lacklustre performances and while their struggles may come as a shock to many, United boss Alex Ferguson saw this coming some time ago.

Looking into his crystal ball last July, a month before the new Premier League season had started, Ferguson boldly stated that new manager Luiz Felipe Scolari had inherited a Chelsea squad which had already peaked and that progress was unlikely.

This season’s performances include six draws and three defeats in the league, while they were losing 1-0 at home to Stoke City last weekend before late goals gave then a 2-1 win. (more…)

Somebody must have bought Alex Ferguson and Arsene Wenger a calculator each for Christmas because both managers have done their sums and criticised the Premier League’s fixture programme.

After the United boss wondered aloud if the league was handicapping his club through their fixture list, his Arsenal counterpart crunched the numbers over the weekend

“I saw Ferguson made the case about fixtures,” Wenger said. “And we checked because we are always curious. And he has a case, and in this case so do we.

“If you take the international fixtures plus the Champions League, everybody has played ten games, six Champions League games and four internationals. And after those 10 games, we played eight away games and two at home. Manchester United played nine away games, Chelsea played six games at home and four away. And Liverpool played eight times at home and two away.”

With domestic fixtures necessarily organised before those in Europe, it’s difficult to completely follow their arguments but there’d certainly be one easy way to end the fixture problem in England.

It might be a bold suggestion in the current economic climate - and one which the Premier League would never accept - but never mind the 39th fixture, let’s cut the top flight down to 18 teams and why not scrap the League Cup while we’re at it.

In the Bundesliga (18 clubs) they get to put their feet up for six weeks every winter. And sure, there are 20 sides in the top divisions in Spain and Italy but they only have one domestic cup competition to distract them.

As for the League Cup, why not follow the German lead again and make it a pre-season tournament, an extension of the Community Shield. I doubt you’d hear a peep from Ferguson or Wenger.

Maybe then we could get down to tacking another tradition - the Boxing Day programme - and give these poor overworked players a few festive days off.

PHOTO: Arsene Wenger at Arsenal training, London Colney, Nov. 24, 2008. REUTERS/Eddie Keogh

Speculation that Manchester United are after Serbia winger Zoran Tosic has gained momentum after reports that Sir Alex Ferguson had gone to some length to obtain a work permit for the 21-year old Partizan Belgrade player.

Tosic, who has made 12 international appearances but is yet to score for his country, is a decent player with a sweet left foot from set pieces but he appeared to be as stunned as many of my colleagues here in Belgrade after being told that Ferguson sees him as an ideal long-term replacement for Ryan Giggs.

“It’s fantastic to know that such a great coach speaks so highly of my abilities and I am truly honoured that he has so much faith in me,” Tosic told Belgrade’s daily newspapers.

Can a player yet to be tried and tested at top level fill Giggs’s boots on United’s left flank?

Will he, if United sign him, turn out to be a real asset like compatriot Nemanja Vidic or merely a fringe player?

Tosic’s diminutive and frail-looking posture suggests he could find it very difficult to adapt to the physical exertions and torrid pace of the Premier League. Croatia playmaker Luka Modric certainly found it tough at Tottenham.

United are reportedly also interested in Tosic’s 17-year old Partizan team mate Adem Ljajic, who recently broke into the first team and scored on his full debut after a 10-day trial at Old Trafford in October.

Although Ljajic has shown glimpses of extraordinary talent, he is still a far cry from living up to the billing of being “the Serbian Kaka”.

Both Tosic and Ljajic need a far more competitive environment than Serbia’s ramshackle 12-team league for any judgment to be passed and United’s board may well keep that in mind when the January transfer window opens.

PHOTO: Partizan Belgrade’s Zoran Tosic is seen in Belgrade in this Nov 12, 2008 file photo.  REUTERS/Ivan Milutinovic

The speculation in Spanish newspapers in the build-up to the Champions League final is all about Cristiano Ronaldo and the chances of him signing for Real Madrid next season (see Marca, for example).

The feeling in Madrid seems to be that if United beat Chelsea here in Moscow tonight, the ludicrously talented Portugal winger could leave Old Trafford thinking something along the lines of “My work is done here…”

Now, as far as I know Ronaldo has never said anything of the kind, while United are adamant that they will not even consider negotiating with any club, whatever the result in the first all-English Champions League final.

It’s the sort of speculation that really annoys Alex Ferguson and the only time he (briefly) lost his air of benevolence at Tuesday’s pre-match news conference was when a journalist asked him about Ronaldo’s future.

“Are you an idiot?” Ferguson responded. “I thought they were just in England…”

United would obviously be a weakened team without Ronaldo and there’s no real incentive to sell — except the money, which would presumably be not far short of the 100 million euros mark.

I don’t believe United will even consider it, but maybe it would be worth looking at what is happening at Barcelona before they rule it out completely.

If Barcelona had sold Ronaldinho after the Champions League final in 2006 they would have been able to name just about any price they liked, and certainly a world record fee, for the Brazilian. As it is, they have seen how their main asset’s form has declined over the past two seasons, and he is likely to leave for a more reasonable amount (15 million euros is the figure I’ve read).

I imagine United fans will think it’s an absurd idea, but there’s something to be said for selling at the peak of the market. If he does as well as most people expect him to tonight, that could be a lot of money…

What do you reckon?

Kevin Fylan, Moscow

PHOTO: Cristiano Ronaldo of Manchester United leaves the hotel in central Moscow for a training session, May 20, 2008. REUTERS/Sergei Karpukhin