Alex Ferguson picked a few interesting teams in his time.
In the 2009/10 season, the legendary Manchester United manager was hamstrung by a defensive injury crisis.
It was bad.
How bad?
Michael Carrick and Darren Fletcher as central defenders bad.
Nemanja Vidic and Rio Ferdinand weren’t fit so Ferguson had no option but to drag his midfielders back into the heart of his back four.
The defensive unit that took on Fulham on 19 December, 2009 consisted of Antonio Valencia, Carrick, Fletcher and Ritchie De Laet, with Tomasz Kuszczak in goal.
United lost 3-0. But Fergie almost avoided the thrashing as he tried to convince referee Howard Webb to call off the game, desperately pointing towards the weather conditions when in reality it was his makeshift defenders that he was concerned about.
“He tried to get me to postpone a game once because he had no central defenders,” Webb revealed on Alan Brazil’s Breakfast Show.
🗣"I'm not his love child"
@HowardMWebb on dealing with Sir Alex Ferguson… #MUFC pic.twitter.com/aC5rRMr5ka
— talkSPORT Breakfast (@TSBreakfast) October 19, 2016
“He had to put Darren Fletcher and Michael Carrick as his central defensive partnership and he mentioned that the pitch was frozen.
“But I think it was about 15° that day!”
It must have been one of the toughest months for Ferguson selection-wise because a week earlier, in Europe, he was forced to play Ji Sung Park as a right back, with Carrick and Fletcher as centre-halves in their final Champions League group game against Wolfsburg.
We don’t know what he said to the referee that day but it’s almost certainly not repeatable.
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