Lee Sharpe on the Man United podcast.

FujiVice

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Surprised they released this one, knowing how our media channels like to sugar coat and rewrite history. Sharpe essentially alledges that Fergie bullied him at the club, and how its affected him as an adult in later life. Great chat, but kinda sad. He says every time he scored, the manager bollocked him for his celebrations. He got a tattoo, along with Keane and Ince, and only he got shouted at (after they won the FA cup as well.) An amazing contrast to how he dealt with other young players.
 

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I’ve no doubt Sir Alex could be harder on some than others, however Sharpey always seemed a joker and a bit of a lad.

Fergie was probably hoping the tough love approach would improve his attitude.

I doubt Sir Alex would have singled him out with no good reason, no other players have said that.
 

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I remember Giggs gave similar interviews where basically Fergie criticised him for things which Ryan don't feel he deserved it. The only difference is Giggs argued back and fought with Fergie at times, things which Giggs admitted are what Fergie wanted from his players.

I think Fergie got his approach wrong with Sharpe, but then again how many young players compare to the whole succeeded -- too few. Too much pampere won't help. Managing people is tricky and difficult. That said, he may get better result if Fergie treat Sharpe similar to how he treat Nani... maybe. No doubt Sharpe is highly talented so likely Fergie had high expectation of him. High expectation leading to more "pushy" treatments.

Strong mental strength is needed at the highest level.
 

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I remember Giggs gave similar interviews where basically Fergie criticised him for things which Ryan don't feel he deserved it. The only difference is Giggs argued back and fought with Fergie at times, things which Giggs admitted are what Fergie wanted from his players.

I think Fergie got his approach wrong with Sharpe, but then again how many young players compare to the whole succeeded -- too few. Too much pampere won't help. Managing people is tricky and difficult. That said, he may get better result if Fergie treat Sharpe similar to how he treat Nani... maybe. No doubt Sharpe is highly talented so likely Fergie had high expectation of him. High expectation leading to more "pushy" treatments.

Strong mental strength is needed at the highest level.
Agreed except for the last line which suggests different players are always weaker. Fergie got quite a few players wrong but no man, no matter how great gets it 100%. Fergie had a style and those that clashed with it were out. There is no system in the world that optimizes 100%.
 

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What's incredible about Fergie is that he improved and adapted as a manager throughout his career. Sharpe unfortunately didn't get the version of Fergie that would've been best for him individually
 

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The dance celebrations I suppose? to be fair it must've looked a bit silly back then.
I’d guess Fergie didn’t like the ‘Sharpie shuffle’ becoming a thing in the press when he hadn’t achieved anything. I’ve heard Sharpe moan that Cantona was allowed off with similar type of stuff to him like wearing trainers with a suit but Cantona was the hardest training player at the club and the team leader. From what I’ve heard from Sharpe is that he expected to be treated the same as Eric but I guess he lacked the intelligence to see a hierarchy based on value to the team and achievement.
 

padzilla

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I’d guess Fergie didn’t like the ‘Sharpie shuffle’ becoming a thing in the press when he hadn’t achieved anything. I’ve heard Sharpe moan that Cantona was allowed off with similar type of stuff to him like wearing trainers with a suit but Cantona was the hardest training player at the club and the team leader. From what I’ve heard from Sharpe is that he expected to be treated the same as Eric but I guess he lacked the intelligence to see a hierarchy based on value to the team and achievement.
Should you allow certain employees to do what they want if they are producing the goods though? Surely that has a detrimental effect on the morale of others? Ferguson himself came down hard on other players like Rooney for example. Surely there should be consistency. There is very much an argument that Sharpe’s career could have turned out very differently if his situation was managed better.
 

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Sharpe didn’t have the kind of application of a lot of the other United youngsters and Ferguson did well to keep him on track as long as he did.

If he didn’t see the difference between himself and Cantona he also lacked self-awareness.
 

Josh 76

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In his book he wrote he use to come to training in the mornings and see Gary and Phil Neville practice throwins against a wall for ages before training. "I thought what the feck are them two doing".
He even asked Phil Neville about going out one night, and he replied "I don't like going out, i just want to train hard and play football."

Lee sharpe said he could never understand that.

Was a interesting read and showed the difference between being a success and failure at the top level.
 

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Should you allow certain employees to do what they want if they are producing the goods though? Surely that has a detrimental effect on the morale of others? Ferguson himself came down hard on other players like Rooney for example. Surely there should be consistency. There is very much an argument that Sharpe’s career could have turned out very differently if his situation was managed better.
It seems the entire point of Fergie's style is that there was no/less consistency. So Rooney got bollocked more or less every half time, whether he deserved it or not, because Fergie knew he could take it and would get fired up by it in a way that was beneficial to the team. I understand Giggsy was similar and it is arguably a huge mark of respect that Fergie has marked you out as one of his 'conduit' players, who he uses in the dressing room to get his points across and gee the entire team up. He identified that Nani, a young flashy player who didn't have the greatest English, would not react so well to a man the wrong side of 65 blasting him with some choice Glaswegian invective.

As for Lee Sharpe I haven't heard the podcast in question but I'd guess Fergie saw him as a young player who needed authority, but perhaps if he could have his time again he'd give him more of the Nani treatment than the Rooney.
 

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What a great player he was. He came through an era where there was a lot of tough love around. Players these days would never put up with it.
 

fps

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It seems the entire point of Fergie's style is that there was no/less consistency. So Rooney got bollocked more or less every half time, whether he deserved it or not, because Fergie knew he could take it and would get fired up by it in a way that was beneficial to the team. I understand Giggsy was similar and it is arguably a huge mark of respect that Fergie has marked you out as one of his 'conduit' players, who he uses in the dressing room to get his points across and gee the entire team up. He identified that Nani, a young flashy player who didn't have the greatest English, would not react so well to a man the wrong side of 65 blasting him with some choice Glaswegian invective.

As for Lee Sharpe I haven't heard the podcast in question but I'd guess Fergie saw him as a young player who needed authority, but perhaps if he could have his time again he'd give him more of the Nani treatment than the Rooney.
He may well have done, yes. Especially as he wasn’t that top level talent, like Rooney or Giggs, but more of a Nani, flash but inconsistent. How do you get a player to start behaving like a proper professional though? I think he saw Sharpe as spiritually linked to members of the drinking culture who he showed the door.
 

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I have added the link to the episode in the 'Official Man Utd Podcast' thread if anyone wants to give it a listen. I was surprised at how honest he was too.
 

SteveTheRed

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In his book he wrote he use to come to training in the mornings and see Gary and Phil Neville practice throwins against a wall for ages before training. "I thought what the feck are them two doing".
He even asked Phil Neville about going out one night, and he replied "I don't like going out, i just want to train hard and play football."

Lee sharpe said he could never understand that.

Was a interesting read and showed the difference between being a success and failure at the top level.
It's true in some sense, but more so with the Neville brothers. Not especially gifted footballers, but worked harder that 99.9% of other players.

Lee Sharpe was the player he was. If he trained and lived like the Neville brothers he may have lost another part of his game.
 

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He may well have done, yes. Especially as he wasn’t that top level talent, like Rooney or Giggs, but more of a Nani, flash but inconsistent. How do you get a player to start behaving like a proper professional though? I think he saw Sharpe as spiritually linked to members of the drinking culture who he showed the door.
Yeah fair points. I really should listen to the podcast before I start running my mouth about the finer points of this situation, but I'd be willing to guess Fergie would regret having mentally scarred Sharpe, if that's what happened. However there's no getting away from the fact that Sharpe did not apply himself 100% to his football, (though as someone has pointed out he was the player he was, doing things differently may not have produced better results and may even have adversely affected him for all we know) and his character wasn't Fergie's cup of tea. Whether Fergie could have handled him differently in the 90s, when perhaps he only learned a more nuanced approach later in his career, is open to debate.
 

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He was a class act and a very talented footballer who didn't make it long term here. My personal hero alongside big Pete so I'm aware I'm slightly subjective. I would put him in the category with the likes of Nani, Saha, Hargreaves, Tevez and many more who contributed greatly to this club but didn't reach legend status. And winning the CWC in 91 and 3 Premier leagues doesn't make him an underachiever. He certainly contributed more than Pogba did since he resigned.
 

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Surprised they released this one, knowing how our media channels like to sugar coat and rewrite history. Sharpe essentially alledges that Fergie bullied him at the club, and how its affected him as an adult in later life. Great chat, but kinda sad. He says every time he scored, the manager bollocked him for his celebrations. He got a tattoo, along with Keane and Ince, and only he got shouted at (after they won the FA cup as well.) An amazing contrast to how he dealt with other young players.
It was a very interesting podcast and a nice different take on Fergie's management, which for Sharpe just didn't work. What was interesting was that Sharpe talked about this with no remorse or regrets and admitted he was partly to blame as he didn't share how he was feeling with Fergie (he insisted that his closest friend even suggested to go to SAF's office with him, to support him), which might have helped smoothen things.

I was too young to have seen Sharpe play, but from what I got from the podcast, he didn't come across as a guy for whom football and success was that important, more of an occupation which would allow him to have a fun lifestyle. Which is absolutely fine, but also explains why there may have been a clash with Sir Alex's style of management and personality, which is driven by a "win at all costs".