Steve man, you can talk all you want that there was an agreement, a deal, whatever, but if the player asks for a meeting to be bought after his first year and Fergie says: "look let's wait till the end of the agreement and we sit back again and we'll buy you", the player in question won't like it but it's easier to deal, than at the same time Fergie saying "...ahhh BTW I almost forgot, I'm buying Berbatov for your role, I need competition, bye, seeya at the end of the year Carlos".
That just speaks volume of what he thought of Tevez as a player and the message he was giving to him. Later you can talk all you want about quantity of matches, yet Fergie ended managing the minutes of both Berba and Carlos in the EPL in a way that in retrospective, at moments might unsettled both.
At the end of the day he was buying a new high profile player with the ammount of money he could have used to buy Carlos, as simple as that, good or bad bizzness, agreement or not, he decided to play that card because he already had an agreement with Carlos and in the way he managed it, he thought he was buying the player he liked more, while still keeping Carlos in the team, thinking that Carlos was some sort of Angel Correa.
BTW nothing assures that at the end of the loan Ferguson was absolutely buying Tevez, specially if Berba had a freaking extraordinary season, he ended trying to seal the deal because both players had good seasons and more than probably thinking that no one would make a huge offer to Carlos (less in the way he managed the rotation with both players).
That affair it has all the numbers to not end well, worse with fellas of the character of Carlos and Fergie. In general players are reluctant, does not like it, but mostly accept to compete with a new fella when they are already in the team, not that much on loan and after such a great season and when they have the sort of personality Carlos has. It's worse the scenario in those days when clearly Carlos clearly didn't want to live the whole loan deal a la West Ham all over again and of course in the mix there would be other Clubs asking for him.
Fergie could have bought Carlos (and accelerate the process) and get Berba on a loan, it was perhaps the most reasonable way to deal with that situation. He would have been buying the player that already worked for him, that the team accepted and liked and add competition and more weapons after loosing CR, while testing him if he works or not (on a personal note, God knows what was on Alex mind to switch to a player of Berba's type of personality, coming from fellas like Rooney, CR and Tevez, certainly a lot easier to manage than those three, like Berba ended being, yet he certainly started a trend of buying players with not precisly the winner mentality of Keane, Giggs, Scholes, Rooney, CR, Tevez and cia). Yet we also have to understand that Fergie wanted Berba badly and that the Bulgarian was already wanted by many, so Fergie tried to play his cards with what already had in his pocket (the Carlos 2 years loan) and assure his position to obtain Berba by buying him before someone buys him first. A loan ain't that attractive. It's ok, it's perfectly understandeable and he is Sir Alex, he gets what he WANTS always, what it's clear too, it's that he was getting into some grey water taking in account the one who still was on loan that can end wrong (like it ended).
Regarding your opinion it's absolutely OK and beyond understandable that if you think like Fergie that Carlos didn't warrant all that hussle, that Carlos should have play the good boy with a coach of the stature of Alex, that even maybe going for Berba was the better option. Also that perhaps Carlos it's plainly just an ok player and a cnut, there is nothing wrong with that. Yet thinking that the situation would have absolutely end in a great happy family, taking in account the personalities of Alex and Carlos and how both managed the situation? nah.
This wasn't a case where even as horrible as it ended in later years, both parts played it nicely and smooth, that is as clear as clean water.
I think Fergie thought he meant sthg extra for Carlos, like it would happen to most players with the "Boss" thing, not only it wasn't the case, Carlos ended shithousing the whole thing a couple of years later.
