Sir Alex’s biggest mistakes

[TheReligion]

I think there were two key decisions he got wrong which has he got right would have resulted in at least one, if not two, more European Cups from 99-04.

1) Not replacing Schmeichel with Van der Sar.

2) Selling Jaap Stam.

That 99 team should have won at minimum another EC and those two decisions above cost us dearly and set us back a great deal.

It’s fine margins I know, and you can look at these things throughout his career and not just a short period as I have there but I’ve picked them as I believe they had the greatest impact to the club.

Any other thoughts?

 

[mu4c_20le]

Not replacing Yorke after the treble year. He'd peaked, should have brought in Batistuta.

 

[reko]

We not gonna talk about moyes? To this day i will can't believe neither him and the board see what a monumental cock up its going to be, considering 99% of us could see it.

 

[P-Ro]

Should have stuck Ji-sung Park on Messi.

 

[TheReligion]

Not replacing Yorke after the treble year. He'd peaked, should have brought in Batistuta.

I mentioned Schmeichel and Van der Sar as the latter was available in 99 and left Ajax to Juve for £5m. United were interested but never followed it up. Had they done so then I have no doubt he’d of moved to United.

Were we ever that close or blind to Batistuta? I know he was admired but did the opportunity ever arise?

 

[AgentP]

Not investing in the squad after Ronaldo left has to be high up the list. We went on to win two more league titles after that but our squad was definitely way worse than the previous decade. Maybe Fergie was not provided with the funds when Ronaldo left but not too sure that was the case.

 

[RpluB567]

Starting Chicharito in the Champions League final 2011. We would have still lost the game but we wouldnt have been outclassed.
He would have made a better subsitute during that game

 

[mu4c_20le]

I mentioned Schmeichel and Van der Sar as the latter was available in 99 and left Ajax to Juve for £5m. United were interested but never followed it up. Had they done so then I have no doubt he’d of moved to United.

Were we ever that close or blind to Batistuta? I know he was admired but did the opportunity ever arise?

Yeah VDS is the obvious one, he was passed by all the top clubs after leaving Juve. I'm not sure if we were ever in for him but Fergie was a known admirer of Batigol, and I remember he was thinking of leaving at the time.

Imagine if we signed VDS, we wouldn't have signed Howard, we would have knocked out Porto that year and maybe even won it ourselves. No more Special One.

 

[simonhch]

It’s so easy in hindsight, and so much more behind the scenes that we don’t know. There wasn’t the media saturation in those days, and social media to know every little goings on.

The things you could say in hindsight that weren’t great decisions:

- Selling Stam
- Announcing retirement, only to change his mind
- Replacing Ronaldo with Valencia and Owen. Valencia was a great signing, but that 80m should’ve brought in 2 world class players.
- Disrupting the best midfield in the world for Veron. Trying to fix what wasn’t broken.

But you can really forgive and forget all of that because he won trophies anywsy. No one was a harsher critic of him than himself.

The biggie is really his retirement. To leave at the same time Gill was leaving, and to pick his own successor, who was essentially a mate, who then gutted the back room team…..it essentially burned everything to the ground. It was the worst succession plan of any top club I’ve ever seen. And it set us back a decade. At that time there was only Guardiola and Mourinho who were big and bold enough to take that job, for us to get neither, to see one of them go to our rivals, and to end up with Moyes…..is just tragic. And piss poor.

I am not laying the blame of all of that on Fergie. Not at all. But he played his part. After all he had given the club over the decades, he earned nothing but our endless gratitude and admiration, but he knew his retirement was coming. The club knew, and everything, EVERYTHING, should’ve been done to get us the best possible manager for the new era. The first new manager in nearly 30 years. And we got fecking Moyes and an inexperienced CEO in the same summer. I remember when I heard the news, and I thought Moyes? From SAF to David fecking Moyes??? And yes, we all tried to “get behind the manager”, but there was no one listening to that speech that didn’t think we had just been royally fecked.

 

[KetilOwren88]

Choosing Moyes as his replacement and saying that Ronaldo should always play on camera springs to mind. The latter wasn’t his biggest mistake, but it made a difficult situation even worse for Solskjaer. Penny pinching over Hazard was a big mistake, and he played too long with the likes of Alan Smith in midfield before he went on to buy Carrick. I also agree to already written posts.

 

[mu4c_20le]

- Selling Stam
- Announcing retirement, only to change his mind
- Replacing Ronaldo with Valencia and Owen. Valencia was a great signing, but that 80m should’ve brought in 2 world class players.
- Disrupting the best midfield in the world for Veron. Trying to fix what wasn’t broken.

But you can really forgive and forget all of that because he won trophies anywsy. No one was a harsher critic of him than himself.

He wanted another CL, he wasn't just doing it for fun. We were still great in the league, but not so much in europe. I'd say another one would be not properly replacing Keane, I mean I love Carrick and all, but we just missed that type of steel in midfield. Im surprised we never went harder for someone like Vidal. But like the Ronaldo replacements, I bet a lot has to do with the Glazers and how they run the club, so his hands were tied and had to look for value in the market.

 

[RedDevilCanuck]

Should have parked the bus in both finals v Barca a la 2008 semi final.

We had the pace to nick a goal. Could have got lucky with Rio and Vidic camped in our box. Celtic did it, Chelsea did it.

His reasoning for doing was weird too.

Also playing Rooney against Bayern in 2010. He was so obviously still injured. Unbelievably Rooney went to South Africa too and was unfit and underwhelming with HESKEY as his partner. We all know what happened there.

 

[hobbers]

Not signing a proper central midfielder after Carrick was a long running mistake.

Ruining Anderson, Scholes back out of retirement and Nick Powell from the conference instead.

 

[simonhch]

He wanted another CL, he wasn't just doing it for fun. We were still great in the league, but not so much in europe. I'd say another one would be not properly replacing Keane, I mean I love Carrick and all, but we just missed that type of steel in midfield. Im surprised we never went harder for someone like Vidal. But like the Ronaldo replacements, I bet a lot has to do with the Glazers and how they run the club, so his hands were tied and had to look for value in the market.

Oh, I know why he did it. I lauded the signing at the time. But with the benefit of hindsight, it wasn’t right.

 

[Stack]

Choosing Moyes as his replacement was his single biggest mistake.

 

[MrMarcello]

Probably difficult to lay blame on SAF when it comes to VDS. It's often been stated Edwards had already agreed a deal with Bosnich who was available on a Bosman transfer.

I find a big mistake by him came after the Treble season for not strengthening the first team, instead signing cheap backup in Fortune and then forced into panic signings ala Silvestre and Taibi. He should have shipped Berg out and went for a quality CB to partner Stam considering Berg and Johnsen's oft-injured statuses. And not doing so in 1999 and especially the following summer was disastrous.

 

[Ekeke]

Berbatov instead of Tevez

I think he made plenty of mistakes in terms of transfers,but was the master of getting the most out of other things like utility players and giving the team a spirit to go unbeaten for large periods, or the confidence that with just 1 or 2 moves with 1 touch or 2 touch passes would open teams up and get us the goals we needed in a tight game in the league and secure the points. I feel like that happened quite a lot where we werent great but the likes of Scholes, Giggs, Rooney, Ruud and some of our other attackers combined with just a few touches each and ended with the ball in the net.

 

[DeGea’sFeet]

I think there were two key decisions he got wrong which has he got right would have resulted in at least one, if not two, more European Cups from 99-04.

1) Not replacing Schmeichel with Van der Sar.

Not replacing Yorke after the treble year. He'd peaked, should have brought in Batistuta.

VDS chose Juventus over United because our board were very stingy with wage structure and transfer fees. Same with BatiGoal he wanted to come but our board never wanted to finance it. What a striker he was, if I remember he went to Roma in 2000 and they won Serie A.

But credit to our board during the 90s and early 00s they invested a lot of the clubs revenue on expanding the stadium and also building Carrington

 

[Pat_Mustard]

I mentioned Schmeichel and Van der Sar as the latter was available in 99 and left Ajax to Juve for £5m. United were interested but never followed it up. Had they done so then I have no doubt he’d of moved to United.

Were we ever that close or blind to Batistuta? I know he was admired but did the opportunity ever arise?

Fergie wanted him but Martin Edwards wouldn't get with the program and pay him what he wanted. I'm pretty sure we paid very poorly compared to the big continental clubs right up until Keane signed that new contract in 2000.

Ferguson was keen to sign Batistuta. We looked at the situation, but at that time, the wages Batistuta wanted, and of course we're talking net. I can't remember the figures now, (but) they would have jeopardised our wage structure at the club at the time, and therefore turned it down.

It must have been well before the Treble-winning season that we wanted him as Fergie was talking about him as a potential partner for Cantona, which is just footballing porn really.

Looking back, Ferguson would have loved to bring Gabriel Batistuta to Old Trafford, to partner French talisman Eric Cantona.

"I'd have thought somebody like Batistuta would have been the perfect partner for Eric Cantona," he declared. "Someone who could run through, a powerful hitter of the ball.

"Batistuta would be good - quick and aggressive. Eric liked that kind of player, who he could thread passes through to."

https://www.skysports.com/football/news/11667/2213771/fergie-barca-wont-let-rivaldo-go

Same article (it must be from 2001 when we signed Ruud and Veron), Fergie says that we tried to sign Rivaldo a few times but Barca refused to sell.

 

[Ted Lasso]

Bringing so much success to the club that the Glazers could get away with value and kept the club instead of being sold and bought by a real sugar daddy

 

[Mr Smith]

Stubbornly continuing to buy strikers and ignoring the midfield for about 7 years

 

[Lost bear]

I think there were two key decisions he got wrong which has he got right would have resulted in at least one, if not two, more European Cups from 99-04.

1) Not replacing Schmeichel with Van der Sar.

2) Selling Jaap Stam.

That 99 team should have won at minimum another EC and those two decisions above cost us dearly and set us back a great deal.

It’s fine margins I know, and you can look at these things throughout his career and not just a short period as I have there but I’ve picked them as I believe they had the greatest impact to the club.

Any other thoughts?

Late in his career, the failure to sort out a good midfield, with the ‘no value in the market’ discourse, left us fecked for years. It hinges on his attitude toward the Glazers, I think. Obviously he was a fantastic manager overall, I should add…

 

[Bebestation]

It always felt like he used Scholes and Giggs for far too long - right until the day he and they retired.

Would have liked him to see him, well use something different.

 

[IRELANDUNITED]

I think there were two key decisions he got wrong which has he got right would have resulted in at least one, if not two, more European Cups from 99-04.

1) Not replacing Schmeichel with Van der Sar.

2) Selling Jaap Stam.

That 99 team should have won at minimum another EC and those two decisions above cost us dearly and set us back a great deal.

It’s fine margins I know, and you can look at these things throughout his career and not just a short period as I have there but I’ve picked them as I believe they had the greatest impact to the club.

Any other thoughts?

He wanted to, he tried to but Martin Edwards had already agreed to sign Bosnich

 

[Wittmann45]

Maybe easier in retrospect, but playing Chicharito against Barcelona in the 2011 Final was a big mistake. He was in really good form but he couldn't keep hold of the ball and he was an absolute liability, especially while playing a midfield two that was absolute passed to death by Barcelona

 

[copen1945]

Not the biggest but the latest and, hopefully, the last, which is the call he made to Ronaldo to get him back.

 

[Shakesy]

Bebe

 

[FatTails]

Moyes.

 

[Red00012]

I’m gonna go with Rock of Gibraltar

The Glazers mightn’t be around if that falling out hadn’t happened

 

[Shakesy]

Moyes.

Yeah. This.

 

[Dr. Dwayne]

Not sanctioning an extra five mil to get Luka Modric.

 

[Frank Grimes]

Not playing Tevez in CL Final in 2009 was a really bad decision. Tevez was a key player in breaking up Barca play the previous season and would have given us a much better chance of winning. Cut off his nose to spite his face there imo.

 

[JeffFromHK]

Maybe easier in retrospect, but playing Chicharito against Barcelona in the 2011 Final was a big mistake. He was in really good form but he couldn't keep hold of the ball and he was an absolute liability, especially while playing a midfield two that was absolute passed to death by Barcelona

Yes, I smelt something wrong always seeing we line up the following midfield in the final.
Park - Giggs - Carrick - Valencia

we would be much better off (still, we would probably lose) if we make a line up like this:
Nani - Park - Scholes - Fletcher - Valencia

 

[Yagami]

Along with van der Sar and keeping Stam, not bringing in another player who could dribble and who could hold onto the ball under pressure.

We only really had Giggs who could carry the ball for us against the top teams in Europe which is why we usually struggled against Munich, Madrid, Barca, etc. A Rui Costa would've took us to another level alongside van der Sar and keeping Stam.


Then there's the Tevez/Berbatov stuff. In my opinion, Tevez was our second best attacker in 07/08 ahead of Rooney, and Tevez worked better with Berbatov than Rooney did. Tevez should've been a key player alongside Ronaldo and Rooney with Berbatov being the rotation option.

Not starting Berbatov and Nani in the 2011 final. They were two of our best players at keeping the ball under pressure. I'm sure, for a final, Berbatov would've ran his socks off, too, if that was the worry.

 

[bringbackbebe]

Stam, Veron and VDS weren't mistakes that by themselves set us years back. He also definitely didn't leave a weak squad when he left. His biggest mistake was himself and the way he worked. He was so good that everything revolved around him and when he left, there was no structure in place to ease out the transition. While other clubs started adopting division of labour in football administration, we remained an old fashioned club for a decade after SAF, believing that other managers can replicate what he did. We remained with an under developed scouting system, absolute disregard for youth and no pre-defined style of play - resulting in Woodward dictating transfer strategy and pandering to players based on Hollywood style commercial potential rather than football. Moyes was a by product of this out dated thinking. Old man Glazer dying & David Gill departure around the same time made things worse due to lack of checks and balances from experienced hands.

 

[GifLord]

Stam, Veron and VDS weren't mistakes that by themselves set us years back. He also definitely didn't leave a weak squad when he left. His biggest mistake was himself and the way he worked. He was so good that everything revolved around him and when he left, there was no structure in place to ease out the transition. While other clubs started adopting division of labour in football administration, we remained an old fashioned club for a decade after SAF, believing that other managers can replicate what he did. We remained with an under developed scouting system, absolute disregard for youth and no pre-defined style of play - resulting in Woodward dictating transfer strategy and pandering to players based on Hollywood style commercial potential rather than football. Moyes was a by product of this out dated thinking. Old man Glazer dying & David Gill departure around the same time made things worse due to lack of checks and balances from experienced hands.

He left us with lots of players that were either past their prime, not ready or just started to decline.
-Rio, Vidic, Evra, Giggs were past it
-Young & Valencia both failed wingers converted to fullbacks
-Jones and Smalling were not first team material
- Carrick was our only creative player and he was 31
-Rooney wanted out and just didn't seem to give a feck when he got his crazy new contract - declined massively and was past it at 29
-Nani was too inconsistent
It was a fecking miracle that we even won the title back then. The midfield was non existent at times. Most of the matches were won purely because of RVP's brilliance.

 

[Revaulx]

People won’t like this, but I have never been convinced that bringing Mark Hughes back was a good idea. Without him in 1987/88 we scored 71 league goals; the following two seasons after his return it was 45 followed by 46.

Sure, he scored some amazing goals and was a real “clutch” (yuk) player, but his return did McClair no favours at all and it wasn’t till Giggs emerged over two years later that our attack started to get back on song.

I’m not suggesting that SAF regretted the decision, but he did acknowledge early on that he made a mistake getting rid of Peter Davenport, who was the ideal second/support striker.

 

[Bestie07]

Not signing Hazard due to the 6 million agent fees. Having him would have pretty much cemented us as at least a top two or top three side for the last decade.

 

[tenpoless]

His biggest mistake was winning so many titles for us because that didnt stop us from criticizing his other mistakes.

 

[stw2022]

When we won the Treble and lost Schmeichel, Fergie was rewarded by the PLC restricting investment that summer to a being limited to just obtaining goalkeeper he didn’t even want on a free.

These are the reasons Ferguson’s own experience working under different ownership regimes is different to fan’s imagined reality both then and later on

In terms of mistakes, selling Beckham when he did is an underrated one. The narrative now is we still Beckham and got Ronaldo but that overlooks the fact it took Ronaldo a long time to get anywhere close to the player he would become and the whole journey went via Ole’s stint or wide. He was decent but nowhere near the level of assists and or dead-ball contributions.

The relationship breakdown meant his long-term future was doomed, but selling Beckham at that time without a ready made replacement was an error and took a lot from us that wasn’t really replaced by anyone playing at a similar in that position at level Beckham would have continued to, for two or three years after that