Injury breaks key to quintuple bid for Ferguson

Injuries will determine the fate of Manchester United’s bid for an unprecedented clean sweep of all five competitions the club has entered this season, Alex Ferguson believes.

United’s Scottish manager believes he has the players to pull off a ‘quintuple’ but admits that it will take a bit of luck for that to happen, particularly when it comes to keeping key stars fit.

Ferguson’s men claimed the World Club Championship trophy in December, face Tottenham in the League Cup final on March 1 and are in pole position in the Premier League.

United have also advanced to the last 16 of the FA Cup and the Champions League, prompting their veteran manager to admit that the thought of a clean sweep — which would inevitably bring with it a temptation to retire on an unparallelled high — had crossed his mind.

“You would need the luck and you would need to keep all your players fit,” Ferguson told Sirius radio. “If we keep everyone fit then, yes, we’d have a chance. When you’re in a competition, you’ve got to try to win it and, as long as you’re still in that competition, you’ve got a chance.

“What we have done well recently is that we’ve had a lot of injuries but the squad has compensated and whatever team I have picked the players have just got on with it. But, realistically, I don’t see it.”

United’s recent success has been underpinned by outstanding defensive work, which has been reflected in a record run of a 12 consecutive clean sheets in the league.

And with Wayne Rooney due back from injury for Sunday’s Premier League trip to West Ham and Cristiano Ronaldo returning to form, the squad’s attacking edge looks set to become sharper as the season moves into what Ferguson refers to as “squeaky bum time.”

The United boss said he was delighted to see Ronaldo apparently enjoying his football again after a sluggish first half of the season which was ascribed to the unsettling impact of his failed attempt to engineer a move to Real Madrid before the start of the campaign.

“He’ll start to flourish now,” Ferguson predicted. “You know what goalscorers are like — when they’re not scoring they’re a bit grumpy and when they are scoring they are the happiest people in the world.”

Ferguson also confirmed that veterans Ryan Giggs and Paul Scholes will both be offered new contracts that will keep them at Old Trafford until at least the end of next season, and predicted that their old team-mate, David Beckham, would leave LA Galaxy for AC Milan.

“I think it would be the most natural thing he could do, to get back into the real hotbed of football,” Ferguson said of Beckham. “If they give him that opportunity it would be silly not to take it. He’s had a spell at Galaxy and, fine, they’ve paid him an awful lot of money and they should have some loyalty from him.

“But being selfish, if I was given the chance to go to Milan, I would take it. There’s no chance he can do it in two years. This is a golden moment for the lad and I think he’ll take it. If they can work out a deal between Milan and Galaxy I think it will happen.”