Is Fergie worried about City?

For many years Manchester United have claimed that their biggest rivals have been Liverpool and, before that, Leeds. They have said that the local rivalry with Manchester City was always more important to City than it was to them.

Successful

Of course, over the past few years United have been incredibly successful and generally speaking, City haven’t been. Whilst United have been mixing it with the Liverpool’s, Chelsea’s and Arsenal’s of this world, and battling it out with the cream of Europe, City have been down as low as the third tier of English football and have rarely threatened the top half of the Premier League.

Now, however, with the huge sums of money available to Mark Hughes and Manchester City it appears that it is possible that they might be in a position to finally challenge the club from Old Trafford.

Battles

Whilst Sir Alex Ferguson has had many verbal battles in the past with Arsene Wenger and Rafa Benitez, he has rarely had much to say about City until now. The fact that he has now spoken out about his club’s nearest geographical rivals might just mean that he is slightly worried about them.

In the middle of one of Manchester’s busiest shopping streets a cheeky poster has appeared saying, ‘Carlos Tevez, welcome to Manchester’.

Whilst nobody has claimed responsibility for putting the poster up, City fans are very vociferous that their club is based within the city of Manchester whereas United are based in Trafford. City have often claimed to be Manchester’s only club.

Official

I don’t suppose the poster is anything to do with the club but official Manchester City merchandise in the past has contained slogans such as, ‘This is our City’, ‘Greater Manchester’ and ‘Pure Manchester’.

In the past, Sir Alex Ferguson has cared little about these types of comments but now he has seen fit to speak out about it.

“It is like one of those war adverts, Your Country Needs You. Arrogance comes in lots of different ways. I think it is daft. They have had a problem ever since I came down here. You have to understand, when they get their moment to grasp for and to seize for, they are going to take it.”

Fergie is obviously referring to the fact that Carlos Tevez chose to move to City rather than stay at United. The £25 million transfer has caused much joy in the City camp and, no doubt, some anger at United.

Delighted

I am sure that all connected to Manchester City will be delighted that Sir Alex has deemed it necessary to comment on what has been going on. They will see it as proof that he sees them as serious rivals.

Great local rivalries are a crucial part of the game all over the world and it would be wonderful if the United and City derby could re-establish itself as one of the great games in English football to rival the likes of the Everton and Liverpool, Birmingham and Aston Villa and Arsenal and Tottenham games.

It has always been important to the self declared ‘only team in Manchester’, but it might just be about to take on more significance for the team down the road in Trafford!