It's 8.20 on Saturday morning and we're on our way from the Burlington Hotel to RTE. Two of the car's passengers are wearily wiping the sleep from their eyes, the third, though, refreshed from a rare lie-in, is in full voice. "Moon river, wider than a mile, I'm crossing you in style some daaaay," he croons as we drive through Donnybrook.
"Don't give up the day job," says the driver. The crooner giggles. "Ever thought about making a record?" I ask. "Aye, Sing-along-a-Fergie," he chuckles. "I could be the new Max Bygraves, you know," he says. "Mmm, that's what I'm afraid of," I mutter, bravely. "What's that?" "I said: `Lovely morning'." He's off again. "Oh dream maker, you heart breaker, wherever you're goin', I'm goin' your waaaay." His mobile phone rings, to the sound of Scotland the Brave, and we're spared the second verse.
Out of tune, maybe, but Sir Alex Ferguson, manager of Manchester United, is very definitely on song during his hectic promotional trip to Dublin for his recently published autobiography, Managing My Life. Arrived Dublin Airport 5.30 p.m. Friday. Met the Taoiseach at 6 p.m. (or did the Taoiseach meet Alex Ferguson? "There's our leader, with Bertie," as one watching United fan put it). Appeared live on the RTE News at 6.20. Held a press conference for almost an hour and then had seven or eight one-on-one interviews with journalists ("Next," he shouted out the door of his "surgery" after each interview ended), before leaving for his hotel where he signed scores of books and made urgent phone calls about some pressing football matters.
On Saturday morning he recorded two half-hour interviews in RTE before 10 a.m., the first for television, the second for Pat Kenny's radio show, and then it was in to Easons in O'Connell Street for a two-hour book-signing session. After that it was back to the airport for an afternoon flight home to Manchester. A reported advance of £1 million from publishers Hodder & Stoughton and sales so far of 300,000 (in Britain and Ireland) might have helped put that extra spring in his step but, still, through the two days even people almost half his 58 years could hardly keep up with him. He walks almost as quickly as Ryan Giggs sprints up the left wing.
His itinerary barely gave him time to catch his breath, but that's a luxury he's rarely enjoyed since the days he combined an apprenticeship as a toolmaker at the Remington typewriter factory in Glasgow with a playing career with Queen's Park and St Johnstone and, later, in the 1970s, when he ran two pubs, managed St Mirren and attempted to fit in a family life with his wife Cathy and three sons, all at the same time. Depending on where your football allegiances lie, Ferguson has been a bit of a dream maker/heart breaker (delete where necessary) himself these past few years, during which time he has firmly established himself as one of the greatest football managers of all time and Manchester United as the team of the 1990s. Many loathe him with a passion, mainly those of a different football faith, viewing him as a dour, bad-tempered, scowling Scot, so blinded by his devotion to United that they believe the eclipse of the sun is a more common occurrence than a display of Ferguson impartiality.
But time in his company reveals a side to him rarely, if ever, seen publicly, not least when he's lambasting referees, television reporters, opposing managers, opposing players, opposing . . . well, anyone he views as opposing Manchester United. He's mischievous, good-natured, courteous, with a sizeable back catalogue of self-deprecating tales and - hold the back page - he's positively charming. Not that these are sides of him that the English press - most of whom he's had an uneasy relationship with since his appointment as United manager in November 1986 - often see. The previous Wednesday, after the Republic of Ireland's game against Yugoslavia at Lansdowne Road, I met two English football journalists and mentioned I was meeting Ferguson two days' later. They gasped. "Why, is he that scary?" I asked. "No, no, he's not scary - he's petrifying," they agreed.
When I tell Ferguson this on the Friday evening he throws his head back and roars with laughter. With relish. He hasn't looked as happy since Ole Gunnar Solskjaer won his team the European Cup, completing a unique treble, with an injury time winner against Bayern Munich back in May. The mere idea of him frightening an English football reporter would appear to have brought him almost as much pleasure. So, is it true, is that the effect you have on them? "Aaah, sometimes," he says, with a devilish grin. "But I don't think it really matters - I may petrify them for a few minutes but once they're out the door they still write their stuff, don't they? So it doesn't make any difference, does it?"
"But is it fair to say that you're paranoid about the media and their coverage of United?"
Uh oh. His eyes narrow and appear to turn an icy shade of blue. For a brief moment I know just how the two English football reporters feel. "No, I'm not paranoid about the press at all," he whispers, slowly, very slowly. "But I think from time to time I use certain things to keep them on their toes, I have to play the game too, you know?
"You have to be cautious with them nowadays, you definitely do. I said things to the Irish press today that were off the record but I don't think there's any such thing anymore in England. There's this new thing they have now, topspin, where the editor changes the reporter's story to make it more sensational - to me it's unethical, unfair and disrespectful, but that's what you're faced with now.
"Is the Four Pros still going?," he asks, as we drive from the airport to his hotel on Friday evening. Pardon? "The Four Provinces? I think it was in Harcourt Street. I came to Dublin with two pals when I was 17, my first holiday away from my family, and we danced in the Four Pros. Great place. We had a laugh. I suppose it's gone now?" The younger passengers nod sympathetically.
"I remember going to Israel with the Scottish squad in 1967 and we were flying with Aer Lingus. I was trying to chat up one of the air hostesses, you know the way you would, and I asked her where she was from. `Dublin', she said and I told her about my holiday and dancing at the Four Pros. `Do you know it?' I asked her. `Yeah, my mother used to dance there,' she said." One-nil to the air hostess. Another woman who's been putting him in his place, for the past 33 years, is his wife Cathy, whom he mentions frequently in conversation, usually accompanied by giggling as he recalls moments from their past. She worked in the same factory and her "lovely walk and nice bum" caught his eye. They married in 1966 in a registry office because she was a Catholic and he a Protestant, though his mother was a Catholic. For a man whose greatest ambition was to play for Glasgow Rangers, marrying a Catholic wasn't a great career move. On the day he finally joined the club, the year after he married, he was called in by one of the directors and asked about Cathy's religion. He wanted to know where they had been married, and when Ferguson told him it was in a registry office he said, "that's alright then". He was left in no doubt that if it had been in a Catholic church his stay at Ibrox Park might have been short-lived.
Religious bigotry in Scotland is a constant theme in his book. His experience of it, he explains, accounts for his and Cathy's decision to raise their three boys as Protestants, because employment opportunities for Catholics were limited.
When their first son was born, Ferguson insisted he be called Alex because "the firstborn in the Ferguson family is always called Alex". "None of this Wee Alex and Big Alex, not on your life," replied Cathy. Their son was called Mark. No flies on Cathy Ferguson.
In 1972 Cathy, after a difficult pregnancy, had twins, Jason and Darren. The experience, though, proved more traumatic for their father than their mother. "Before she went in to theatre, frequent contractions were causing her severe pain and I held her hand to comfort her," he recalls in his book. "Then her face turned purple and that was too much for me. I fainted." When he came around, Ferguson, as he was taken from the ward by a nurse, called back `you'll be alright' to his bemused wife. "Yes, she said, but will you?"
He describes her as the "rock in his life", and chuckles loudly when he recalls her unique way of bringing him back down to earth with a bang. "I came home the night Monaco had knocked us out of the European Cup [last year] and there she was at the front door shouting `Fergie Out, Fergie Out'. Can you believe that?
"Oh yeah, when I was at Aberdeen I'd come home after a bad result, I'd be ready to kick the cat and I'd walk in and she's shouting `these bloody wains - are you going to talk to them? I'm fed up with them'. "It brings you right down, but that's her way of bringing home to me what's important. That's a great quality she has. She's not that interested in football but she's obviously interested in me, worries like hell about results. Every year if we win something she says `right, next year I'm not going to worry anymore', but the season starts and she's worrying again." "Love is a many splendoured thing, it's the April rose that only grows in the early spring." He's at it again. "Great song," he says, "but Moon River's my all-time favourite. Wait till you hear this. A few years back myself and Cathy had a couple of friends staying with us from Aberdeen and we had a wee party. We all did our party pieces - us Scots are like the Irish, we like to sing - so when it was my turn I sat down, closed my eyes and belted out Moon River. When I opened my eyes the room was empty. I went after them and said `You come to my house, you eat ma food, you drink ma drink and this is the respect I get'. Bloody hell." The driver says nothing but I know what he's thinking.
Is it a lonely job? "It can be. It's hard to explain but sometimes you just have to withdraw into yourself when you have a problem, and you have to sort it out because you're the only person who can sort it out. That's why you're the manager. Sometimes I've had quite difficult problems to sort out and I think `how am I going to solve this?' but I cannae talk to anyone.
"Sometimes you're isolated just because people think you want it that way - `I better not bother him, he's busy' - when there are times you'd like people to drop in. It can be lonely at times but the great thing is you always have training with the players and have a game."
Are those 90 minutes your favourite time of the week? "Oh aye. That's what's happened me the last few years, I can't wait to get to the games, whereas when I was a younger manager I enjoyed the training, developing the players, the game was just something to get out of the way. Now it's everything, my sanctuary, all 90 minutes of it." "Alex! Alex! Tell David Beckham we love him, will ya? Alex!" He nods furiously and roars with laughter. He's signing books in Easons and three girls, all around 12 years of age, standing behind the railing keeping the throngs back from his desk, are pleading with him to pass on their "kind regards" to the United midfielder. The session finally ends, he's autographed 1,200 books in just under two hours and his hand is aching.
How much longer will he keep this up? "Three more years and that's me finished with management, I'll be 60 then so it'll be time to get out." No matter how hard I try I can't see you gardening or taking up stamp collecting. "Christ no," he says, recoiling at the horror of the thought. "We'll see what happens, I might have another role at the club, but there'll be no gardening. Bloody hell." There's always the singing. "Moon river, wider than a mile . . . " Is that the time?
Managing My Life by Alex Ferguson is published by Hodder & Stoughton (£18.99 in UK)
