Facing rose-tinted masses

SOCCER: On his return to Elland Road today, Rio Ferdinand will learn that some Leeds fans hate Manchester United more than they love their own club, writes Daniel Taylor

The "Beautiful Game" will cease to exist today, no matter what Leeds United and Manchester United conjure up at Elland Road. It will feel spiteful, vindictive and very, very ugly. Football will become the grotesque game.

"It's not a war," Rio Ferdinand reminded us this week. Yet it is not the beautiful game, either. Not when his parents Julian and Janice have been advised to stay away, not when he has to be smuggled into the ground like a murderer into court, and not when West Yorkshire police are planning their biggest security operation since Galatasaray's notorious match in Leeds 29 months ago.

Ferdinand will not be the first footballer, or the last, to face accusations of traitorous disloyalty from former employers. But in a very public ordeal, nobody, probably not even Sol Campbell on his return to White Hart Lane, will have experienced the venom and vitriol that is spewed in Ferdinand's direction today, his first game back at Leeds since swapping one United for another seven weeks ago.

Sturdy characters such as Gordon McQueen, Joe Jordan, Arthur Graham and Eric Cantona have feared for their safety after making the same treacherous journey, but it has never felt as menacing as this.

"If it's anything like the reaction I got he will never forget it," says McQueen. "But I think it will be a lot worse. It was bad in my day but it's terrible now. The Leeds fans are really spitting venom. It just seems to be getting worse and worse. Everyone is getting stoked up more and more. You wonder where it is all going to end . . ."

Ask Alex Ferguson what it is like to take a Manchester United side to Leeds and he will shake his head in distaste. At Liverpool, he says, there is hostility, but also a begrudging respect. The same applies to Arsenal, Newcastle, even Manchester City. But his memories of Elland Road are tainted by recent history: the team coach being attacked, the Munich chants, scalding tea being thrown over Bobby Charlton's wife in the directors' box, a fan climbing into the dug-out to assault the youth coach Eric Harrison.

"The crowd invariably give us the impression that lynching would be too good for us," says Ferguson. "But, as far as Rio is concerned, I can understand the fans' anger. Football is about passion, people supporting a club because they are engrained in the fabric of it. When a top player leaves to go to a rival club, what do you expect? It's the most natural thing to get that kind of resentment."

McQueen moved from Elland Road to Old Trafford in 1978, three months after Jordan had made the same journey.

"There was one difference," he points out. "Joe was sold, whereas I forced the issue to leave Leeds. They hated me for that."

The supporters who had made him their player of the year for two of the previous three seasons were not discreet with their feelings.

"It started with hate mail, and plenty of it, too. Really horrendous stuff. Then I made the mistake, still living in the Leeds area, of thinking it would be okay to pop down to Elland Road to watch a midweek game. Bad judgment. The abuse was so bad I had to leave before the end. It was horrible, but I think they were just warming me up for my first game back.

"It was seven or eight months after I had left and I remember the abuse started as soon as I stepped off the team bus. Constant booing. They wanted to get their message over loud and clear. The reaction was really bad."

McQueen hardly won back any old friends by scoring in a 3-2 win and, 23 years later, there are still people in Leeds who cannot forgive him. "I was at the first game of the season, against Manchester City, and there were fans wearing T-shirts that said: Jordan, McQueen, Cantona, Rio: Traitors. I laughed it off. Good luck to the guy who designed them, I'm sure he's made a few quid out of it."

The truth, it seems, is that there are some Leeds fans who hate Manchester United more than they love their own club. They hate the fact that Old Trafford is bigger and better than Elland Road, that they are not as successful as their rivals, and that when Alex Ferguson comes knocking he usually gets what he wants.

They hate the superiority complex they see in Mancunians and, when all the arguments about football stop, they hate the fact that Manchester is considered a more desirable city. Leeds may be a hip, vibrant place to live, but the northern capital of fashion, music and culture is 50 miles along the M62. Manchester, as Ian Brown once said, has everything except a beach.

"It's been going on for years," says McQueen. "It's the old Yorkshire-Lancashire thing, the War of the Roses and all that. There's a lot of jealousy and resentment in Leeds. They've seen what has happened in Manchester and they are envious of them."

For some Leeds fans (the ones who still regard "Cantona" as a swear word), Ferdinand's defection was the ultimate act of betrayal, the £30 million transfer fee being of little consolation.

Three random quotes from the Leeds fanzine, The Square Ball:

"I hope he breaks his leg in front of the Kop" . . .

"I hate you, you scumbag" . . .

"This bloke ruined our summer with his lying and disloyalty."

Ah, the beautiful game.

Jordan recalls the Leeds fans "boiling with anger" on his first game back but, pre-Ferdinand, it was Cantona's £1.2 million trans-Pennine switch in 1992 which fuelled the most fearsome hostility. The Frenchman was so badly abused on his return that he spat at some home fans. The FA fined him £1,000.

Both clubs have denied reports that six former SAS men will protect Ferdinand, but today is another potential flashpoint. "I'm sure he will handle it, though," says Jordan. "When you play for big clubs such as Manchester United and Leeds you get used to hostile atmospheres. Young as he is, Rio has a good temperament."

Those feelings were echoed by Ferguson. "It might be the only time a player gets more stick than me, but I've not spoken to Rio about it, just as I never used to speak to Eric. I'm sure he will cope. Leeds have conducted the security operation very well over the last two years. In the past I would have to say it has not been perfect, but it has been fine the last couple of seasons."

Nevertheless, it promises to be the most harrowing 90 minutes of Ferdinand's career. Ray Fell, chairman of the Leeds supporters' club, said yesterday he hoped the crowd would ignore Ferdinand. Pressed further, however, he had to accept the inevitable. "I can't see it happening in my wildest dreams."