MARK HUGHES had finished with his players, done all the interviews and, stopwatch in hand, reviewed the footage of that seven minutes of added time.
Old Trafford was nearly deserted as Manchester City’s manager returned to the bowels of the stadium to collect his belongings and see whether Alex Ferguson was around for a drink. Hughes, like Ferguson, believes it is a good thing for rival managers to share a post-match glass of wine. But when he knocked on the office door, there was no reply.
Ferguson and his coaches had left the building.
As a snapshot of the two men’s relationship, it is probably an accurate gauge of how things stand between Hughes and Ferguson. “Respect not reverence”, as a close associate of Hughes puts it. Yet some of that respect has been eroded over the years and, increasingly, it looks like things will get worse before they get better. The barbs have started to lose their subtlety, suspicions have built and grudges have festered.
Hughes might as well have made a “w” for “whatever” with his fingers when it was put to him that Ferguson thought Manchester United deserved to win Sunday’s derby by six or seven goals. There was a knowing roll of the eyes and, for a seemingly interminable second, the same eyes flashed with indignation. “Count to 10,” he seemed to tell himself. “Don’t let the old stirrer get under your skin.”
Of the many lasting images from a raucous day, one stood out above the rest. It was the moment when the final whistle went and the two managers came together. A few seconds earlier, Ferguson had draped his arm around the fourth official, Alan Wiley, and made a matey joke expressing his gratitude for the amount of added time. Michael Owen had just made it 4-3 and in the City dug-out it felt like Ferguson was rubbing it in.
The whistle blew and Ferguson punched the air before making his way over to shake hands. Hughes accepted the gesture but his body language laid bare his thoughts. His upper body was half-turned towards Ferguson, but his lower body was moving away. It was the briefest contact, a moment freighted with so much cold detachment you wondered what could possibly have happened between them.
The popular though inaccurate theory is it all dates back to a 4-3 defeat for United at Blackburn Rovers in February 2006, when Hughes was in charge at Ewood Park and Ferguson had a post-match drink with him, congratulated him for the win and then, in a moment of vintage Ferguson, went on television to berate Rovers’ playing style.
Others say Hughes just likes to be his own man. Some managers cling to Ferguson’s coat-tails and convince themselves he is their friend. Hughes is dispassionate. He does not see the need to cosy up.
But there is history. Ned Kelly, once United’s head of security, remembers bumping into Hughes in a nightclub one evening in 1995, shortly after the player had left Old Trafford to join Chelsea.
“Whether it was the lateness of the hour, the strength of the alcohol, or something he had read . . . Sparky wanted to talk only about his former manager,” Kelly recalls. “‘Fergie never really rated me as a player’, he complained. ‘I was only brought back from Barcelona to keep the fans happy’.” Kelly remembers telling him “that’s bollocks”, but being unable to cheer him up.
It is an anecdote that might partly explain why, 14 years on, Hughes is quite happy to snipe at Ferguson. In the run-up to Sunday’s derby he even admitted being “amused” by the thought of Ferguson being asked so many questions about what is going on at the City of Manchester Stadium – which Ferguson once called the “Temple of Doom” – these days.
He shrugged his shoulders theatrically when a Ferguson rant was brought up. He could barely suppress his mirth when Ferguson got so hot under the collar about the Carlos Tevez-inspired “Welcome to Manchester” billboard that City put up on Deansgate.
As for Ferguson, there are times when the United manager seems to regard confrontation as something that will help keep him young. His own digs have become sharper. Both men know how their comments will look in print. They are comfortable with it.
Ferguson is a leading member of the League Managers Association but he did not ring Hughes when he got the City job. Ferguson knew what he was doing when he questioned whether Hughes, having spent €132m this summer, had to win the Premier League title. Hughes, out of choice, remains distant. His own man. It does not particularly bother him what Ferguson thinks – and perhaps that is what Ferguson dislikes the most. Guardian Service
FERGUSON'S FOES
KENNY DALGLISH
‘We’re hoping for a Devon Loch situation,‘ said Ferguson with Blackburn in control of the 1994-95 title race. They lost three of their last five games but won the title for the first time
KEVIN KEEGAN
In the 1995-96 run-in, Ferguson said that Leeds and Nottingham Forest might not try their best against Newcastle, prompting Keegan to lose it on live television after the Leeds game
ARSENE WENGER
After they lost at home to Derby, Ferguson said Arsenal ‘used to be a big club’ and was scathing about Wenger, saying: ‘He has come here from Japan and now he is telling us how to run our football’
JOSE MOURINHO
A playful relationship soured when Mourinho said Cristiano Ronaldo had ‘no education’.
