CLASSIC CLIPS | Rio Ferdinand: “He’d RIP Your Head Off” — Inside Ferguson’s Ruthless Standards

0:00What was your initial contact? Because everyone's got that first meeting with the new manager. And obviously, more often than not, the meeting with Sir Alex is, he's driven down five hours to go and see someone in the living room. But what was, can you remember yours when you first spoke to him? Sid's got a great Mourinho story. Everyone's got one though, but I'm saying Sir Alex, I could just see it being something that just stand out. I met him at the airport hotel in Leeds. Was it a hotel around the corner from Leeds Airport, I think? or was it Manchester? Leeds Bradford Airport might have been in Manchester one of the airport anyway hotel and I went like a Premierian I'm like yeah but he had the main room no worry about that there was the elite room he was in it right and it was like going to see the Godfather on the way up my legs had gone completely yeah and I was walking up and thinking rah Alex Ferguson like you start thinking about what he means to football it's like mad it's like a video starts playing in your head and it's like these double doors open there's a corridor in this room and he's just sitting at the end of it.

1:00He must have staged this to make me feel intimidated. But I walked in and he's obviously really light-hearted and he's so different to what I imagined him to be. Welcome in. We want you. It made me feel like, listen, we need you at our club. I've been in for Sanso. I've spoken about this player, big players around at the time, but we want you. And I was like, that's me, man. We're going to win. We're going to win again. Because they didn't win the year before. And I was like, we're primed to win and I want you as part of it we're going to break the record to buy you and I was like I can't go anywhere else who in the centre half is there now so like the way I'm thinking I'm thinking like so who's more competition I didn't see competition I've got to be honest because like Mikel Sylvester top player great pro you can see top player Laurent Blanc on his last legs it's not the Laurent Blanc when he was 27 so I knew Laurent Blanc Laurent Blanc is going to be going you're going to come maybe play a season with him then he's going to go so and you're breaking the record for me I'm coming him playing I know that so I was like I just wanted to put the shirt on man did you say yes in that meeting in that hotel yeah because I wasn't someone to talk about money I didn't like it the same when I went Leeds that Mr Rizda was chatting money I said listen we've all drew this about the one you talk to him about that I want to know that David O 'Leary is going to improve me as a player that's it same thing was with um Sean X Ferguson like am I coming to play obviously and we're going to try and win I just wanted to hear what he was saying about coaching me and how the team and the environment and all that's what I wanted to know about you know like when you did you walk around Old Trafford and like look at the kind of history obviously when I signed for Liverpool obviously a bigger club than Manchester United he's pissed against he's got a little ripple he's got a ripple from the scouts he's smashed well no genuinely did you did it hit did it like did you think oh my this is a proper club yeah I didn't go walk around the museum Liverpool ain't got a museum I didn't walk around the museum or anything like that but it was you walk you walk out onto the pitch out of the tunnel at Old Trafford you know what it's like when you walk out there the place just opens up and you just the history just hits you in the face and yeah I just was like it was weird because my mum was in Sir Alex Ferguson's office or was it David Gill one of their offices where I was doing all the paperwork to sign and I remember him saying to my mum um Rio is he alright he don't seem that happy and like I was never one to get too excited at the time until I want to get the kit on I want to feel what the socks feel like I want to get on the pitch and play games so until and also the paperwork I didn't weren't dry do you know what I mean it wasn't like official yet so until that goes through my medicals alright I can't be celebrating nothing if I was your mum older I said have you not seen the suit he's wearing he's like don't worry about that I had to make an appearance you know do you remember the shot Probeeto oh yeah in West End somewhere I went down there specifically especially New Bond Street yeah unbelievable went in there yeah that's the one for the walk out it was unbelievable yeah did you ever get by like something when you signed like a special I did it a few times I was like which ones get me signing suits out I had a rack of them is that a thing a signing suit I thought it was I thought listen this is a massive day for me and my family Wayne Rooney signed for 30 odd mil as a teenager and come in in some baggy jumper.

4:30Disgraceful. He got hammered. Disgraceful. You have to make an effort, man. When you talk about the godfather, obviously Sir Alex Ferguson, I had one where I went to the Alderley Edge Hotel and I was at Stoke at the time and I remember going in there and apparently on a Sunday he has the same table. I don't know if you know this. There's the same table in there. Oh, in the Alderley Edge Hotel. In the Alderley Edge Hotel. On a Sunday there's a roast dinner. so anyway I've come in me and Ab and he's gone obviously yeah where'd you sit I said yeah lovely table by the window there anyway we sat down and one of the waiters come over and goes this is Alex Ferguson's table and I was like what seriously and he goes yeah he's not he's not coming today is he I said no no no don't worry don't worry and I've seen this car pull off haven't I no way and I've gone oh fucking hell he's walked out I'm sitting up tucking into me roast beef and I'm on his table and I went oh no and I said to Ab and she's going what are you talking about don't be so ridiculous so I've made her pick up the roast dinner and move and move and sat on the other table over there and like I didn't even tell the waiters or anything I'm just on a different table now and anyway he's walked in he is none the wiser goes and sits down but like that's the kind of respect that I think you have to have even you know I never played for him but this is so exposed it's like when I first I ever met him as a West Ham player in the car park at West Ham after a game.

5:55They beat us probably. And I'm walking to go to my car and he's walking towards me. And I just was like, I couldn't get my words out. I didn't know what to call him. Sir, Alex, boss. I ended up calling him gaffer. He's not even my gaffer. Weren't even my boss. Weren't even my gaffer. Harry Redknapp would have been devastating. I called him gaffer and I was like, I just shook his hand and just walked off and thought, fuck, what do you do? That's the amount of like, you're in awe a little bit about, around him. Yeah, so you signed, right, and then you're there. And did you sort of keep that relationship that you had from when you signed?

6:30You felt that, or did it change when you were in the team to something a bit more distant? Yeah, that warm, like, welcoming character after your first couple of days at the club disintegrates. Because it's just totally serious, man. He still likes a little laugh around a training ground and he'll say something about your shoes or your gear, what you got on, or your haircut or something like that. But then once you get out on a training pitch or match day, different animal. Like, just a ruthless guy, like, would rip your head off. So was the first bollocking a bit harder to take because you'd had this brilliant experience?

7:05No. My first bollocking was West Brom away. And I remember, obviously, trying to live up to the price tag and trying to spray the ball about a little when I don't need to, just forcing the game, as you do. And I got, the ball got cut out from, I tried to play a right to left ball, it got cut out. and they almost went in and had a shot, tried to do it again to make up for the last one I missed and Jason Coombe has got it and ran in. I don't know if he scored or he hit the bar or something and I remember half time, there weren't even a half time talk, it was just about, he just volleyed me. He said, I don't know who you think you are, you've got to fucking do this and that.

7:40You're a centre half, be a centre half. Don't think you're fucking spraying the ball over the gaff. You've almost given two goals but I've watered that down.

7:51so he was like a lunatic so you sit there and you think that and you're shitting yourself like you are sitting there going fucking like anywhere else there's no geezer just talking to you like that and you're just going to suffer it but here you're looking around like for a little bit of like reinforcement from your teammates and they're all their heads down like that like big players wow I was on holiday a couple of years ago and got talking to Teddy and when you're with players you never want to talk about football but I had to ask him literally about United at the time and I was like, listen, what was it like there?

8:20And he just said he used to come in most days and just sit there and just look at whether it was going to be Scholes or Giggs and they would just go, that was good, that wasn't it? Like the standard was so good and just so like on it that they would just come in and not a word would be said because they said the players drove it, like drove training itself, but they'd look there and just go, that was good, that. The manager, I don't know about all your clubs where you played, but the manager never come in a change room. I think he'd come in there about four times probably and one of those was to say that he was leaving because he just let us run it all the time, like standards, punctuality, whatever, in a change, it was us.

8:59But yeah, Teddy's right, 100%. I came after Teddy, but the standard of training every day, there weren't many days when the standard dropped off like 5%, 10%. It was like a ridiculous standard every day and the winning and losing in training was one of the big things. If you were losing or you lost in training, the arguments, the hammering of the coach who was reffing the game or whatever was a joke off the scale. Yeah, you were always quite aggressive with the referees in training, weren't you? Sammy Lee took a bit. Sammy Lee got it. You midget. Sammy Lee got it. You ginger rat. Sorry, Sid. Sorry, Sid.

9:37I'm sorry. Oh, that's Sid. What's he calling you there? I'll be a ginger. I'll be a gerbil. We were not in the edit. I couldn't contain myself in training But it was aggressive

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