It has been revealed by Rio Ferdinand that Sir Alex gave one of his famous team talks before the final of the Club World Championships.

Fergie quite rightly told the players that they must win the Cup because they have travelled 12,000 miles, face a fixture pile up and it would basically have been a total waste of time if they didn't win it.
Sir Alex also said that if they lost then it would have a really negative effect on the rest of the season.

“The manager’s team talk before the game hit the nail on the head.

“In fact, he hit a lot of things on the head that were needed for us to get into gear. That is the sign of a great manager.

“We spoke before the game about how, if we lost this game, it could have a big effect on us for the rest of the season. We have been in Japan for 10 days and it has been a hard trip, if I am honest, both physically and mentally with adjusting to the time and all that.

“The manager went into certain points. One of the things said was that if we didn’t win it would have a major effect on our season — a very negative effect.

“But there are frequent significant moments from the manager, not just team talks but at different parts of the season either on the training field or in the changing room.

"Sometimes you need to be told the basics and reminded about what got us to where we were last year and the year before.

“Great players need reminding — and we have a few of them in our squad. Hopefully, this could be a defining point in our season.”


Now after winning it, hopefully it will have a positive effect on the season, we are still in four competitions- Premier League, Champion's League, FA Cup and Carling Cup.

We have already won the Community Shield and Club World Cup, hopefully it can spur us on into the second half of the season.