KEEP YOUR NOSE OUT

Last updated : 22 June 2003 By Editor

In the Screws:

"From the day I met Alex Ferguson he has had my full support, my full respect. But this time he has gone too far, he has got it wrong. I feel he has stabbed us in the back.

"David phoned me and told me Madrid had come in for him. I asked what he would do and he told me he had to go because the manager didn't want him.

"I still can't believe the deal has gone through with the manager in France and David in America. That is why it is so wrong.

"I don't know how it started, whether it was United or Madrid but I know for a fact that David didn't want to go. I am certain he would have signed a new contract. He has a fabulous new house and his family are settled.

"I told him to stay. I said if it were me I would have stayed for two years and then gone on a free.

"But David told me he wanted to play, he didn't want to rot in the reserves. He saw what happened to Dwight Yorke and he couldn't let that happen to him."

And Ted on Bootgate:

"I wouldn't say that the boot incident was the reason. It has been a gradual decline but that maybe sent it over the edge.

"He came storming into the dressing room and, unfortunately, of all the players in that dressing room, it had to hit David. Even if he had been sitting on the toilet I am sure it would have bounced off four walls, around the corner and still hit him. It was destiny.

"David and Gary Neville sit in the corner and this was straight after the game. They were all still in the kit, they were sitting down, really peed off. They know they didn't perform.

"Obviously he was upset, I would be. He came in and was fuming. He was effing and blinding and, unfortunately, he saw a boot and just kicked it.

"He didn't mean it. David knows that but it hit him and David was fuming. He went to get up, then put his hand on his eye and it was bleeding. He needed two stitches.

"The boss immediately said; 'Sorry David, that wasn't meant to happen.'

"I think the manager was shocked himself. It could have been very serious and I think that upset the manager. The stuff about how he didn't say sorry was rubbish.

"It upset David, he didn't want that. He rang me afterwards and he wasn't happy but he didn't deliberately get photographed. He just went out shopping. He had a cut eyebrow. What could he have worn to cover it — sun glasses, a massive hat, a balaclava? It was ridiculous.

"If he is in the paper every day I understand the manager getting wound up and it created a problem between them publicly, definitely."