Sir Alex Ferguson expects Man Utd to start surge up Premier League against Bolton
Despite a lacklustre start to the season, Sir Alex Ferguson is confident that within a month Manchester United will be firmly entrenched in the top four with Liverpool, Chelsea and Arsenal.
The Manchester United manager can point to several reasons why the champions have yet to feature even in the top half of the table. They have played one fewer match than everybody else bar Fulham; they have been disrupted by injuries and an awkward beginning to the season. Ferguson could have pointed out that the champions of Spain and Germany - Real Madrid and Bayern Munich - have also begun uncertainly.
Tomorrow's Premier League encounter with Bolton at Old Trafford is one of a string of winnable fixtures - their subsequent home games see United face West Brom, West Ham, Hull and Stoke.
"The form of the team is starting to come right and by October we will be back to normal," Ferguson said today. "We have seen some encouraging signs. The football in the first half against Chelsea was good; the football we played on Tuesday against Middlesbrough was excellent.
"The win over Middlesbrough (in the Carling Cup) will send us on our way. It was a tough start with three away games on the trot but we have exactly the same number of points as we did at this stage of last season.
"Then, we drew with Portsmouth, this time we beat them. Last season we beat Liverpool and this time we have lost to them. We took a point at Chelsea, where we lost last season. Our form has not been as incisive as I would have liked but, starting tomorrow, I would expect it to improve."
In the wake of the seven yellow cards dished out to his players during last Sunday's 1-1 draw with Chelsea, Ferguson argued there was no problem with his players' discipline. "There was not one bad tackle at Stamford Bridge and we always try to play our brand of football," he said, though he did acknowledge that certain players such as Gary Neville, Owen Hargreaves, Ji-Sung Park and Dimitar Berbatov all lacked match fitness which showed in the second half.
Edwin van der Sar, who was injured at Chelsea, will return in goal against Bolton while Rodrigo Possebon is making a good recovery from the abysmal tackle from Emanuel Pogatetz that felled him in United's 3-1 Carling Cup win on Tuesday night. The Brazilian midfielder suffered only a gashed leg.
"We are delighted he is not more serious," Ferguson said. "At the time, I feared the worst for the kid. You saw the reaction from Nani - he turned away in horror. You saw the same reaction from the Arsenal players when Eduardo was injured and it was the same 10 years ago when David Busst broke his leg at Old Trafford when he was here with Coventry.
"You feared a repetition, you really did. There's not even ligament damage just a gash. It went into the bone we had to keep him in hospital because of the risk of infection and the doctors couldn't close the wound. But compared to what he could have suffered, I am delighted for the boy."
geovani
Sorry, but this thread should have been posted in the Man United forum... It would be more appropriate...