United's dark memories of player quotas

• omgukilledkenny

  31 May 08, 20:42

  

  Talk of bringing back limits on foreign players may induce shudders in those Manchester United fans who recall their team's 1994 humbling in Barcelona.

  Uefa rules meant clubs could field only three foreign players, plus two 'assimilated' players who had come through their youth set-up, and Alex Ferguson decided to leave out goalkeeper Peter Schmeichel.

  The Dane's replacement, Gary Walsh, endured a torrid night as Johan Cruyff's 'Dream Team' ran riot, scoring four unanswered goals to prompt familiar bout of soul-searching about the state of English football.

  There were other factors in United's mauling at the hands of Hristo Stoitchkov and Romario. Barcelona were still smarting following their 4-0 humiliation by Fabio Capello's AC Milan in the previous season's final and were determined to show the continent they had not been crushed by that experience and United were also without the suspended Eric Cantona.

  But if Schmeichel had been in goal, perhaps United's defence would not have been so comprehensively taken apart. Ferguson, however, turned the experience to his club's advantage. Before this season's semi-final triumph over Barcelona, he referred to it as a "great occasion" for United, as it taught them valuable lessons about ball retention in Europe.

  The year after that chastening night, the restrictions on foreign players were ditched under the Bosman ruling, leading to another round of nazel gazing about the state of the national game.

  However, the United side that beat Chelsea in last week's Champions League final perfectly fitted Sepp Blatter's 'six-plus-five' principle - Englishmen Wes Brown, Rio Ferdinand, Owen Hargreaves, Michael Carrick, Paul Scholes and Wayne Rooney started in Moscow. Chelsea fielded four England players - Ashley Cole, John Terry, Frank Lampard and Joe Cole, which would fulfil Blatter's demands in the first two years after his proposed changes.

• iceFatboy

  3 Jun 08, 01:41

  alot of "could-have" and "if, else"..

  anyway, lesson learnt, and I don't expect MU to repeat these mistakes..

  move on..