Mark Hughes steers clear of war of words with Ferguson
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Mark Hughes has insisted that he will not be provoked into a public war of words with Sir Alex Ferguson, despite the Manchester United manager's increasingly hostile comments about the way Manchester City have set about trying to infiltrate the Premier League's top four.
Ferguson has questioned whether Hughes has overspent on his transfer targets, describing their summer business as "crazy", as well as alleging that players had moved to City only because of the vast salaries on offer and that Emmanuel Adebayor had secretly tried to engineer a move to Old Trafford on the eve of joining the Abu Dhabi United Group's revolution. More provocatively, Ferguson has talked of City being guilty of "arrogance" and being a "small club with a small mentality".
Hughes is bemused by the aggressive nature of those remarks but, despite being one of the few ex-United players who is daring enough to criticise his former manager, he made it clear tonight that he wanted to avoid their relationship descending into the kind of open warfare that, at times, has symbolised Ferguson's rivalry with the likes of Arsène Wenger and, increasingly, Rafael Benítez.
"That's how we conduct ourselves at this club," Hughes said, when he was asked whether he would try to rise above it. "Sometimes we have to respond because people make these comments, but we don't try to cultivate these situations."
Hughes explained he had "great respect" for Ferguson but it was also clear he was irritated by the accusation that he had overspent by paying a total £94m on Adebayor, Kolo Touré, Gareth Barry, Carlos Tevez and Roque Santa Cruz.
"I've said before that our valuation could well be different from other clubs. It's obviously different to Sir Alex's valuation but, to us, these players are invaluable. We feel we have done good deals on every player we have bought."
Ferguson has been particularly aggrieved by City putting up a billboard in Manchester city centre showing Tevez, the former United striker, and the words Welcome to Manchester. The poster, Hughes admitted, was designed to poke fun but he was surprised that Ferguson reacted with such hostility. "I think he has got a little upset about our poster campaign – although to call it a campaign would be wrong because there is only one. It was just a bit of fun between the two sets of supportersand I think they have taken it in that manner."
Hughes does not intend to take the criticism personally, pointing out it was worse last season when he faced constantspeculation about his job but he has warned his players they will need to prepare themselves for more of the same. "All the expectation will be on us," he said, "but we have come to deal with that. We have to live up to those expectations."
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Smart, know cannot win tt y steer clear.
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He hasn't made Man City into a top 4 club yet.
When Man City is up there with the big boys, then he can start to thrash talk.
Otherwise, if Man City doesn't do as well in the coming season, all the other managers will laugh at him.
You don't want to count your chickens before they hatch.
