Fletcher's now the mean man! And proving Roy Keane wrong
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Darren Fletcher's now the mean man! Midfielder is proving Roy Keane wrong
Of all the questions he has been asked already this season, there is one that Sir Alex Ferguson will not answer. Why did you lose the Champions League final last May? However, it is not difficult to work it out for ourselves with the benefit of hindsight.
Poor defending. The anonymity of Cristiano Ronaldo and the Brazilian Anderson. And the absence of Darren Fletcher. ‘If they ever needed Fletcher it was in the Champions League final against Barcelona,’ former Scotland and Liverpool midfielder Graeme Souness told Sportsmail this week.
‘On the night, Anderson wasn’t up to the task of stopping their footballers from playing. Fletcher would have done that and given his defenders protection and provided the platform for the front players. He would have made the difference.’
Who would have thought it? Darren Fletcher the difference between winning and losing the greatest club prize on earth. The same Darren Fletcher who was ridiculed by supporters — they used to call him ‘Fergie’s son’ — and dismissed by his former captain and teammate Roy Keane.
‘I can’t understand why people in Scotland rave about Darren Fletcher,’ Keane is thought to have said in the infamous MUTV rant that was never aired back in 2005.
Perhaps he can now. Fletcher, after all, is Scotland’s captain and a midfielder referred to as a big-game player by his manager. Less than two weeks ago one tabloid newspaper even described him as the ‘new Roy Keane’ in the wake of Manchester United’s unlikely Barclays Premier League victory over Arsenal.
It has, it must be said, been a remarkable transformation and pictures of him in midweek squaring up to Arsenal’s Robin van Persie as Scotland lost at home to Holland perhaps indicate how a callow boy has become a man.
‘For a while I have wanted Darren to take hold of games and now he does that for me,’ said Ferguson.
‘I thought he was fantastic against Arsenal. I said right after the game that, for me, he was the star man. Wayne Rooney, who got the man-of-the-match award, said it should have gone to Fletcher and we all agreed.’
It is six-and-a-half years since Fletcher made his debut for United in a 1-1 Champions League draw against Basel. He is now 218 appearances into his professional career and it has not always been a straightforward path.
Fletcher has always had the ability to pass well; to see and understand angles. But he was too often unable to find the pace of games and apply himself physically, which only serves to make his recent reincarnation as a hard man all the more fascinating.
Arsenal coach Arsene Wenger accused the 25-year-old of dirty play at Old Trafford a fortnight ago, something that Fletcher would deny but perhaps not worry about too much. Such things certainly never bothered Keane, a player who actually did much to shepherd his younger colleague through difficult early times at Old Trafford.
‘I know Arsene Wenger was critical of United’s aggressive tactics the other week but British football isn’t just about playing pretty passing styles,’ added Souness, a man whose autobiography was aptly entitled No Half Measures.
‘You have to win the battles on the pitch first. It’s what we all love to see in the British game and please may it continue. The art of tackling, being strong and then using the ball wisely.
‘Fletcher can do all this. I’m not saying he’s just a destructive force, he has other assets, too. When I first saw him I thought he would be just an up-and-down player, but he has matured and is full of confidence.
'He’s been well-schooled, tackle hardened and the experience he has gained is shining through now. I’m a big fan. He is the modern midfielder. Tall, great athleticism and traditional qualities. Last year he was United’s most effective performer.
'For instance, United like to combat Arsenal with aggression and in the Champions League semi-final he was the instigator. He was the man that set the tempo and raised his team’s performance.
‘I believe he will be, arguably, United’s most important player for the next seven years.’ Souness’s words constitute high praise and it is something Fletcher — a patriot — will appreciate. Fletcher has long since been one of United’s more approachable players. Rather than revel in the media blanket that United throw over their squad, he actually approached a club PR person and asked why it was.
Married now with twin boys, Fletcher grew up on a council estate outside Edinburgh. Coming from a family of agricultural workers, he is tee-total and, in some ways, an unlikely Scotland captain.
Scotland assistant manager Terry Butcher said: ‘You would be proud to have Darren as your son. He’s a lovely, honest boy. He is in love with football and, to me, a bit of a throwback.
'He is quite simply a very good footballer.’ United manager Ferguson has not enjoyed the best of luck with central midfielders in recent years. Names such as Miller, Djemba-Djemba and Kleberson still make him cringe.
Saturday afternoon at White Hart Lane, though, Fletcher will stand toe to toe with Tottenham’s own enforcer Wilson Palacios.
He is, in his own way, a modern United success story.