It was me who came up with hairdryer legend
MARK HUGHES
MARK HUGHES has held his hands up and admitted he invented the legend of Fergie’s hairdryer.
‘Sparky’ was brought back to Old Trafford from his unfulfilling exile at Barcelona by Sir Alex Ferguson in 1988, and Hughes was a key influence in landing Manchester United’s first trophies under the growling Scotsman’s rule. Hughes, who won two Premier League titles, three FA Cups, the League Cup and the European CupWinners’ Cup with United, revealed: “I know it has been said I came up with the term ‘the hairdryer’ over the blasts he would give the players.
“It first came up in something the former United correspondent for the Manchester Evening News, David Meek, wrote in an interview with me.
“I must have mentioned it. “Whether it was later embellished, I don’t know. I had said at first it was like standing next to a blowtorch. That then became a hairdryer.
“He would stand so close to you while he was giving you a b ****** ing and I would imagine the cartoon where the character’s hair is standing on end from a blast of hot air. So, yes, maybe I’m guilty of calling it ‘the hairdryer’.
“He wasn’t averse to giving me the hairdryer.
“I used to frustrate him because, on occasions, I was a bit loose with possession of the ball. I could hold onto it a bit too long and get dispossessed.
“We were playing Leeds in an FA Cup game in 1992 and I miscontrolled a throw-in.
“He rushed to the side of the pitch and shouted at his assistant
Brian Kidd to get me off.
“At the time I had been oblivious to all this. Kiddo evidently placated him saying, ‘There’s only 10 minutes gone for goodness sake, calm down’. I actually scored the winning goal but he still wasn’t happy and I had to apologise for losing the ball.
“Sometimes it was premeditated. He would think in his head, ‘I’m going to nail you,’ hoping for a reaction. You quickly learned not to be the person to lose possession just before half-time. If you were the last one who had lost the ball before the referee blew for half-time, you were getting it.
“Nowadays, if a player gets stick from the manager they go to their agent saying, ‘I can’t play for this man’.We just used to say, ‘Sod that, we’ll show you we can play’.”