FERGIE I feared I’d never speak again
Football legend on his brain surgery nightmare
Sir Alex Ferguson has revealed he feared never being able to speak again after waking up from a brain haemorrhage.
The Manchester United legend – famous for subjecting underperforming players to the hairdryer treatment – was given a 20 per cent chance of survival.
He said: “I was crying. I just could not get a word out and it was terrifying.”
Sir Alex Ferguson has revealed how he could not talk for 10 days after his brain haemorrhage and feared he would never speak again.
The former Manchester United boss, the subject of a new film which airs the harrowing 999 call son Jason made after the collapse, said his life changed forever.
After waking up from his life- saving operation, he said: “I just could not get a word out and it was terrifying, absolutely terrifying. Everything was going through my mind – ‘Is my memory going to come back? Was I ever going to speak again?
“This speech therapist came and started working on me and told me, ‘ Write down all the members of your family, all the members of your football team, all the teams you have played against,’ and asked me questions about animals, fish, birds.
“I was crying. I felt helpless. I would have hated to have lost my memory. That would have been a terrible burden on my family.
“After 10 days, my voice came back and I realised then, having gone through all that, my memory was fine.”
But Alex, 79, one of football’s toughest characters , said the apt ly t i t led documentary f i lm Never Gi v e In, directed by Jason, had reduced him to tears.
The movie reveals his neurosurgeon Joshi George had given Alex only a 20 per cent chance of survival. His brain scan showed just how close to death he was.
The film also relives the toll the incident had on his family, who thought they were going to lose him.
Alex said: “When I saw the final cut, I was nearly crying at various points and felt really emotional. If you’re going to do something, you want to do it correctly and don’t want to have a mask over it – hiding things.”
The haemorrhage also made him look again at his life.
He said: “Regarding my health, I was not in control. In the football world, at United, I was in control of the situation. It’s vital because a player cannot do it himself. A player is only part of a team. The manager is in control of all that.
“I was never a failure. I never looked back because there was always tomorrow, whether you lose or win but now… I’ve done a lot of reflecting.”
Jason, 48, said it had been very difficult to include the 999 call – on May 5, 2018 – in the film but also very powerful.
His dad remembers nothing of that day but making that call is etched on Jason’s brain forever.
He said: “On the night I started work on my first draft of the treatment (for the film), I finished at about 1.30am and went to bed.
“Five hours later the phone rang and it was my mum. She said, ‘ Your dad’s had a fall’ and that was the brain haemorrhage.”
In the f ilm you hear the ambulance operator asking him details of his dad’s fall, his age and his name. There’s a long pause before Jason answers… Alexander Ferguson. Jason said: “Ultimately, it’s one of the key moments of his life, so therefore it becomes a key moment of the film.
“It almost felt like the call had to be there. It took a while to get hold of it – there was a lot of paperwork and so on. It was really strange and a bit uncomfortable hearing it for the first time but at the same time you could detach yourself enough to realise there was a certain power to it.”
The film, which had its world premiere last night at the Glasgow Film Festival, tells the story of Alex’s life through his strongest memories.
While it maps his hugely successful career, it also gives an extraordinary insight into his life off the pitch and his years growing up in Glasgow. Researchers gathered more than 500 hours of archive footage that Jason would comb through every weekend with his dad. And Alex revealed that one of his proudest moments in life has nothing to do with football and everything to do with where he grew up.
It dates back to the five years when he was training to be a toolmaker at the Remington Rand typewriter factory in
Hil lington, Glasgow, and a strike he supported for young apprentices. Jason and his team tracked down old news footage that by chance captured young shop steward Alex taking part in a protest march.
Jason said: “We’d have regular meetings with the archive team and in one of these meetings I was like, ‘ Look, there was an apprentice strike in Glasgow in April 1960. Can you find anything on it?’ Three or four weeks later I got a text and when I opened it, it was a photo – a still of a shot and the message said, ‘I think I’ve found him.’ I looked at it and thought, ‘ That’s not him’ because he’s got a fringe. I sent it to my dad and 10 seconds later the phone rings and he said, ‘It’s me.’”
Alex, who met his wife of 55 years, Cathy, while they were both working at the factory, said: “I’d never seen thee shot beforebefore. I was so proudproud. There’s moments in youryou life when you say, ‘I did something really worthwhile.’
“In those days a lot of the apprentices were married very young and had families. I brought them out on strike because they needed to get better conditions.
“The strike became a national strike and we were out for months. But the important thing was we got better conditions for those apprentices. I didn’t need the money as I was getting paid as a part-time footballer.”
From the footballing side of Alex’s life, the film features interviews with players and managers including Eric Cantona, Ryan Giggs, Gordon Strachan and Archie Knox.
It touches on his achievements, having won 38 trophies at Manchester United including 13 Premier League titles, five FA Cups and two Uefa Champions League titles.
But Jason hopes the film will show a much more personal side to the Govan-born boss.
He said: “The intention for the film was always to have that personal, intimate feel to it – focusing on who he is rather than the public perception of what he is.
“He’s not defined by all the success he’s had. I strongly believe he’s defined by how he has dealt with adversity in his life, both personally and professionally, so that was one of the key foundations for the whole film. The brain haemorrhage occurring obviously became an extension of that. “What it then gave us was two timelines. We had the chronology of his life and the story of his health. There were elements we worked out in the edit quite quickly where they were going to be placed – opening with the brain haemorrhage and the 999 call. “When we knew he was going back to Old Trafford for the first time (after the haemorrhage), I thought the moment when he walked out would probably be the last shot of the film, which it was. “I knew Barcelona would be the culmination of the football element of the film. That was the moment he climbed the mountain. “To me, those three moments represent his key philosophies in terms of rebuilding teams, faith in young people and never giving in.”
Sir Alex Ferguson: Never Give In will be in cinemas from May 27 and on Amazon Prime from May 29. For all movies available online at the Glasgow Film Festival, visit www.glasgowfilm.org