Sir Alex: McLeish had it figured

Alex McLeish Snr begged the then Aberdeen boss to end his son's blossoming profession at Pittodrie. Alex Jnr was numbercrunching, alongside centre-forward crunching, as a young centre half.

'Big 'Eck' had been studying accountancy for three years and Fergie said: "He'd been picked for Scotland by then and he didn't want to go back to his studies and his father was very unhappy about it. He wanted me to persuade Alex to go back to accountancy — fortunately I failed to do so.

"He was already with an accountancy firm in Aberdeen, so he would train with us in the morning and then do his accountancy work in the afternoons, then he would go on to night school.

"Apart from being a really clever boy, I could see a manager in Alex from an early age. He wasn't going to change his mind. He always had that dogged determination to succeed."

This afternoon's fixture is the first time the two have crossed Claymores since Manchester United defeated Rangers in a twolegged Champions League fixture four years ago.

But after eight years spent working under Ferguson in Scotland, McLeish knows what kind of reaction may be awaiting him at Old Trafford. He said: "He always went on about not losing two in a row, not dropping more points so after the West Ham defeat it's going to be very difficult for us."