After Manchester United signed a new sponsorship deal with Chevrolet in the summer all the players were offered a free car. Sir Alex Ferguson banned the players under the age of 23 from selecting a sporty model though.

“As with most automotive partnerships, Chevrolet will be offering players a car,” a United spokesman confirmed. “The model will be dependent on their time at the club and driving experience.”

Whilst obviously football is changing and youngsters start earning silly amounts of money before they’ve really made it, Ferguson tries to do whatever he can to keep the players’ feet on the ground.

Yesterday, 19-year-old Ryan Tunnicliffe was banned from driving for 14 months after writing off his £60k Range Rover when twice over the alcohol limit. In his defence, the crash took place at 2pm the day after a drinking session, which suggests he wasn’t actively drinking and driving.

Boys will be boys and all that, so if he’s earning the money to buy such a flash car, some would say you can’t blame him. However, it would be welcomed if, after just one first team appearance as a sub, he tried to appear more humble. Gone are the days when our youngsters should be driving Ford Escorts, like David Beckham did (buying it off Ryan Giggs for £6k) though, right?

Apparently not.

Nick Powell, who joined the club for a deal that could be worth up to £6m from Crewe Alexandra in the summer, announced yesterday that his car passed its MOT. The first thing that tells us is that he drives a car that’s at least three years old. He confirmed the car he drives is a Vauxhall Corsa. Powell, who’s a year younger than Tunnicliffe, scored a cracking goal at Wembley last season to secure Crewe’s promotion to League One, and finished the season as the club’s highest scorer. You might think after securing a move to United he’d get too big for his boots and splash his cash on a fancy set of wheels.

After scoring on his début against Wigan last month, Powell insisted: “My dad will keep me in touch, I’ll tell you that. I’m just going to go home, have this great feeling and I’ll keep myself on the ground.”

I’m sure it was entirely innocent and he wasn’t trying to look like teacher’s pet by tweeting about his Corsa… but Powell’s other car is a Ranger Rover! Looks like after securing a move to United he did splash his cash on a fancy set of wheels. Try as he might, doesn’t look like there’s much Fergie can do to stop this one.