Desperate Vieira Claims United Favoured By Refs

Patrick Vieira launched a bizarre attack on Manchester United last week, claiming we must be desperate to bring Paul Scholes out of retirement and that we wouldn’t have lost our young stars, like Ravel Morrison, in the past. In just the few months since Scholes returned, he’s already scored more goals than he did last season, and Morrison getting shipped off to a Championship club where he doesn’t get a game after we didn’t offer him a new contract is hardly “losing out” on our young players.

Regardless, when asked about Vieira’s comments, Ferguson quickly put the former Arsenal captain in his place. The manager reminded them of Roberto Mancini’s claim that Tevez would never play for City again, before he took a six month break from the club, only for him to be brought back in to the team now that City have lost out to United on first place.

“If Tevez had been playing for us, there’s no way the gaffer would have given him a game this season,” said Bryan Robson. “It doesn’t matter how good you are.”

Not content with being made to look foolish once, Vieira has today spoken to the BBC about his beliefs on referees and the title.

“When United play at home they get some advantage other teams don’t get,” he claimed. “I think when you go to United, Madrid, Barcelona, or Milan, when the referees referee these kind of games, it’s always difficult to go against these kind of teams. This is the way it is.”

After accusing United of being desperate, the Manchester City ambassador (who played a total of 32 of his 651 games in his career for City) Vieira is starting to sound fairly desperate himself now.

We should note that only West Brom have been awarded more penalties against them at home than Manchester United this season, with the most memorable the Demba Ba one in the 1-1 draw with Newcastle, where replays showed there was no contact. We should probably also point out the fact that Gareth Barry should have been sent off and City should have conceded a penalty after just 15 minutes against Stoke at the weekend. And let’s not forget the two players that should have been sent off in City’s victory over Spurs, as well as the penalty which should have been awarded against them.

Talking about the title, Vieira claimed that City, who are 2nd in the table, have been the best team this season.

“This is our moment,” he said. “Since the start of the season we’ve been the best team and played the best football. I believe the club deserves it.”

This is an interesting claim, given then United have won more games than City and City have lost more games than United.

Jealousy is a terrible thing, Patrick.