Darren Fletcher has been appointed interim head coach at Man Utd and he revealed he spoke to Sir Alex Ferguson before accepting the role.
Darren Fletcher sought the approval of Sir Alex Ferguson before taking on the role of Manchester United’s interim head coach
Darren Fletcher revealed the first phone call he made after being offered the role of Manchester United’s interim head coach was to Sir Alex Ferguson, as he sought the blessing of his former boss before taking on the Old Trafford role. Fletcher was offered the position on Monday morning after United sacked Ruben Amorim and his coaching staff. However, he spoke to Ferguson about the job first, seeking the 84-year-old’s guidance on whether he should accept it.
Fletcher spent 20 years as an academy graduate and player at Old Trafford, with 18 of those years under the guidance of Ferguson, who remains a regular at United games and at Carrington. He was at the draw with Leeds on Sunday, which proved to be Amorim’s final game in charge, and when Fletcher called, he echoed the sentiments his former midfielder had felt about the task at hand and his responsibilities if he were to take it on on a short-term basis.
“I don’t like to make any major decisions or things without speaking to Sir Alex and that’s something I’ve done since I’ve been at the club and since I’ve left the club and everything I do,” Fletcher said. “I’ve got a really good relationship with Sir Alex so he’s probably the first person on the phone actually so I wanted to speak to him first. And ultimately, to get his blessing, to be perfectly honest with you, I think he deserves that respect.
“I wanted to run it by him, what he thought and he was supportive of it and he echoed my thoughts which I’ve always said. It’s your job to do the best for Manchester United when you’re an employee of the club. It’s amazing when he says something that I try and live and believe every day, so it was comforting for me for him to say that.”
Fletcher also reached out to Amorim after the Portuguese head coach’s dismissal. He felt he had a good working relationship with the 40-year-old and said he would always be grateful to him for handing a professional debut to his 18-year-old son Jack, while he also named Tyler in his final three matchday squads.
“I’ve reached out to him, I’ve not managed to make contact yet but that’s understandable,” he said. “He’s obviously got a lot on his mind and I’ve been really busy so I’ve not had the chance to.
“I’d love to because I had a good relationship with Ruben. He was great with me. He was very welcoming to me and to his staff at the end of last season, in terms of being the under-18s coach, in terms of small communication I’ve had this year, because I’ve been on another side of the building.
“Always good interactions and ultimately he’s the manager who gave my son his debut as well. So as a father I’ve got a lot to thank him for. Although the boys have gone and earned that themselves, he was the manager who did that. So I’ve got a good relationship with Ruben, so I’m disappointed for him.”
Fletcher has held talks with the players since replacing Amorim, with a particular focus on those who he hasn’t worked with before, having been around the first-team before starting his coaching journey with the Under-18s this season.
The Scot held talks with captain Bruno Fernandes to gauge the mood in the squad and then held one-on-ones with summer signing Matheus Cunha and Benjamin Sesko in a bid to get to know them better and find out how they’ve settled in.
“I have had conversations with players, and it’s been time-consuming, so I actually plan to have more conversations,” he said. “Maybe my first experience in the first days of Manchester United, you don’t have as much time as you think, so in my head I had these plans of speaking to loads of players and it didn’t pan out that way.
“I had a conversation with Bruno because that’s important because he’s the captain and I wanted to speak to him. I focused on a couple of players who I don’t know so well, so Matheus Cunha and Benjamin Sesko.
“Senne [Lammens], I actually had a conversation with him not too long ago, but those two I focused on because I’ve not really got a relationship with them and I wanted to get to know them and I wanted them to get to know me.”