Alex Ferguson Pins Manchester United Hopes on Young Players

Ferguson is adamant that the club’s future is with players such as Federico Macheda, Tom Cleverley, Javier Hernandez, Chris Smalling and Rafael and Fabio Da Silva.

Ferguson said, "I've got probably 12 players all under 21, which is a fantastic average age, and the future should be pretty secure with them. Over the years we've bought players for quite high amounts like Dimitar Berbatov, Rio Ferdinand, Juan Sebastian Veron and Wayne Rooney. But we try to equate how we're going to get the proper value before we do it. When I see some of the values now, and you're talking about players at £40m or £30m-odd, we have to assess our own players first. We take a quite good view of it now and say let's look at our own young players. Have they got the ability? How much can we trust them? Do we see a top player in that young player? And we're not bad, you know. There are some good young players who have come through the system. They understand the club, they're loyal to the club, and we can build on that."

Some people are suggesting that the club’s 717 million pounds of debt might be the true reason but Ferguson went on to say, "The enormous amounts of money players are paid, not just for the transfer fees but for their salaries - I don't think it rests easy with supporters."

Ferguson is reaching the end of his career and will be preparing the club for his successor.

"What you have to do is maintain the success of the club and make sure that, no matter when I quit, they are always in good hands. With any big club, and there's no question we are a massive one with a great history, you have to ingrain yourself immediately into the fabric of what Manchester United are. That gives you a good chance in terms of understanding the history. And it's not a history you should be afraid of. I was never afraid of it, I was proud to be part of the history. Then after that you need a strong personality, a strong mentality and then of course you need to know the game. There are a lot of things that come into management, and for a club our size, personality, experience and a good background are important things."

Only time will tell if Ferguson is right and his young players grow into the stars he thinks they will be.