What angry Ferguson told Man United squad after 2009 Champions League final loss

Manchester United’s current struggle to keep in touch with the Premier League’s top four under Jose Mourinho only highlights what an incredible job Sir Alex Ferguson did over the years.

Thirteen league titles and two Champions Leagues only go to highlight just how good a manager the Scot was, but he’ll be disappointed that he didn’t win Europe’s highest club honour on a couple more occasions.

United lost two Champions League finals to Barcelona at the turn of the last decade, in 2009 and then again at Wembley in 2011.

And as revealed by Michael Carrick in his new autobiography, it was that first failure that seemed to hit Ferguson the hardest.

United would have become the first team to successfully defend the Champions League in its current guise had they won, but they went down 2-0 to Barca in Rome courtesy of goals from Samuel Eto’o and Lionel Messi.

And Carrick – whose book is being serialised in The Times – says the manager was livid after the game.

"The Boss was understandably angry and had a go at everyone," he wrote.

“’You need to have a look at yourselves and see if you can play at this level,’ he said. Moscow [in 2008] was irrelevant.

"We were Manchester United and the expectation was relentless.

"’You’ve let a good chance slip away here,’ he said.

"The boss summed up exactly how I was feeling.

"After he finished, I just questioned myself again and again. Am I good enough?’

Carrick has called that defeat the biggest low of his career, and says he suffered with depression after the loss .

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