The background to this story is also rather interesting, the BBC's investigation was following up on a dispute between Manchester United and their largest shareholders which led to the club's directors to answer 99 questions that probed a number of rather dodgy transfer deals. The reason for this was a nasty spat between Alex Ferguson and major shareholder Magnier over the breeding rights to a certain race horse. The following call was contained in the document detailing the 99 questions:
'The prohibition of payments for player transfers to agents or agencies whose members or directors have a close personal connection with the Company or any officer or employee of the Company.'
All the BBC did was produce a program that explored a few of these matters further. The BBC demonstrated how dodgy some of these transfer dealings were and how corrupt some of the conflicts of interest were concerning these big money moves. FIFA rules were broken and corruption was unearthed, Sir Alex's close ties with the Elite agency were also exposed. It is worth noting that both Jason Ferguson and Elite turned down the chance to have their say on the allegations in the program. Unsurprisingly Manchester United moved to distance themselves from this network of corruption and quickly severed its connections with the Elite agency.
Since then Sir Alex Ferguson has refused to speak to the BBC. Quite rightly the BBC has refused to apologise as all they have done is accurately reported the facts surrounding some rather dodgy transfer dealings. The stand off is due to be addressed at next month's Premier League meeting. This is why the story is hitting the news a bit more frequently of late. Amusingly Magnier and McManus made a fortune by selling their stake to the Glazers shortly after this whole affair in 2005.
In my opinion Sir Alex Ferguson has made himself look incredibly stupid and foolish by boycotting the BBC. If he feels the BBC made clear errors that were libellous that he should have taken them to court, the fact that he has not adds weight to the argument that the BBC have done nothing wrong. It appears that Sir Alex is a rather unpleasant bully who is used to getting his own way by behaving like an aggressive spoilt toddler, it is not working in this case, it is just making him look all the more like the spoilt toddler who stubbornly refuses to admit that they have got it completely wrong. The more one looks at this whole affair the more stupid Sir Alex appears and the more dirt he appears to be hiding under his carpet. The 99 questions have still to be answered.
