Man Utd hero found out who snitched about night out to ‘flapping’ Fergie 30 years later

Manchester United hero Lee Sharpe has told how Sir Alex Ferguson once stormed his house to stop a night out.

The former Red Devils winger said he and teammate Ryan Giggs were given the ‘rollocking of their lives’ when their infamously strict manager turned up unexpectedly just moments before they were about to hit the town.

He recalled the hot-headed Scot “smashing everyone around the head” and “booting them up the backside” as he ordered them out of the house in south Manchester.

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The ticking off was so severe that as soon as Fergie had gone, Sharpe called his parents to tell them he feared he was going to be sacked the following day.

In the end, he wasn’t relived of his duties and went on to play many more games for the Old Trafford club.

But Sharpe, who played for United from 1988 to 1996, could never work out how the gaffer knew about the night out and how to stop it – until 30 years later when someone finally told him who grassed them up.

Speaking on the Quickly Kevin, Will He Score? The 90s Football Show podcast, Sharpe said it was a Thursday night and the team didn’t have a match until Sunday.

The rule was that they weren’t allowed to be on licensed premises 48 hours before kick-off, so they were, in his words “sort of just about in the timeline”.

He said Giggs was at the house along with a few friends, including girls, and some of the United youth players.

The plan was to “go out for a couple of quiet pints”

Sharpe said: “We’re all getting ready to go out and there’s a knock at the door, and I think it’s the taxi driver, and one of the lads comes upstairs – I’m putting the finishing touches to my hair – and I’m like, ‘Yeah, yeah, is that the taxi?’ And he goes, ‘No, you’ll never guess who’s at the door – the manager.’

“I went, ‘No, no, no,’ I said, ‘It’ll be a taxi driver that looks like the manager. Just get in the cab and I’ll follow you down there.’

“He was like, ‘No, no, it’s the manager,’ so I’ve peered down the stairs and there’s the manager with his red face, coughing and spitting, with his hands flapping.

“’Sharpe, get your arse in this living room with Giggs. Get every one of these f***ers out of this house, I want a word with you two now.’

“He’s then stood at the door, smashing everyone round the head, booting them up the backside, telling them to f*** off. Sits me and Giggsy down, gives us the rollocking of our lives.

“He said, ‘Right, I’ll see you both in my office at 9 o’clock tomorrow morning. I’m not finished with you two.’

“So he drives off, Giggsy drives home, I rang my mum and dad. I said, ‘I think I’m getting the sack in the morning. We’re in massive trouble.’

“And we went in in the morning and he just said the same. He b*llocked us both again, said we were letting our team down, letting our families down, letting this down, letting that down. ‘Now get out me office, I’ve got a team to pick for Sunday. Keep out of trouble.’”

Sharpe said he thought Giggs was in the team on the Sunday and that he was on the bench.

He added: I’ve always thought, how did he ever find out?

“And then it was about 12 months ago, someone said to me it was Giggsy’s mum that rang him and said, ‘Our Ryan’s just gone round to Lee’s with a load of mates, I’m not sure if you want to go and get him.’”

Sharpe, who played almost 200 games for United, before turning out for clubs including Leeds, Sampdoria, Bradford and Portsmouth, had a reputation for being something of a playboy.

But he told the podcast: “We weren’t particularly bad. We weren’t doing anything that any other player wasn’t doing. It’s just that we were single.

“The other players would go out with their wives for a bite to eat, we would go to louder, lairier places. We’d go to a club.”

Sharped helped United to three Premier League titles, two FA Cup wins, a League Cup and European Cup Winners’ Cup. He also won eight England caps.

Now 51, he lives in Javea, Spain, where he runs his own bar.