Fergie's personal call to stricken Ryan Shawcross

Published 23:00 01/03/10 By MirrorFootball

Sir Alex Ferguson made a personal call of support to stricken Stoke defender Ryan Shawcross barely hours after lifting the Carling Cup at Wembley.

Ferguson rang Shawcross and urged the former Manchester United trainee not to let Aaron Ramsey's horror injury take the shine off his first England call-up.

Shawcross is still struggling with the nightmare events of Saturday night, when his late tackle left Arsenal midfielder Ramsey facing at least six months on the sidelines after breaking the tibia and fibula in his right leg.

The 22-year-old has made contact with the Wales international and plans to visit him after England's game with Egypt on Wednesday night.

And he was stunned on Sunday night to receive a call from Fergie, with the United boss breaking off his celebrations to console the centre-half who spent nearly six years at the Theatre of Dreams as a kid.

Stoke boss Tony Pulis revealed: "Sir Alex rang Ryan after the game on Sunday to give him his support and told him that he shouldn't miss out on England duty.

"These things do happen, unfortunately, and Sir Alex still thinks a lot of Ryan after having him for so long at Manchester United.

"He knows him as well as I do and knows he is not the sort of player to go out to deliberately hurt anyone.

"Sir Alex had obviously seen the incident and believed, like I do, that it was an accident.

"He told him he will get over it, even though he knows he's hurting now.

"Ryan really appreciated the call and it's given him a bit of a lift at a very difficult time."

Shawcross and Stoke have spoken to Ramsey, 19, over the last 48 hours to apologise after the incident and it is understood that the young Gunner accepted there was no malicious intent.

The Potters star endured a bittersweet weekend after his sending off at the Britannia Stadium was swiftly followed by the news that he had received his first call-up from Fabio Capello.

Shawcross is the first Stoke player to be named in the England squad since Mark Chamberlain appeared in 1984.

Pulis added: "It will take some time for Ryan to get over what happened on Saturday but it shouldn't detract from the fact that he has made remarkable progress.

"He fully deserves his call-up and we believe he is worthy of this chance to represent his country.

"Hopefully he can put himself in contention for a place in the England squad for the World Cup Finals."

Shawcross, who quit Old Trafford in 2008 for £1.5million, is still highly regarded by Ferguson who negotiated a buy-back clause when he left for Stoke.

Mirror


Brilliant guy Sir Alex needs. Shawcross was absolutely devastated and this call from Fergie would definitely help him get over it soon. How many managers would actually have done this? Just shows how classy Fergie is.

Good work by Fergie.

Poor Ramsey and Shawcross.

Good work

Vishal16 wrote:

Good work

Thank you

Your welcome

good work