The Acid Never Lies

Haven't been here in a while, and this is just a flying visit, but I've a couple of minutes to spare and I'm still a little annoyed by our Champions League exit and the reporting of it, so here I am.
Sir Alex had a go at journalists for their remorseless negativity about us, and for concentrating on his "typical Germans" remark, rather than on aspects of our performance, the journalists then get together to tell lies about how their coverage of us is great - I saw Daniel Taylor of The Guardian on Twitter saying that 95% of articles about us are favourable (this is the Daniel Taylor who tweeted incessently his criticisms of Sir Alex's remark for the following 24 hours or so absolutely confirming Sir Alex's thoughts on the press...), which is as blind as the linesman from the Chelsea game...
Today I saw a piece which is just such a lie that I had to mention it in the context of the supposedly great paper coverage we get. From The News of The World:

Manchester United's manager is noted for sounding out his senior stars, calling mini-conferences before he makes the big decisions.

Gary Neville, Ryan Giggs, Paul Scholes and Rio Ferdinand are often asked their opinion, brought into the manager's inner circle to talk team shape and tactics.

Not this time.

This one was down to manager and player, plotting his return to the team for the Champions League quarter-final tie after he came through a secret training session.

Slagging off Sir Alex - which might be stupid enough at the best of times, but to simply lie about something to do it?! See this from The Guardian:

he took a risk by starting a man whose injury – sustained in the closing seconds of the first leg in Munich – had been expected to rule him out for three weeks, Ferguson said the decision was not his alone. "He [Wayne] had burst a blood vessel in Germany," he said. "But, once the swelling had gone down on the Sunday, Steve McNally [the Manchester United doctor] said he could be ready for Wednesday.

"I said I doubted that very much, but Steve said that the swelling and the bruising had gone and the scan was perfect. The work Wayne did on Tuesday persuaded me to put him in a practise game with the other players. He was perfect – shooting and tackling all over the bloody place.

"Then you have to decide if it was worth the risk. I spoke to him on the Wednesday morning and he said he'd had no reaction. He wanted to play."

It was such a secret from the other players that... he played against them in a practise game...

And this is favourable coverage apparently...