Ferguson salutes ‘fantastic’ Scholes

FIFTY years after Munich, forty years after George Best inspired Manchester United to its first European Cup, Alex Ferguson witnessed one of the club’s greatest-ever players secure the club’s third European Cup final as Paul Scholes scored the only goal of the tie to eliminate Barcelona at Old Trafford and confirm United’s place in Moscow on May 21.

Scholes, famously suspended for the 1999 triumph against Bayern Munich in the Nou Camp, won this tense encounter with a spectacular long-range goal just fourteen minutes into the game.

The 33-year-old, free from the peril of suspension, will now, barring injury, line-up against the winners of tonight’s Chelsea-Liverpool tie in the Luzhniki Stadium next month and the United manager admitted that Scholes’s goal was the perfect way for the club to progress to the final.