Fergie running out of patience over Rio

Manchester United boss Alex Ferguson has vowed to strengthen his squad before the start of the forthcoming Premiership season.

England defender Rio Ferdinand remains the number one target, but Fergie admits he may have to look elsewhere if Leeds are unwilling to sell their star player.

‘‘It has been disappointing that we haven’t secured anyone yet and I am getting a bit edgy,’’ Ferguson told the Manchester Evening News.

‘‘But it won’t be the case that we will go into the season with less players in the squad. We will have new players in place.

‘‘The Rio Ferdinand thing is an issue and we are waiting on things developing at the moment.

‘‘It is not our job to antagonise people and there’ll be no war of words, but Leeds have said themselves that we are the club that has talked to them about Rio so it is no secret.

‘‘If he’s available then we’d be interested. But it is not clear-cut. We will work away and we have alternatives and other thoughts.

‘‘We are short in defence because we have lost three senior squad defenders from last season. When you lose the likes of Denis Irwin and Ronny Johnsen you are losing a lot of experience there.

‘‘We haven’t drawn up a big list of potential targets. You don’t do that when you are trying to achieve what we are trying to achieve.

‘‘With the quality and type of player we want to bring to the club you only have a list of four or five players who are operating at the highest level who you feel would could come here and enhance the team.’’