Ferguson's father was a worker at the High Bay Shipyard in Glasgow, and under the influence of a blue-collar family and the local employment environment, Ferguson became an apprentice mold worker in a precision instrument factory at the age of 16, and Ferguson never gave up football outside of work.
In the 1958–60 season, Ferguson scored 15 goals in 31 amateur league appearances for Scotland's Queen's Park club (not the England club), showing a certain amount of football talent.
Ferguson was only 19 years old when he moved to St. Johnstone in 1960. St. Johnstone returned to the Scottish First Division (scotland's top flight at the time) in 1960 under the leadership of coach Bobby Brown and they needed some fresh blood.
Soon, however, Ferguson felt like he had been fooled by scout Willie Neil. Because Ferguson found that as an amateur player, he would exhaust all his energy to play on this team.
Training back and forth for 6 hours, Ferguson was miserable
In his first autobiography published in 2001, Ferguson elaborated on how much trouble he had to play.
"I was asked to take the train from Glasgow to Perth two nights a week. I left the factory at four o'clock in the afternoon, took a bus to the suburban train station, took the train to Glasgow Central Station, then took a taxi to another main line station, Buchanan Station, where I left at five o'clock in the afternoon, took two hours to reach Perth, and when I arrived in Perth, I had to take a taxi to Multon Park, and start training at 7:30 pm. ”
The return trip after training, however, was more complicated, with it almost 1 a.m. every time I got home, and at six o'clock the next morning, Ferguson had to get up and go to work. Ferguson wrote in his autobiography that I was very exhausted to write down all the process of going back and forth.
What makes Ferguson even more unbalanced is that the shrewd manager Bobby Brown will find various reasons to refuse to reimburse Ferguson for transportation costs, after all, Ferguson is only an amateur player who plays in the reserve team.
Prepare to give up football and immigrate to Canada
Even more upset than the drain on money and energy was that scout Willie Neal dug himself into St. Johnstone's and said he had a bright future, but in his first season, Ferguson only played for the first team for about 10 minutes.
In the years that followed, Ferguson kept going, and he even began to question whether he was suitable for playing football.
In early December 1963, Ferguson had just returned from an injury with a fractured brow bone. In games against the Celtics and Manook reserves, Ferguson's side lost 1-10 and 2-11, respectively.
Ferguson began to become more and more confused, he felt that he could not devote himself to football, and the work of mold making himself did not like, he did not know what to do.
It just so happened that at this time, he saw the information of labor immigration to Canada, because there was a great demand for tool-making workers in Canada at that time, and Ferguson saw that the salary was far more than he earned in Scotland, so he had already filled out the application form.
He has already begun to abandon football in action. Confused, Ferguson was also very depressed, the night before the reserve team game, he was drunk in the bar, and when he returned home, he was reprimanded by his father, which was the night before the game, and Ferguson's father had always encouraged him to play well. You can imagine his father's anger, and at this time, Ferguson was like a loser, breaking the jar and breaking the jar, hiding in his grandmother's house.
The most important turning point in life came
On 21 December, st. Johnstone's first team will meet rangers in the league, and the day before, Ferguson, who thought he wouldn't play anyway, did something ironic.
He persuaded his brother's girlfriend, Joan Parker, to pretend to be his mother to call manager Bobby Brown, tricking him into saying he wouldn't be able to compete the next day after the flu. Afterwards, Ferguson spent the afternoon at the local pool.
After returning home in the evening, Ferguson was severely reprimanded by his mother for the first time in his life. Because the team's manager Brown recognized Ferguson's lies and sent a telegram to Ferguson's house, which read: "Call me back immediately."
Ferguson went to the nearest phone booth and dialed Brown's house.
As a result, he was served by the manager's "hair dryer", and unexpectedly, Ferguson in the player era was also blown. "How dare you have someone call me on Friday and say you're sick?" I know it wasn't your mother who called. I have 5 first-team players who have really been put down by the flu and will report to the Buchanan Hotel by 12 noon tomorrow or you will be in big trouble. ”
Do you know what happened afterwards? This match, even indirectly influenced the football history of England and Manchester United.
See what Ferguson had to say in his first autobiography, "My performance at Ebrox that afternoon can only be described as a miracle. I completed my hat-trick. I was the first person to do it at home with the Rangers and the first ever victory there for St. Johnstone.
A native Glasgow boy, born and raised 200 yards from this pitch, scored 3 goals against a team he'd supported all his life — crazy enough just to look at the description. I truly believe that there is a force that gave me a chance, and it is also a signal for me to seize this opportunity and never forget my responsibility as a footballer.
My mind went back to that day again and again, and I tried to understand it rationally, but from that time on I could not rule out the existence of some mysterious force outside of ourselves. ”
In this way, Canada has one less Scottish mold worker and one more "giant" in the football world.
Ferguson wrote this autobiography around 2000, after he led Manchester United to win the Treble in 1999, particularly at camp Nou in the Champions League final, when his team scored two goals in stoppage time to complete the super reversal in full passivity.
In the decade since, Ferguson has continued to win a series of titles at Manchester United, and has also cultivated a historic superstar like Cristiano Ronaldo, passing on the "miracle power" of his player era.
This major turning point in sir Ferguson's playing era, his son Jason Ferguson last year's documentary "Sir Ferguson: Never Give In", also described, for the impact of this game on his own life, Ferguson said in the film: "I often tell others now, don't miss a good opportunity, maybe there will be no more missed, that is my good opportunity, the most important opportunity for me." Since then, I vowed never to look back, I was determined, yes, unwavering, and I will live for football for the rest of my life. ”
In addition, Ferguson's 2016 book, Leadership, also briefly mentions this story. However, it is not mentioned in a second autobiography published in 2013 after Ferguson's retirement.
What is the relationship between Ferguson and his mentor Bobby Brown?
To my surprise, Bobby Brown can be said to have influenced the fate of Ferguson's entire life, why does Ferguson say nothing about the name of the manager in his personal autobiographical documentary?
In Leadership, Ferguson also takes Bobby Brown's decision-making execution as a negative example, "Bobby Brown of St. Johnstone will write the starting list on the board, and if anyone disagrees with this lineup, you will see a new list in half an hour, and what people like Brown may lack is the confidence to stick to the decision." ”
Nor do Ferguson's three books describe and express gratitude to Brown. After Brown's death in 2020, Ferguson also did not issue any eulogies.
There must have been some contradictions between the two of them, so I studied it and bought a biography of Ben Bobby Brown.
First, in 1961, when Ferguson's father's intestinal illness worsened and he could no longer do heavy work at the shipyard, their family income was drastically reduced, and Ferguson accepted a professional contract from Brown, but only gave Ferguson a low signing fee of £300 after tax, and Ferguson also said in his autobiography that he was a fool.
Brown later said in an interview: "Ferguson still complains that he only received a signing fee of £300. In Brown's biography, he has a similar expression: "Ferguson will never forgive me because he later thought he deserved more." ”
It is worth mentioning that the two books do not say the same time about the signing fee, Ferguson's first book is said to be the second year after Ferguson joined the team, and Brown's biography is written when Ferguson transferred from Queens Park. I believe brown's biography more, because Ferguson only became a professional player after moving to Dunfermlin.
Then in 1964, when Ferguson scored a hat-trick against the Rangers, he became the main player of the team and continued to be in good shape, and many Scottish teams wanted to recruit Ferguson, of which Dunfermlyn was interested in Ferguson.
However, Bobby Brown set a transfer fee of £3,000 for Ferguson, which made Ferguson so angry that he appealed to the Scottish Football Association, because the value was inflated, it was not conducive to his own transfer, even if other clubs were willing to pay this transfer fee, his treatment in the new owner would be greatly reduced.
These two things really made Ferguson have a grudge against Bobby. But in fact, the relationship between Ferguson and Brown did not reach the point of intolerable water and fire.
In October 1963, Ferguson suffered contusions in his cheekbones and upper brow bones during the game, fractured his nose bone, and after being taken to the hospital for surgery, he was alone in the hospital for two days, and no one from the club came to see him, he felt abandoned, and even thought that his teammates thought they had been discharged.
But to Ferguson's relief, on the day he was discharged, Coach Bobby Brown drove to pick him up and take Ferguson to the train station.
In 1967, Bobby Brown, who was the manager of the Scotland team, recruited Ferguson to the team for the World Tour in Scotland that summer. Israel, Hong Kong, Australia, New Zealand and Canada were all on the itinerary, and Ferguson, who had only been to Spain as far as the time, was extremely excited.
And on the Tour, Ferguson was in excellent form. In the Hong Kong match in China, they won 4-1, with Ferguson scoring twice. Ferguson scored the winning goal in Sydney's 1-0 win over Australia, and Ferguson continued to score two goals in the Melbourne match.
After coming to Canada for the first time as a player rather than a mold worker, Ferguson remained in shape and continued to score goals in Vancouver. The 25-year-old Ferguson is going through the most wonderful period of his career, leaving a nine-goal experience in seven games for the Scotland team.
Bobby Brown said in his biography: "At St Johnstone, Ferguson was a very practical player, he always played well, although he was never the top player, he did really well in the box and was a reliable shooter. He was scrappy, hard to beat and always played for the win, so that's why I recruited him to the national team and took him on tour.
Some people say I don't have a good relationship with him, but that's not true, otherwise how could we be on each other's Christmas card list, I think we got along pretty well. Alex did well on tour and he got along well with the other lads and was well received by all parties. ”
Therefore, I think that the relationship between Ferguson and Brown can only be regarded as ordinary colleagues, Ferguson's favorability for Brown due to several personal losses (especially Brown has said that Ferguson is particularly sensitive to finances and always wants to know the prize money of major games in advance), and Brown has also said in his biography that he admired Ferguson's performance in his coaching career.
One thing that is noncommittal is that Bobby Brown debunked Ferguson's lies and produced a butterfly effect, which was an opportunity to bring Ferguson's football career back to life, thus indirectly affecting the entire history of English football and Manchester United in the future.
About Bobby Brown
Finally, with regard to Bobby Brown, I would like to say a few more words here. As a player, Brown was a goalkeeper. The reason why Brown originally poached Ferguson from Queens Park was because Brown was very close to this club, he came from the youth academy of this amateur club in Scotland and played here for 7 years.
During World War II, Brown joined the Royal Navy's fleet aviation, although eventually he did not go to war, but became an instructor in the rear and continued to play in the wartime league.
It is worth mentioning that Brown was also a lucky one, because of the six students from Jordan Hill College who joined the fleet aviation with him at the time, the other five were killed in the war.
At the age of 48 in 1971, Brown retired from football and settled with his wife Ruth in the Seaside Town of Helensburgh, Scotland, running a gift shop and coffee shop, and living a clean life, Brown often hiked with his old friends.
In the 2015 BBC documentary Britain's Greatest Generation (the generation born between the two world wars), Bobby Brown appears in episode four, when the 92-year-old appears charitable, healthy and loves life, recounting his military and football careers. Five years later, Bobby Brown, who was 97 months old, passed away.
PS: You can't help but believe that the power of chance and mystery can completely reverse a person's fate, and I believe that such a miraculous force will have a butterfly effect on the lives of a few people, such as Ferguson, who is the chosen son.
If the process had followed Ferguson's ideas at the time, he would have given up football and immigrated to Canada to become a mold worker, perhaps with his fighting spirit and ambition to become a strong and shrewd businessman in the Maple Leaf Country in the future. The reality of the ending is completely different, football has more Ferguson, should be thanked to his coach Bobby Brown.