Fergie: We want to win the Europa League...'seriously'
Published 22:26 11/02/12 By Derick Allsop
Ferguson earned a prickly rebuke from Platini when he described United’s demotion from the Champions League to the lesser tournament as their punishment for underperforming.
But Ferguson takes his side to Amsterdam for Thursday’s 6pm first-leg meeting with Ajax insisting he will put out his best team and launch a genuine bid for the trophy.
Ferguson said: “We definitely want to win this tournament.
“The thing is to look forward to it. It’s still European football, it’s still a good standard of football.”
United’s elimination from the FA Cup leaves them free next weekend and gives Ferguson the opportunity to concentrate on their first tie with the legendary Dutch club. He said: “The great thing is that we don’t have a game on the Saturday, so I can play my strongest team – and I will play my strongest team.
“It’s a bit of a bonus for us. It’s amazing that in 55 years’ involvement in Europe, we’ve never played each other.
“The name of Ajax still has that aura about it. They are not having a great time at the moment and their directors have resigned, but I think playing against United they’ll be well motivated.
“Like ourselves, they have always produced good players and played good football.
“They have a great stadium and great pitch. Hopefully we can get through.
“If we do, we play Athletic Bilbao or Lokomotiv Moscow in the next round, so that would be a challenge, but then it takes you to the quarter-finals and once you get that far you say to yourself: ‘let’s go the whole road’.
“I’ll treat it as I treated some of the group games in the Champions League, but be a bit more careful with the number of young players I play in these games.
“It depends who we’ve got the following weekend in the Premier League.”
The Ajax power struggle – that saw the Netherlands’ greatest ever player, Johan Cruyff, oust his nemesis, Louis van Gaal – will not lure Ferguson into underestimating the scale of United’s task. Ajax have in their ranks one of Europe’s most coveted players, the Dane Christian Eriksen, rated by Cruyff as being up there with Laudrup brothers, Brian and Michael.
United are among a posse of top clubs tracking the attacking midfielder, 20 on Tuesday, and Ferguson admitted he would be monitoring his performance with interest.
Ferguson added: “There’s been a lot of attention on him.
“Everybody’s been watching him. We’ll see what he’s like.”
The United boss intends to give some of his recently injured players, such as Phil Jones, Nani and Chris Smalling a proper run-out in Amsterdam.
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