Crerand in radio outburst

  • Last Updated: December 10 2012, 13:54 GMT

Former Manchester United midfielder Paddy Crerand produced an astonishing outburst on national radio as he reacted angrily to the suggestion that Rio Ferdinand could in any way have provoked Manchester City fans with his celebration of United's winner in Sunday's derby.

Rio Ferdinand grabs his head after being struck
Rio Ferdinand grabs his head after being struck


It was put to Crerand during an interview on BBC Radio Five Live that listeners had called and texted the show to suggest that players should tone down their celebrations in front of opposition fans, but Crerand was disgusted by the insinuation that Ferdinand had any responsibility for the incident and repeatedly challenged the station to say how many people had blamed him.

"Who said that? That is ridiculous," Crerand said. "What planet do they live on? That is absolute garbage. How many people have phoned you up? One, two, three? How many? Why make a statement like that if you haven't got (the number of listeners) to hand...if you haven't got the evidence?"









Crerand later insisted he stood by what he had said in his radio interview.

He said the issue was with a coin being thrown, not the players' reaction, and therefore he was not prepared to add fuel to what he considered was the wrong debate.

"It is a local derby and you are expected to get carried away, particularly after you've come back having been 2-0 up and let it get to 2-2," he said.

"But they (Five Live) were looking for something sensationalist, they weren't looking for anything sensible.

"They were interested in making it worse than it was. They said they had received lots of calls from fans but they couldn't say how many. One of them (Burden) was not even at the game, they didn't even see it."

Crerand condemned the throwing of objects at players.

"What do people think about when they do that?" he added. "It was stupidity and it shouldn't happen but it is very difficult to find out who threw the coin."

A spokesman for Five Live defended the line of questioning to Crerand.

"We put to Paddy the fact that various listeners had contacted the station to make the point that footballers have a duty to behave responsibly at matches, and there was a lively exchange between Paddy and the Breakfast presenters Chris Warburton and Rachel Burden," he said.

"You can hear the interview on the Five Live website."
