Sir Alex Ferguson Denies His Assistant Boss Carlos Queiroz is Trying to Pinch the Portugal Job

Sir Alex Ferguson has launched a fierce attack on Luiz Felipe Scolari over the Brazilian's claims that Manchester United assistant manager Carlos Queiroz is touting himself for the Portugal job.

Scolari yesterday accused Queiroz of "using the media" to gain a return to the position he held from 1991-93. He also raised suspicions over Queiroz's regular attendance at Portgual Under-21 games.

"I don't understand his [Queiroz's] role in football but it seems to me that he is trying to return to the Portuguese national team, where I am already in charge," said Scolari. "It seems he is working on his candidacy for the position of national coach."

Today, however, Ferguson piped up to rubbish that suggestion. "The comment Scolari made about Carlos hanging about the Portugal games looking for a job was a crazy thing to say," he said. "I am sure Scolari goes to watch Porto and Benfica at some point. Is he after the guy's job?

"I had three of my coaches and all my scouts out at games in Europe this week. I am sure they are all still working for me."

Ferguson also rejected Scolari's claim that while Quieroz publicly suggested Cristiano Ronaldo wasn't fit enough to play in Portugal 3-0 win over Kazakhstan on Wednesday he privately said the winger was fine.

"Carlos is a fantastic professional and he never spoke to Scolari at all," said Ferguson. "It confuses me that Scolari implied Carlos spoke to him and marked his card that Ronaldo was all right but we were giving a different story to the press to keep Manchester United's fans happy."

Ferguson also revealed he had no problem with Ronaldo playing for his country this week, even though it had been suggested in the aftermath of last week's win over Blackburn he wanted the 21-year-old pulled out of the squad.

"By the time I got back into the dressing room last week, Cristiano had gone to catch a plane," said Ferguson. "I didn't know what condition he was in.

"Normally, when you get taken off with a knock like the one he had, you will give the boy a scan the following day to see if there is a problem. There was a bit of swelling but there was no way we could assess it.

"What we said was it would be up to the Portugal medical staff to do that. It was an important qualifying game for them and if Cristiano was fit, we were happy for him to play."