Manchester United boss Sir Alex Ferguson insists they moved first for former Crewe Alexandra prospect Nick Powell.

Powell joined from Crewe and Ferguson believes he is the latest example of the club leading the way in terms of scouting.

"We scout well," he added. "Sometimes we do the scouting for other clubs. The minute the agent knew we'd spoken to Powell, I think every club was in with offers. But we'd done the deal.

"Whenever we show interest in a player it activates the situation with other clubs. But we've done well over the years. We've bought well. One or two bad ones, no doubt about that, but you handle that.

"The big difference is when the academy started 10 years ago we had to change our scouting in terms of abroad. So that's increased.

"Looking at countries like Brazil, Mexico and through South America. France too, we're all over Europe now."