Manchester United boss Sir Alex Ferguson has amazingly claimed that Real Madrid only wanted his former defender Gabriel Heinze so to strengthen their hand for Cristiano Ronaldo. "When we sold Gabriel Heinze to Real Madrid we knew it was going to happen, because Ronaldo was very close to Heinze," Ferguson told GQ's December issue, which is released on Thursday and reproduced in The Times.

"I knew what they were doing. I don't believe they were interested in Heinze - good player though he is. The end-game was to get Ronaldo.

"What made it really obscene was that Madrid, as General Franco's club, had a history of being able to get whoever and whatever they wanted, before democracy came to Spain."