Owen Hargreaves may have been frustrated by injuries in his
first few months at Old Trafford, but the Reds midfielder says it
took him no time at all to settle.
The 26-year-old appears to have finally overcome the tendonitis
injury that plagued the start to his United career, and he has now
started the last five league games for the Reds.
And while things are just starting to go right on the field, he
reveals hes not had any problems off it.
I feel like Ive been at the club for years, he told MUTV. Ive
known a lot of the players for a long time through the England
set-up and, of course, the national team has trained at Carrington
on numerous occasions and also played at Old Trafford. So its
always been familiar to me.
Being a United player is everything I expected and more. Ive been
really impressed with the club as an organisation, the people, the
way everyone has taken to me. Ive been hugely impressed with the
quality of the players, the staff, the fans and also the style of
football this team plays.
The only disappointment has been that Id like to have played more
games. Hopefully that will change now.
Despite the injury, Hargreaves was always comforted by the
knowledge that Sir Alex Ferguson would deal with the problem in the
right way.
He has so far proved to be the perfect manager, added Owen. With
the injury he's known when to rest me and when to give me games.
But its not just the manager, all the coaches that work with the
first team are excellent. They play an important role, but Sir Alex
is the figurehead of it all.
The aim now is for a run of games in the side, but that in itself
brings its own challenges.
The competition in midfield is great, he adds. We miss Scholesy
at the moment, hes such a great player, but Anderson has come in
and hes really starting to show what hes capable of.
"Weve got plenty of options with Michael Carrick and Darren
Fletcher pushing for places. It makes it difficult for the manager,
which is a good thing.