Fergie confident Mourinho will stay at Real

By FOX Sports Staff

The Portuguese coach has had a difficult time in charge of the Spanish giants with reports of internal strife coupled with his desire to return to England leading to heightened speculation that the 'Special One', as he calls himself, will leave the Santiago Bernabeu at the end of the season.

Ferguson, however, disagrees.

The Scotsman has seen Mourinho mastermind a win over arch-rivals Barcelona in the Copa del Rey earlier in the week and, on Saturday night, Los Merengues repeated that feat within the league.

Ferguson believes that Mourinho has produced the results to justify his four-year sojourn in the Spanish capital - the younger manager won the La Liga title in some style last season - and cannot do better than occupy the hotseat at one of the most successful clubs in the world of football. Moreover, he believes the club hierarchy would not be keen to fire Mourinho as they would struggle to replace a manager of Mourinho's calibre.

"You see all these things on Mourinho but he's got two years left on his contract. Everyone assumes he'll leave but I heard that last year, too. I'm not certain he'll leave," Ferguson told the Sun.

"Maybe it's possible because there's no smoke without fire and I'm sure that clubs would love to take him. He's given me no indication.

"I don't know how they can replace someone like him, anyway. I think he's done a great job there.

"A reasonable assessment of his time at Real Madrid has got to be countered with how good Barcelona have been. They've been an exceptional team.

"Would you really want to let a good coach like that go? I don't think Perez would want that.

"So what you are reading about Chelsea and all the rest. I just think it would be difficult for Jose to leave Real Madrid because he's at the top."

Ferguson led his charges to a 4-0 rout over Norwich on Saturday night in the Premier League. But he was more than happy to heap praise on Mourinho's side as he confessed to having been impressed by their 3-1 demolition of arch-rivals Barcelona in the Copa del Rey semi-final second leg.

But he believes that Madrid will not be as ruthless when they visit Old Trafford for the second leg of their Champions League last-16 tie on Tuesday night. 

"What was I thinking after watching that? That they were fantastic and every part of their game was spot-on," Ferguson continued.

"You get that sometimes, I've experienced it myself. You need 11 players to play well but, on odd occasions, you have 11 players who are absolutely superb.

"That's what you had the other night. They had 11 who were absolutely superb.

"But I don't think they'll reach that height on Tuesday. I think it was a one-off performance.

"They'll still play well and we'll have to make sure we play well. But the other night they really hit the heights, it was a top performance.

"We'll be okay because it will be a different game. That was the issue on Tuesday, their counter-attacking was terrific. We're aware of that and our preparation has to include that but I think we'll score, I really do."

The first leg ended in a 1-1 draw at the Santiago Bernabeu and United have a chance of knocking out their European rivals in the return leg with a goalless draw. But Ferguson believes that Madrid will likely give it their all as they really need to secure silverware after falling 12 points behind arch-rivals Barcelona within the Spanish league.

"For Jose and for Perez and the supporters, the European Cup is going to be really important for them this season, there's no doubt about that.

"I wouldn't know how they'd react to going out. They have that Spanish mentality and have changed their manager that many times over the years.

"They won it in 2002 and, considering their history, I suppose 11 years is a long time since they last won it."

The 71-year-old can't pick any one side as favourites to lift this season's Champions League trophy either.

"I fancied Dortmund right from the word go because they don't seem to be interested in the league and they're 17 points or something behind Bayern, who will also be one of the favourites.

"I watched Dortmund the other night against Bayern and they were disappointing. But it's a really hard tournament this year.

"You can't discount Barcelona - AC Milan's performance against them was fantastic. But there's Real Madrid, ourselves, Bayern Munich, Dortmund.

"Bloody hell, there are a lot of good teams this year!"