Ferguson: Clubs must stamp out diving

Stoke boss Tony Pulis called for retrospective action against divers following the game earlier this season in which Liverpool's Luis Suarez recently admitted he deliberately cheated in an attempt to win his side a penalty.

Reds boss Brendan Rodgers has already voiced his displeasure about Suarez's conduct and vowed Liverpool will take action against the Uruguay forward, who only last week was said to be mired in controversy by Ferguson.

The United manager has revealed the issue of diving was brought up at the two-day League Managers Association conference at St George's Park earlier in the week.

And in confirming he was forced to lecture Cristiano Ronaldo about the matter during his early days at Old Trafford, Ferguson feels it is down to the clubs rather than the Football Association to impose their own discipline.

"Do the sanctions come from the club or the FA?" said Ferguson.

"The FA have a problem because is it legal? How can they prove a lad has purposely dived?

"It is very difficult. The FA have always said that. Does it go to the clubs? At the end of the day it probably does."

Yet Suarez's admission does offer the potential for the FA to take retrospective action, which is what they did with Roy Keane in 2002, when they banned him for five games following a claim in the Irishman's autobiography he had deliberately set out to injure Alf-Inge Haaland during a match with Manchester City in 2001.

"The FA could react," said Ferguson.

"I haven't a view on it myself because I don't know much about the interview, apart from what I have read in the sense he admitted the dive."

The FA have indicated they will not be revisiting the Suarez incident.

However, the whole diving issue is not something that sits comfortably with Ferguson, who has not been afraid to get involved himself.

"We did it with Cristiano," said Ferguson.

"He was only a young boy when he came to us and it took him a couple of years to understand. But after that he was fine.

"There is a connection to the foreign players coming into our game I don't think there is any doubt about that."