Sir Alex Ferguson tells how his wife Cathy saved his life

Sir Alex Ferguson has rarely talked about himself away from football. In his new book, *Games of my Life*, extracts of which were published by The Times, the 84-year-old Scot goes back to the day he nearly died: 5 May 2018, five years after he left the Manchester United dugout.

A night of headaches, then the fall

That morning, around 7am, Ferguson woke up with a severe headache that had kept him awake for much of the night. When he got up, he collapsed onto a shoe rack. He only really came round a day later, in a bed at Salford Royal Hospital.

His wife Cathy was downstairs. She heard the shoes hit the wooden floor above and raised the alarm. She had been due to leave for London a few hours later. United's club doctor, Steve McNally, was called straight away and immediately suspected a brain bleed, because Ferguson had been complaining of headaches for several days.

The Referee in the Sky

Ferguson writes that 75 to 85 per cent of people over 60 who suffer this kind of haemorrhage do not survive. He sums up his luck in football terms: if his wife had not been there, he says, the Referee in the Sky might have blown the final whistle on him.

Cathy Ferguson died in 2023. The book is dedicated to her with one line: "For 59 years she was my everything."

Back at Old Trafford, the first game of his life

The book goes through the matches that mattered to him, from his schooldays to the present. The first one is neither a final nor a title decider. It is 22 September 2018, when he returned to Old Trafford four months after surgery, with a medical team including neurosurgeon Alexandru Cotici. The stadium gave him a standing ovation.

A giant opens up

In 26 years at Manchester United, Ferguson won 13 league titles and two Champions Leagues. He was often described as ruthless, willing to do anything to win. These pages show another side of him: a man who owes his life to his wife being in the house that morning, and who says so plainly.