United get ready to maintain hot streak

Manchester, Jan 2: Manchester United manager Sir Alex Ferguson is adamant his treble winners will not wilt in the withering heat of Brazil...

Manchester, Jan 2: Manchester United manager Sir Alex Ferguson is adamant his treble winners will not wilt in the withering heat of Brazil when they compete in the football World Club Championship.

Ferguson believes the scorching weather in Rio de Janeiro could be the biggest obstacle his players face in their bid to become the first club side to be crowned world champions.

Temperatures during the Brazilian summer regularly approach 40 degrees and United have taken medical advice to counter dehydration.

Story continues below this ad

United could play four games in only nine days if, as expected, they progress to the final or third-place play-off and Ferguson is worried about his players becoming exhausted.

“It will be warm weather out there from what I can gather,” he said. “It’s 38 to 42C, which is very, very hot and that’s the only concern I’ve got.”

“We hope we can handle it and we’re obviously taking all the support and medical advice we can get.”

Ferguson has experienced managing a team in extremely hot conditionsbefore, from the 1986 World Cup in Mexico when he was in charge of Scotland.“In Mexico, we only really had one very, very hot day and that was when it hit 98F against West Germany,” he said. “It was very hot and Graeme Souness, I remember, lost 12lbs in weight.”

Story continues below this ad

To combat the conditions, Ferguson intends to rotate his 23-man squad as much as possible.

He has also said he will use his three substitutes in each match to keep players as fresh as possible.

“I’ll be changing my team around game by game and will be using the quota of three substitutes in every match and hopefully we can handle it,” he said.