Manchester United manager Alex Ferguson cranked up the mind games with Premier League title rivals Manchester City on Friday by suggesting their recall of Carlos Tevez smacked of desperation.
The Scot used a news conference to fire back at City's former player Patrick Vieira for saying earlier in the week that United had shown their weakness in bringing Paul Scholes out of retirement.
"If it's desperation bringing the best midfielder in Britain for the last 20 years back then I think we can accept that," said Ferguson.
"(City manager) Roberto (Mancini) had a wee dig a couple of weeks back. We're all going to play our hand that way. There will be plenty of ammunition for that," he added.
"If you talk about desperation, they played a player the other night who refused to go on the pitch and the manager said he'd never play again and he takes a five-month holiday in Argentina.
{{/usCountry}}"If you talk about desperation, they played a player the other night who refused to go on the pitch and the manager said he'd never play again and he takes a five-month holiday in Argentina.
{{/usCountry}}"What is that? Could that come under the description of desperation? There will be plenty of ammunition, don't worry." Tevez is back in favour at City after being absent since September when he refused to come off the bench in a Champions League match in Munich.