Teddy Sheringham opens up on Sir Alex Ferguson's team talk before Champions League final

Teddy Sheringham has revealed how he was secretly hoping Manchester United would not score in the 1999 Champions League final with Bayern Munich - because Sir Alex Ferguson made a promise.

The striker memorably came off the bench to equalise for the Red Devils before Ole Gunnar Solskjaer scored a dramatic winner to secure a stunning European triumph for Ferguson.

Indeed, that remarkable victory capped off the Treble for United but Sheringham admits he was gutted not to start the final at Barcelona's Nou Camp.

And in a revealing interview, the former England hero has explained how Ferguson's team talk ultimately inspired him to produce a match-defining performance.

Sheringham told Sky Sports’ The Football Show: "The manager actually came to me at half-time and he said, “Look if it stays at 1-0, you’re going to be going on, so get ready after about 10 or 15 minutes”.

"So I obviously wanted the score to stay the same at the time. I know that sounds a little bit selfish but you want to be part of what’s going on out there. And the score did stay the same and 15 minutes later he put me on.

"At the time I was watching Bayern Munich thinking, “Blimey! They’re very good”. We hadn’t been in the game at all, it was probably our worst performance of the season.

"They were 1-0 up, they could have gone 2-0 or 3-0 up, hit the bar, hit the post, Peter Schmeichel made some great saves, and we were kind of on the rack really. I think the manager just wanted to change things up and just see if we could ruffle them up a little bit."

On the disappointment of not starting, Sheringham added: "Strange situation. I think if you asked everybody about those 10 or 11 days in May, we would all have different scenarios of what happened.

"I didn’t have the best of seasons, I’d had a lot of injuries, I’d lost my place to Dwight Yorke – who’d come in and done fantastic, I couldn’t dislodge him.

"I started the last game of the season then came off as sub, then started the FA Cup game on the bench and then came on after six minutes for Roy Keane, which I didn’t expect. Scored the opening goal after the first minute of coming on.

"Then we won the game 2-0 so I thought I had a chance of starting the Champions League final, but the manager had already set out what his plan was for the three games I think. I didn’t actually know that at the time but when I was told that I wasn’t playing I was disappointed again.

"But I just felt you never know what’s going to happen in football, it had already changed around in the FA Cup final, it might change in this one.

"So I kept my fingers crossed that I’d get the chance to be involved in an unbelievable treble that we were all hoping for at the end of that season."

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