Man Utd captaincy settled after 14 brutal rounds of musical chairs
Manchester United settled Fernandes's future with a party game after Wayne Rooney called the squad babies.
"...and when the music cut out in round fourteen, you could hear a teaspoon hit the lino," said Gareth Plinth, Manchester United's head of internal ceremonies.
Bruno Fernandes will remain Manchester United captain. The club confirmed it on Wednesday, after a musical chairs tournament in the Carrington canteen that staff are calling the most important night the building has ever hosted.
The contest was the club's answer to Wayne Rooney, who described the players as babies after the 4-1 Champions League defeat by Como. Senior officials read the remark as a scouting report. If the squad were children, the armband would be decided the way a four-year-old's birthday party decides things.
The Como result was handled in the morning briefing, between a car park update and a note about the soup. Fernandes's post-match criticism of Michael Carrick got one line. Nobody will be disciplined. Then the chairs came out.
Fourteen chairs, one armband
Fourteen moulded plastic chairs went down in a ring by the salad bar at 7pm. What followed was trench warfare in training socks. Early rounds went fast and ugly, with hips thrown and one chair skidding into the drinks fridge. By the middle stages the circle had tightened to a knife fight. Fernandes, by every account, never sprinted. He drifted, read the speaker, and sat a half-second before the silence like a man who had studied tape of the playlist.
Deirdre Fallowfield, who runs the hot counter and controlled the music, called it the hardest shift of her career.
"I've done Christmas lunch for the whole academy. That was nothing. Tonight I had a career in my thumb," she said.
The final went to a single chair and a pop ballad Fallowfield refused to name for operational reasons. Witnesses said the ballad ran for nearly four minutes before she stopped it. Fernandes was already seated when the room realised it was over.
Plinth said the format had restored order to the dressing room. "Grown men argue in the papers," he said. "Toddlers sit down when the music stops. We have chosen a system that produces results."
Supporters have questioned where the season is going. The club has heard them. A pass-the-parcel draw for vice-captain is scheduled for next week, and seedings are being kept from the press.
Asked whether the Champions League would also be addressed, Plinth said it was on the list, just below the soup.
