The thing about being at the sharp end of Europe's football season is that Alex Ferguson has seen it all before.

Had a comfy Premier League lead and blown it? Manchester United's rust-resistant manager has been there, done that.

Had a comfy lead, wobbled but recovered at crunch time to lift the title? The wily Scot long ago crossed that off his "to do" list, too.

So beware those who are writing off United's championship chances now that fatigue, poor play and doubt are starting to corrode the cutting edges of what Ferguson calls the best squad he's ever had. In 22 years at the helm of the self-proclaimed "world's most popular football team," the 67-year-old has taught us how dangerous it can be to draw too many conclusions from performance vagaries in the mad month of March.

Liverpool, floating on the sublime but physically vulnerable attacking partnership of Steven Gerrard and Fernando Torres, does have train-like momentum. Scoring 15 goals and conceding just one - to United - in March put the spring firmly back into the step of Rafa Benitez's outfit and vindicated the Spaniard's decision to sell striker Robbie Keane back to Tottenham. Given the deluge of goals, Keane has not been sorely missed.

But the mathematics still favour United. A lead of one point and, crucially, a game more than Liverpool left to play, still form a small cushion that Ferguson's titleholders can use to ride out what he so famously calls "squeaky-bum time."

The 7th edition of the Collins English Dictionary defines the phrase thus: "Brit, soccer, informal, the tense final matches in the race to a league championship, esp. from the point of view of the leaders."

No one has more Premier League experience of crunch time than Ferguson. While Benitez can draw on his lists and tactical formulas in the crucial remaining weeks, Ferguson carries into United's dressing room an unmatchable encyclopedia of knowledge about managing this period when heart and self-belief get their sternest test.

To combat complacency in his troops, Ferguson can conjure the demons of the 1997-1998 season, when an 11-point United lead wilted in March like a cut daffodil.

By month's end, Arsene Wenger's Arsenal had pruned the gap to just three points and the Londoners clinched their first league title since 1991 just over a month later.

The turning point in that race, Wenger said, was Marc Overmars' 79th-minute goal for a 1-0 Arsenal victory at Old Trafford on March 14 - the exact same date and venue that Liverpool hammered United 4-1 to re-ignite their title hopes this season.

But Ferguson can also draw on positive examples. In 1993-1994, United recovered from a March wobble with uncanny similarities to the one it has just endured.

United's recent dip is curious given how strongly it was doing. Liverpool and Fulham exposed fragilities in a defence that had otherwise been rock-solid. Star winger Cristiano Ronaldo hasn't been the consistently brilliant performer he was last season, and the rigors of a long and packed schedule - combined with injuries - have drained some zap from the United midfield.

United's chasers 15 years ago were Blackburn, armed with an Alan Shearer scoring at one of the fastest rates in English soccer history. United's 16-point lead in January seemed almost unassailable, but was cut to just three after a March when ill-discipline, as now, took a toll.

Last weekend, it was Wayne Rooney and Paul Scholes who were shown red cards as United lost 2-0 at Fulham. On 19 March, 1994, it was Eric Cantona, ejected for famously stamping on Swindon midfielder John Moncur in a 2-2 tie. Three days later, the Frenchman was sent off again against Arsenal, in another 2-2 draw. That month, United also lost 1-0 at Old Trafford to Chelsea and 3-1 to Aston Villa in the League Cup final.

Cantona served a five-match ban and scored two penalties in the FA Cup final to help United secure the league and cup double in 1994, a feat it could go three better than this season.

Even for a side as deep with talent as United, there's a risk that the giant workload of the FA Cup, the league and the Champions League, along with the League and Club World Cups it already has in the trophy cabinet, will prove one or several tournaments too far this season. Winning all five would be huge; losing the last three would suggest that United overreached.

John Leicester is an international sports columnist for The Associated Press. Write to him at [email protected]