Manchester United manager Alex Ferguson accused his opposite number, Geert Meijer, of "insane thinking" as United's 3-1 win over Feyenoord was overshadowed by a serious injury to Denis Irwin.

High late and appalling tackles proliferated the match with the worst incidents being an elbow to the face suffered by Gary Neville from Argentinian striker Julio Cruz and an assault on Irwin's knee by Paul Bosvelt.

Ferguson said: "It could be a bad injury for Denis and we'll have to take him to hospital to see the specialist. But I'm just happy we didn't get any more people seriously injured because it could easily have happened that way.

"The referee is experienced and he never let the game get out of control but they should have had a couple of red cards at least."

Bosvelt, amazingly, was not even cautioned by Hungarian Sandor Puhl and Ferguson was involved in an exchange on the touch-line with his opposite number.

"That was a bad tackle to make and I couldn't believe their player didn't get booked," said Ferguson, who branded Bosvelt's tackle "a disgrace" during an angry words with Meijer on the touch-line.

"I spoke to Meijer and he referred to the first game at Old Trafford and the tackle that David Beckham made that meant Giovanni Van Bronckhorst was taken off.

"But that is insane thinking, a very silly thing to say. If you are a coach you have to have some principles."

Meijer responded to Ferguson's charge by admitting that he had taken off Cruz and Bosvelt to prevent them seeing red although he added: "It's the referee's job to decide if players should be sent off.

"Ferguson was upset but there were two or three incidents in the last game at Old Trafford when their players should have had cards. "If you're looking to compare what happens on the pitch you can do that and you can always see it from both sides but I don't want to respond to anything else he has said."

Ferguson, however, was delighted by the discipline his side had shown in the face of the appalling provocation which was also matched off the field with Dutch riot police seemingly failing in their duties to keep feuding fans apart.

Despite all the aggravation only Paul Scholes was booked for United and Ferguson admitted: "I think our discipline was great in the light of what went on.

"It was a great result for us and I'm very pleased with the result and the performance especially in the second half when we controlled ourselves so well. We are in a great position now."