Vida's return boosts Reds

Nemanja Vidic is fit and will face Blackburn Rovers at Ewood Park on Saturday afternoon.

That was the big team news from Sir Alex’s weekly press conference at Carrington on Friday lunchtime, followed by word that Nani will also travel with the squad and could be on the bench for the crunch Premier League fixture.

Vidic injured his knee against AS Roma on 1 April and was forced to sit out the return leg in Manchester, as well as the Reds’ league battles with Middlesbrough and Arsenal.

There was also encouraging news on Darren Fletcher, who was injured on international duty for Scotland in late March. The 24-year-old has returned to light training and is expected to resume full training on Monday.

“It’s good news,” Sir Alex said. “It’s another player back to add to the recent returns of Gary [Neville] and Mikael [Silvestre] and will give us good options."

Not all the news from the manager’s press conference was rosy, however. Midfielders Anderson and Owen Hargreaves are both slight doubts ahead of Saturday’s trip to Blackburn, although Anderson was able to train on Friday. But Louis Saha is definitely out after injuring his hamstring in training earlier this week.

"It's very disapppointing both for us and the Louis," said the boss.