Champions League Group F: Whatever the personal history between Alex Ferguson and Gordon Strachan, the time for discussing who was wrong and who was right was never going to come before a match as momentous as a Champions League encounter between Manchester United and Glasgow Celtic.
With Battle of Britain headlines being brought out of hibernation, Ferguson and Strachan acknowledged last night that it was too big an occasion for their difficult relationship to be anything other than a small sub-plot.
Seventeen years have passed since Strachan last worked with Ferguson and whatever they now make of each other - and few will believe Strachan's take that everything is sweetness and light - both men are entitled to argue it should not have any consequence when the two teams face each other in a competitive match for the first time.
Of far more importance to Ferguson was the news that Park Ji-sung, Paul Scholes and Edwin van der Sar were unable to take part in a full training session yesterday. Strachan, meanwhile, should be more pre-occupied about the return of Wayne Rooney rather than questions about whether the man in the opposite dugout will shake his hand at the final whistle (answer: yes).
The tennis-like exchanges in their autobiographies - Ferguson's in 1999 and Strachan's this year - ensured that it remains a topic for debate, but when asked to go back through time yesterday both men gave the impression they had temporarily called a truce.
"I don't have a feud with anyone in football," Strachan said. "If you did your homework you would know that the last time I spoke to Alex we spent 40 minutes talking about football, laughing and joking. I'm finished with that now."
Ferguson replied on a similar theme. "I've nothing to say about that. If you want to know about the social aspects of my life, you should speak to some other people. I'm here to talk about a football match."
It was only when the questions returned to Strachan at the end of the press conference that he briefly let his guard down. Ferguson was asked whether he could see an element of himself in his former player. "Not really," he replied, before jokily adding: "I hope not, anyway."
Ferguson's tactic has been aimed at diffusing the tension, not just by choosing his words carefully when it comes to Strachan, but by instructing his players to forget about "the English-Scottish thing".
His thinking is that there is such an imbalance of talent between the two sides, a victory will be jeopardised only by allowing the game to be shrouded in the hostility that often accompanies a derby match.
Strachan has deliberately veered the opposite way, promoting the sense of tribalism and reminding his players they are not just playing for Celtic but Scotland. "Our squad isn't as good as theirs," he said. "We're 200 to 1 to win the Champions League and they're 7 to 1. We're a good team, though, and we're representing Scottish football.
"Our national game has had a wee turn for the better under Walter Smith over the last few months and we're hoping to continue that. We're the champions of Scotland - by 20 points (it was, in fact, 17) may I remind you - so there's a lot of pressure on us. People will be looking at our performance to decide whether the Scottish league is any good."
Last season, United finished bottom of their group having scored three goals in six matches while Celtic went out in the qualifying round against Artmedia Bratislava. Strachan described it as one of "four or five experiences" in his career he will never forget, while Ferguson looked back on his team's failures and acknowledged they had let themselves down. "Last year, going out the way we did, was a terrible disappointment. All the players know we are better than we showed."
The home side will be weakened by the absence of Cristiano Ronaldo, who is serving a one-match suspension for his one-fingered salute at Benfica's fans last December.
