Sir Alex Ferguson has declared Carlos Tevez was not worth the £25million his advisors wanted to turn his "lease" period into a permanent deal with Manchester United.

Tevez joined cash-rich neighbours City from United last week, ending an acrimonious parting with his former Old Trafford boss, who the Argentina star accused of not treating him with respect.

Ferguson did attempt to keep Tevez but only after trying to knock down a price that had previously been agreed with the player's long-time advisor Kia Joorabchian.

And, while many United fans are still unhappy at Tevez's loss, in the brutal final analysis, Ferguson just considered the price to be too high.

"I didn't think he was worth £25m - that's just my judgment, maybe I am wrong," said Ferguson.

"The fans quite rightly have their heroes and I respect them, so I was happy to go along with a deal as long as it was the right one - but he was simply not worth £25m."

Instead, Tevez has joined a massively expanded City squad that has now welcomed Emmanuel Adebayor into its fold, with the prospect of more to come.

The Blues have come under fire for their attempt to lure Chelsea skipper John Terry to Eastlands although, in the same position, Ferguson might well have done the same.

"If I was in City's shoes, with all that kind of money, then I would have a go at that," he said.

"I think it's sensible. He has experience and is the England captain. For some reason they must have known that he was interested.

"I am sure there have been plenty of phone calls going on."

Whether City eventually sign Terry or not, Ferguson is as intrigued as everyone else in football to see how the Abu Dhabi bankrolled project works out.

"It won't be easy for them to win anything, even with all the players they have bought," said Ferguson, moving onto the whole City project.

"They have bought a lot of high profile players but they have 10 strikers. That is a hell of a lot.

"I have not spoken to all the managers but the one or two I have are saying "Who are they going to leave out?".

"How do you tell players they are not even going to be travelling to London? How does he pick a team? We are all interested."

Sir Alex Ferguson has revealed Manchester United "explored" the potential for a deal to sign Bayern Munich star Franck Ribery.

France international Ribery has been a target for many of Europe's leading clubs, with Spanish rivals Barcelona and Real Madrid expressing an interest.

Chelsea have also been linked with the winger, but Bayern have been adamant that the club will not be cashing in on the 26-year-old.

United were rumoured to be readying a bid as they sought to spend some of the world-record windfall from the sale of Cristiano Ronaldo to Real.

However, Ferguson confirmed a polite enquiry was met with a firm response from Bayern, who sold Owen Hargreaves to United two years ago.

"We didn't try to buy Ribery, we explored it in a nice, quiet way when David Gill was at one of his meetings with Bayern in March," said Ferguson.

"They told him, 'absolutely no chance' and the one thing you can say about Bayern is that, when they say something, they mean it.

"When we negotiated with them over Hargreaves, at the beginning they said 'no', but they also said that, if it ever changed, their minds, we'd be the first to know.

"It was exactly the same this time. There is no way that they will sell Ribery."

Ferguson also considered signing Karim Benzema from Lyon, but conceded he did not want to pay over the odds for the Real new-boy.

He added: "We tried to spend it (the Ronaldo money) on Karim Benzema as, at 21, I felt that there would be an improvement there.

"He is tough, good physique, a good goalscoring record, so it was worth going a wee bit extra for him because of his age.

"But when it went to £42million, it was beyond his value. We went to £35million and I think that was fair."