Arsenal v Manchester United: Paul Scholes reunited with the team he irritated most Frustrated by an inability to enjoy his new role as United's reserve-team coach, Scholes alerted Ferguson to his itchy feet having been made aware of the possibility of a return to action with Hull City, managed by his former England team-mate Nick Barmby. Prompted by Scholes's retirement regrets, Ferguson sensed an opportunity to ease United's personnel ­problems and an unlikely comeback was arranged. Having returned against Manchester City, prior to a goalscoring outing against Bolton last week, the former England midfielder will be involved at some stage against Arsenal. His experience will be needed given that Rio Ferdinand's inclusion is considered very doubtful. The defender missed training on Friday with a back injury. Few players know how to irritate Arsenal better than Scholes. His appearance as a substitute during the FA Cup quarter-final against Arsène Wenger's team last season saw him clash with Jack Wilshere and Samir Nasri before earning a booking with a late challenge. "All of a sudden, it started to kick off," Scholes said. But I never went on to the pitch intentionally trying to start something. It just happened. Wenger has spoken out against Scholes's "darker side," insisting he is not a "fair player" and claiming that age has not mellowed the veteran. "It's not because you are older suddenly that you are a saint," Wenger said. However, Ferguson believes that both Scholes and Henry justify their returns to scenes of former glory, having made fairy-tale starts to their second coming. "You're talking about one-off players," Ferguson said. Henry, in fairness, has been playing football and is still playing for [New York] Red Bulls, so I don't think there's really a physical problem of him coming back. With Paul, I don't see any signs of stamina problems. It's just been an amazing turn around for the lad to make the decision to come back and he's motivated for it as well. With Scholes and Henry, there are no negatives at all. When I saw Arsenal erecting the statue to Henry, I thought it was a nice lead in to bringing him back for a short spell. The way the fans reacted to him scoring against Leeds was fantastic. He's still a great player. Ferguson, who expects Cleverley and Ashley Young to resume training in 10 days after injury lay-offs, admits United are facing a defining period in their season, with the Arsenal game signalling the start of a fixture list that includes Liverpool (twice), Chelsea and Tottenham within six weeks. "You want to get into these games in good form," Ferguson said. Hopefully we can navigate this clutch of games because they will be important for where we end up this season. But they aren't easy for the other team either. They'll all be looking at United and saying, "phew, it's another hard game." We've had situations in the past where we've had a clutch of important games against teams who are challenging you in the league. You just have to cope with it.