Injuries to Owen Hargreaves, Paul Scholes, Louis Saha and Ole Gunnar Solskjaer mean Ferguson has fairly limited options for the showpiece clash at Wembley on Sunday.

The Scot has traditionally used the match for his own purposes, preferring to give action to players he feels need match fitness rather than chasing the trophy.

That is partly the reason that United have lost five out of their last six Community Shield matches.

But he knows his men will be going at full throttle against their main rivals for the Premiership title in what is his first meeting with Jose Mourinho in this fixture.

Ferguson said: "Over the years we've come up against the team that's been second to us on many occasions.

"It's always been difficult to assess how important it is in the build-up because a lot of times we've used it as a stepping stone to the first game of the season, playing players who needed a game, and that's the way we've always viewed it.

"But at the moment Hargreaves, Anderson, Gary Neville, Saha and Solskjaer are a bit short on games and won't be involved.

"It will be a competitive game. Even though I'm saying we've used it as a stepping stone on other occasions, it's always been competitive.

"I don't think you can avoid that simply because football players, particularly playing against teams they are going to be competing with for the top honours in the season, are going to be competitive and I think it will be that way on Sunday."

The teams' last meeting at Wembley was a dour affair; with Didier Drogba's late strike settling a scrappy FA Cup final back in May.

The two best teams in the country going head to head on such an occasion was never going to live up to the hype but this time around, Ferguson is expecting a more fluent match.

He added: "It will be a better game than the FA Cup final because there was possibly tiredness from both teams.

"We had the same players every week from the beginning of April so they did a good job that way.

"The other thing was, the pitch was a bit dead. There had been a lot of rain during the week and then there was sun on the Saturday morning and it just deadened it a bit so the speed of the game wasn't great.

"I know the grounds man and he will make sure it's a good pitch eventually but it just needs time to settle down. If it's a better pitch it might be a better game."

The Community Shield marks the end of Ferguson's 21st pre-season in charge of United and he is eagerly awaiting the start of the Premiership campaign, which sees his team start their title defence against Reading at Old Trafford on August 12.

"You want to get into it," he said.

"Pre-season? I've had too many to think it's exciting but you've got to have preparation, that's essential."