A TIME of national reflection gives the tale of Two Fergies an extraordinary resonance.

The lives of Sir Alex and Duncan of that ilk are apparently linked only by the coincidence of name and pursuing their professional life in football yet their stories are a testimony to the truth that while Scots historically strive, fight and scratch for success, particularly when on foreign duty, the nation has a fascination for the enigma, the maverick, the one who, like Big Dunc, flattens to deceive.

There is a sober centre to Scottish football folk that demands strongly and applauds gently the substance of success. But there is a big yin to this yang. Give Scotland a fractured, flawed under-achiever and strong men will swoon. Women, of course, have more sense.

The first observation about Michael Grant's Fergie Rises and Alan Pattullo's In Search of Duncan Ferguson is that they resonate with the importance that this nation affords to football.

They are, therefore, written with an intelligence imbued by a love for a game that repays that passion in a crippling mixture of chronic chillblains and debilitating disappointment that forever retains its sharpness despite the regularity with which it is inflicted on the puir soul who is condemned to supporting a team.

It is also impossible to survive the bedlam that is Scottish football without being armed with humour.

Grant, a scribbler of this parish, and Pattullo, who performs the same task in a place called Edinburgh, have written books with a serious purpose. Both tales have moments of brilliant humour. This ability to laugh silently in the face of roaring, overwhelming odds is what sustains the Scottish football fan. It is also what binds a dressing-room and leavens the sort of obsession bred into such outliers as Alex Ferguson.

Grant is not discomfited by the fear that there can be nothing new to be said of a viable candidate for greatest manager ever. Instead with a lightness of touch that belies the seriousness of his endeavour, he seeks to find the Fergie mother lode.

The desire to be the best, to win is a commonplace commodity. Grant, brilliantly, shows how it was nurtured, developed and finally addressed in the genteel surroundings of north-east Scotland.

This is a book that takes the evidence from a series of witnesses to burgeoning genius. The testimonies are stunning, insightful, sometimes bitter, mostly awed and regularly funny.

Ferguson achieved his greatest success in Aberdeen. Only Scots can appreciate this. His achievements at Old Trafford are stunning but what occurred in Aberdeen in the 1980s remains almost baffling to those who have watched the Scottish game for decades.

Fergie did not only beat the Old Firm but did so regularly. Most pertinently, however, he created an Aberdeen that both Celtic and Rangers, fans and players, feared. They could play. They could also kick.

They were the reflection of a manager who could sit with Pat Stanton, his first assistant, and muse about the cosmos but who could also grapple with a player in the dressing-room in a more robust exchange of views.

It is this juxtaposition of obvious intellect and unbridled passion that makes Fergie Rises both entertaining and informative. It is also the best Fergie book since Managing My Life, the great man's first autobiography.

If Grant is all about finding the substance of greatness, Pattullo is more concerned with gently showing how it can be both elusive yet gauged erroneously by fans blinded by sentiment. The tragedy of Duncan Ferguson was that he was sent to prison after a series of assaults that culminated in a clash with Jock McStay of Raith Rovers for which his probation was revoked.

The incident on the field of play was not unusual and is normally treated by a suspension. Ferguson's fate was to find that his violent past had caught up with him, though a prison sentence was draconian in the light of punishments later handed out to such as Eric Cantona.

This heightened outrage on the part of the justiciary, though, can be seen as somehow consistent with the fever that accompanied Ferguson on field or in pub. His reputation dwarfed his achievements.

In a 17-year career, Ferguson was sold for more than £20m. Rangers paid Dundee United £4m for him in 1993. Ferguson played seven times for Scotland but never scored.

Indeed, he is famous for a near miss rather than a goal. His overhead kick against Germany is generally remembered as having hit the bar. Pattullo points out it was saved.

It is this attention to the merest detail that marks the search for Duncan Disorderly. Pattullo, who writes beautifully, has a strong-willed adherence to discovering the truth rather than adding to the enigma. His triumph is that Ferguson is never interviewed but he is captured.

Sympathetic but rigorous, Pattullo never lectures but slowly, inexorably one is aware that he is uncovering a truth about Scottish football and its devotees.

There is a Caledonian psyche that can be uncomfortable with the success of one Fergie but intrigued by the near misses of another Ferguson. Scottish writing has always been marked by duality.

Pattullo and Grant have come up with the game of two halves of the Scottish personality and the result is the uncovering of a nation that breeds greatness but is fascinated by failure.

n Fergie Rises by Michael Grant is published by Aurum at £18.99. In Search of Duncan Ferguson, by Alan Pattullo, is published by Mainstream at £18.99.