Manchester United defender Patrice Evra has said that he will not be willing to celebrate a goal with the manager, Sir Alex Ferguson, as he fears the sack. Striker Robin van Persie recently celebrated his 10 match goal drought coming to an end by celebrating with Sir Alex Ferguson. Van Persie scored through a penalty in the 2-0 win over Stoke City during the weekend. The win also helped Manchester United move one step closer to the title. They have managed to extend their lead at the top of the table to 15 points, although their main rivals Manchester City have a game in hand.
The French defender, though, has said that he will not celebrate in a similar fashion with Ferguson if he manages to score a goal in the future. He has said that he would rather do it with his teammates than celebrate with the manager because he fears getting sacked. Van Persie has been one of the main reasons for United’s impressive record in the Premier league this season. The striker has scored 20 goals to put him near the top of the charts. However, he has been experiencing a goal drought in recent months. He had not scored in 10 matches prior to the Stoke City encounter.
“No chance. Never. Maybe I will do it with my team-mates. But not with the gaffer. He is older. Imagine I go in too strong against him. He could fall, then he might sack me. I will never do that. Robin has had a lot of stick from us. It was nice. I could see a lot of love and emotion. It is the first time we saw that. Robin can tell you, for two or three days we have been getting at him,” said Evra in a recent interview.
One thing which sets gifted Manchester United left back Patrice Evra apart from other top stars, over and above his incredible talent, is quite simple: Pure class. Despite what he called the “massive disappointment” of seeing United fall at the quarter-final stage in the FA Cup, the most popular Frenchman at Old Trafford since Cantona still found it in himself to congratulate Chelsea goal scorer Demba Ba on his sublime winning strike.
Wearing the captain’s armband in the absence of Nemanja Vidic, the Gallic star referred to the former Newcastle marksman’s “great goal.” So a classy human being then, as well as a class footballer. Imagine certain other Premier League ‘legends’ being as magnanimous! Read more »
It has been almost 4 seasons since the departure of Cristiano Ronaldo from Old Trafford, but the defender Patrice Evra reckons that the club still misses him. The 27-year-old Portuguese international managed to become one of the best players in the world during his six year spell at the club. He had arrived as an 18-year-old prodigy, but he was known for his inconsistency early in his career. However, he developed himself to such an extent that he later won the FIFA Ballon d’Or award with Manchester United. Ronaldo then transferred to Real Madrid in a world record deal of £ 80 million.
He will be returning to Old Trafford to face his former club for the first time since leaving in 2009 in the two clubs face each other in the last 16 stage of the European cup. Ronaldo scored in the first leg against the two teams with a header that was reminiscent of his goal in the 2008 Champions League final for Manchester United. Evra and Ronaldo played with each other for three years from 2006 to 2009. Ronaldo almost single-handedly helped United win several matches during his time at the club. Even though there have been many great players since then, Evra has admitted that the Red Devils still miss the Portuguese.
“This will be a highly emotional game for Ronaldo, simply because he still loves Manchester United! I definitely hope that all this emotional charge around these games end up getting to him, since that can turn out to be perfect for us. I believe we can stop him with love! We’ve already been exchanging plenty of text messages with him and I hope and expect that the fans grant him a huge ovation because of everything he did for Manchester United,” said Evra ahead of the return leg.
The former Manchester United defender and current television pundit Gary Neville has said that he expects the Italian manager Roberto Mancini to get the sack if he does not win the title this season with Manchester city. Mancini guided the team to their first Premier league title last season, but has been struggling a lot in all competitions this season. City have not only crashed out of the Capital One cup and the Champions League, but they are also not in a position to win the Premier League title as well. They are currently six points behind United in the table after the 3-2 defeat against their arch rivals recently.
Due to the fact that they have only the FA cup and the Premier League to play for, Neville has said that he would expect the club to sack the manager if he does not win any trophy this season. There has been a lot of changes in the backroom staff over the last six months. This has in recent rumours that the club are looking to get the former Barcelona manager Guardiola. Neville believes that it will be the case if the club are unsuccessful this season, despite the fact that they have shown a lot of patience since taking over the club in 2008.
“Roberto Mancini deserves more time but it is not a ridiculous suggestion to think City would not consider making a change if he doesn’t win the league. Whilst Roberto Mancini continues to be successful he should stay in his job but it does feel like one day Mourinho or Guardiola will end up there. They have a new chief executive and a new director of football who presumably have the ear of the owner,” said Neville, who has been hugely praised for his punditry work.
The Manchester United defender Patrice Evra has said that the manager Sir Alex Ferguson will not think twice about sacking the players if their performance does not improve the rest of the season. Manchester United currently have a six-point advantage over second placed Manchester City in the table, but the situation could have been extremely different had not been for the luck that the club has enjoyed this season in abundance. Even though they have conceded two goals in a number of matches, Manchester United have been able to record numerous 3-2 victories that have helped them open a six-point advantage.
The manager Sir Alex Ferguson has been extremely critical of the Manchester United defence this season. Even though they are top of the table, they have by far been the worst under Ferguson during his 25 years at the club. He has said that he is amazed at how United have been able to maintain their top position despite their fragility in defence. Now, the defender Patrice Evra has said that the players should improve as soon as possible or face the wrath of the manager, who does not have second thoughts about dropping a player regardless of his stature in the game. United brought an end to the 37 matches unbeaten run enjoyed by City as a result of this victory.
“I think Ferguson is going to sack everyone if we did that. I’m serious – it would not be funny, for the fans, for the players, for everyone. I remember what happened last year. We were eight points clear and in the end we lost the league, so a six-point lead means the league is not finished yet. There is a long way to go, but I really mean now we have to make sure we are ready for Sunderland on Saturday,” Evra said.
Even though Liverpool have started the campaign in exceptionally poor fashion, many United supporters still had their reservations ahead of the trip to Anfield on Sunday. It would be fair to say that such concerns were justified after United stuttered through to victory, with Sir Alex Ferguson even admitting that the Red Devils were poor and luck played a huge part in the win.
While opponents Liverpool may be rooted in the bottom three, the fact that they possess such a strong record over United at Anfield over recent seasons made many feel that this could be a huge banana skin. Moreover, when this was combined with the added emotion following the recent Hillsborough developments, there was no doubt that United approached this game with plenty of caution.
The fact that Liverpool played long periods of the game with ten men, following Jonjo Shelvey’s dismissal, made United’s performance look even poorer. While he is usually one of the first to defend his team, Ferguson afterwards admitted that the Red Devils had not played well and had been very lucky to steal the three points. He said, “We were very poor. Liverpool dominated the first half and we were lucky. In the second half, we had better statistics in terms of possession but we were playing against 10 men so that was disappointing.”
Despite the lucky circumstances, the victory still lifts United up to 2nd place in the table – one point behind leaders Chelsea. The fact that both teams have not really reached their peak but still sit in the top two is certainly interesting, especially as Manchester City have also made a slow start to the campaign as they sit in 7th. Nevertheless, United are continuing to show their ability to grind out results and with this game seeing the team come from behind to win for the fourth time this season, the omens are certainly looking good.