Not many players can worry Manchester United's rock solid, hard as nails defender Nemanja Vidic. He is part of the formidable barrier in front of Edwin Van der Sar that took Manchester United to last season’s Double glory, the Serb is rarely fazed, but towards the end of training at Carrington, the one thing Vidic does not want to hear is a Scottish accent pointing to the other end of the pitch and saying:
“Wayne, you can play for that side.”
Vidic is used to lining up alongside Cristiano Ronaldo, Dimitar Berbatov, Carlos Tevez and Wayne Rooney and aware of what they bring to the team. When his limbs are begging for mercy, though, the last thing he needs is a Scouse inquisition.
“It’s hard to play against all of them, of course, and I wouldn’t like to single one out, but if you get to the end of a session and are feeling tired, you really don’t want to have to play against Rooney. Rooney is always running, trying to find the space and score. He never stops, which you don’t need. Tevez is similar. This is their game, how they play and it’s maybe harder to have to play against Rooney or Tevez than any of the others, because of their energy. That isn’t all they have but they’re energy players who work so hard. It’s their game and they can’t change in training.”
Vidic feels the other Premier League defenders who only have to take on Rooney and Co twice a season should count their lucky stars they are not in his boots, but then again, the damage Rooney, Berbatov and Ronaldo have wrought on opposing defences in a six-match winning run which has brought 17 goals, which had a slight hiccup at the weekend, and a new sense of purpose to Old Trafford is an even bigger reason for Vidic to grin.
“We didn’t start well in the first few games and when you don’t have a good start you worry about what might happen. You begin to think, ‘If we lose one more game we could be out of the Premier League’. It’s something at the back of your mind and you feel the pressure. When you have that you get worried about what you might do in a game. But when you start to win, that brings the confidence back and when you are winning and scoring goals, like we are now, the confidence starts to flow. We’ve started to look like a team again, compact and with the right shape. I feel we’ve definitely got more now than last season. I believe we can be better but we can only show that on the pitch. Then you will see how much we improve, and at the end of the season, we can say we did. We haven’t changed our style but he gives us something we didn’t have last season,” suggested Vidic – is the sheer intensity that still comes from the man who has created the modern United in his own image.
After 22 years at the club, Sir Alex Ferguson shows no signs of wanting to quit yet. And Vidic sees only that fiery determination to be the best once again.
“The gaffer is the man who knows how to speak to players and give them confidence, to know he believes in them as players. He is the man who set up the club in that way, that desire to win and he expects his players to play every game 100 per cent to win. But I can see that in the squad, too, in Scholesy, Gary Neville and Ryan Giggs. They have played more than 15 years at United and you can still see the same desire in their eyes, all the time, even in training, desperate to win every game we play at Carrington. This is what makes United and it comes from the manager, who gives it to the players. Giggsy, Scholesy and Gary make sure we follow what they have done, so we all know we have to live up to the past of the club. Here it’s all about the next challenge. No matter what we’ve done, no matter how big the game we’ve won, the boss just says we can celebrate what we’ve done to win a trophy. But the next day, it’s over, forgotten. It’s all about the next one. We have to put the past away and concentrate on the future.” .....Back To Home Page
Having drawn three World Cup Qualifying games and then getting thrashed 6-1 in a friendly with Serbia, former Bulgarian boss Plamen Markov was swiftly shown the door and Stanimir Stoilov was given his old job back.
