David de Gea has named Cristiano Ronaldo among the best players he shared a dressing room with over his 12-year spell at Manchester United. Now at Fiorentina, he looked back at his time at Old Trafford and picked out the five forwards who stood out to him as the most potent.
The former Red Devils goalkeeper explained how these attackers would keep him focused while training in an interview with La Repubblica (via Stretty News):
“Van Persie, Cristiano Ronaldo, Rooney, Ibrahimovic and Lukaku. But when they didn’t score against me in training, they also got frustrated.”
Van Persie propelled the club to their last Premier League title in 2013, two years after De Gea made the switch from Atletico Madrid to Old Trafford. Wayne Rooney was easily a club legend at the time. Zlatan Ibrahimovic had a productive 2016/17 season, leading the club to win the EFL Cup, the Community Shield, and the Europa League.
Romelu Lukaku might have struggled to impress for Manchester United, but De Gea certainly has reasons behind his admiration for the big Belgian striker. Cristiano Ronaldo left Old Trafford before the Spanish goalkeeper joined up with the club. However, he returned for a second spell in 2021 and played until November 2023.
Former midfielder reveals how Cristiano Ronaldo changed his approach to fitness at Manchester United
Danny Drinkwater has revealed how Cristiano Ronaldo’s work ethic switched his mindset when they were teammates early in his career at Manchester United. The former midfielder came onto United’s books as a young boy and got to watch Ronaldo’s emergence as a star.
Although Drinkwater never played for United’s senior team, he recalls how Ronaldo returned from summer break in the best shape of his life. He told Rio Ferdinand Presents (via Mirror):
“I remember he come back [to pre-season] and he looked like, I don’t know, he looked like he smashed the gym for a whole year, man. And I remember thinking like, ‘wow, like he’s at the first team and he’s doing that, like we’ve got ages to go’. And I remember after that then I started taking gym seriously.”
Drinkwater went on to win the Premier League with Leicester in 2016 before a big-money transfer to Chelsea. Cristiano Ronaldo, on the other hand, won the Ballon d’Or at Manchester United, before his mega-move to Real Madrid in 2009, where he won four more Ballons d’Or.
Edited by Vaishnavi Iyer
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