Manchester United legend, Gary Neville has come out to say that the club ignored his advice to sign Joao Cancelo years ago. He recently revealed that Cancelo was clearly an exceptional talent at Valencia.
According to him, the education Joao Cancelo had in Italy would have definitely helped MUFC a whole lot, but Manchester City were more proactive for his signature.
Neville added that the Portuguese is currently realising his potential and he couldn’t be happier for him.
His words, “I had him as a very young player at Valencia but you could just see exceptional talent.”
“I made calls back to England, you could imagine to which club I’m talking about, [saying], ‘if you’d ever take a young player, he’s one you’d take’.”
“Him and Andre Gomes, I felt, were exceptional talents that could come and grace the Premier League. Andre has had bad injuries which stopped him.”
“But I think the education Joao Cancelo had in Italy would have been a good one for him. I think Italy toughens you up from a defensive perspective being at Juventus.”
“When City paid £60m for him the only doubt I had was the fact did City need to spend £60m on a full-back again because they already had players in those positions. Not any doubt whatsoever about what this player was.”
“He’s an athletic machine. He’s a brilliant runner, he’s a beautiful runner with the ball, he’s a tough kid as well. He’s strong, he’s brave in his defending, he affects the game in defence and attack. He’s delivering on what I thought he would in terms of you see players sometimes not realising their potential, he is realising his potential. I couldn’t be happier for him as a person.”
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