If I hadn’t had Jim on my side, I would have probably finished playing about four seasons earlier than I did. ![]() “The Villa physio Jim Walker, who is more than a friend – a hero of mine – is basically the one that kept my career going. “I trained for the first few months I was there, but never again over the next seven years,” McGrath told FourFourTwo in 2007. King often spoke of how he was inspired by McGrath’s exploits at Aston Villa, where he won two League Cups and was named PFA Player of the Year despite debilitating knee injuries. READ: Ariel Ortega & Romario at Valencia: Discos, great goals & fights with Ranieri Paul McGrath He told me: ‘Coach, my plane leaves in an hour.’” ![]() “The next day, Romario scored his second goal 20 minutes into the game and immediately gestured to me asking to leave. “I replied: ‘If you score two goals tomorrow, I’ll give you two extra days rest compared to the other players.’ “One time, Romario asked me if he could miss two days of training to return to Brazil for the carnival,” Cruyff recalled. And there was no better example than in 1994 when the Brazilian famously convinced Johan Cruyff to not only let him miss training but be substituted early in order to go to the Rio Carnival. Like Ronaldo, Romario was so good that he managed to wangle favours others could not dream of. READ: Ze Elias: Ronaldo told Mancini, ‘Keep quiet, I’ll give you my autograph after’ Romario A smiling Míchel Salgado recalls players telling the coach not to force him to train: “Ronaldo would say, ‘Don’t worry, I’ll get you two goals’ - and then he would go and get two goals.”‘ ‘Five minutes later, Ronaldo had scored, and offered a cheeky: “That OK by you?” It was classic Ronaldo. “You run,” the Brazilian replied, “I don’t. ‘A new arrival couldn’t believe his eyes during preseason one year, screaming “Run, you fat !” at Ronaldo as he ambled about. He was so good, it was impossible not to fall in love with him, as brilliantly summed up in this passage by Sid Lowe in a tribute to the great man following his retirement: Yet Capello still names Ronaldo as the “best by far” of all the players he ever worked with. ‘Can you go down to 90kg at least?’ And he didn’t…” “Look, he weighed 96kg ,” Capello told AS. “I asked ‘how much did you weigh when you won the World Cup ?’ “I never asked him to run, he just needed to train and play with the ball, someone else would have run for him.”Īnd when Fabio Capello took over at Real Madrid in 2006, although Ronaldo turned up for training, the Italian found a player struggling with his weight and seemingly not in the mood to get himself fit. “But I don’t train all the time, as well, and he likes people who train every day, so, we’ll see what happens.”Īs one of the best players the world has ever seen, it’s fair to say Ronaldo was never put under too much pressure in training.Įven Gigi Simoni, who managed Ronaldo at Inter, told us he didn’t ask him to do the same things as other players: “I never thought that all players should be managed in the same way if someone is special – and Ronaldo was exceptional. Woodgate was team-mates with King at Tottenham, where they formed a centre-back partnership of what could have been for England.Īn international at the age of 19 while with Leeds, Woodgate’s injury problems began at Newcastle and continued throughout his career.ĭespite impressing at White Hart Lane, the defender admitted he had “no chance” of making Fabio Capello’s England squad for the 2010 World Cup. He didn't really train that much but was fantastic in games." /JwQWcEs9MY ![]() Kyle Walker on Ledley King: "He was a great, great player who taught me a lot. “It’s crazy that you can not train once all week and then come in on a Saturday and be the best player,” Harry Redknapp marvelled in 2011. Ledley KingĬited by Thierry Henry as one of the best defenders he ever played against, King is often thought of as one of the greatest players England never really had.Ĭhronic knee problems meant King could not even kick a ball in the garden with his children, never mind train at Tottenham, but then he would invariably turn up on a matchday and put in a brilliant performance. Here are some players who struggled to make it onto the training pitch, including a remarkable story from Brazil. It often goes overlooked that some footballers put themselves through incredible physical strain to play week in, week out. ![]() While a lot of football fans often think professional players are capable of playing 90 minutes every day, sometimes they aren’t even fit enough to train between games.
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