Rio Ferdinand has made the startling claim that he was better than Manchester United teammates Paul Scholes and Cristiano Ronaldo at the game of two touch. The English defender was the undisputed two-touch champion at Manchester United and did not take kindly to Adnan Januzaj’s attempt to usurp the throne.
As part of Rio Ferdinand’s promotional #ChampionTheMatch campaign for Heineken, the English defender spoke to Squawka and narrated the tale, saying “I was named, officially, the best two-touch player, you know like you do keepy-ups. Me and Scholesy, and me and Cristiano [Ronaldo] used to do it religiously before matches in the changing room. I used to beat all of them.”
Given the quality present in the Old Trafford dressing room under Sir Alex Ferguson, Ferdinand was understandably hyperbolic about his skills, saying “Scholesy obviously knows that and he wouldn’t tell you otherwise. Me and Cristiano, there used to be those bikes, 10 bikes lined up in a row, and he used to go one side and we’d play two-three touch over them. It used to be blinding.”
Scholes and Ferdinand are indulging in a mental game of two-touch now as they use their sharp wits as pundits for BT Sport. The pair were most recently in the news when Scholes and Ferdinand laid into the current Manchester United squad for a dismal performance against Liverpool in the UEFA Europa League.
Januzaj was schooled by Ferdinand
Another member of the Manchester United squad so heavily criticized by Rio Ferdinand was Adnan Januzaj. The Belgian has returned from a disappointing loan spell with Borussia Dortmund and has struggled to get on the pitch under current Manchester United manager Louis van Gaal.
It’s a far cry from the Belgian’s introduction into the Premier League, when he was considered a sensation and the next Manchester United star. It waas in such an atmosphere in an undoubtedly confident Januzaj came in and attempted to dethrone Ferdinand from his two touch champion’s seat.
The English defender predictably did not take too kindly to the attempted coup, telling the Belgian to go back and improve his technique before attempting to defeat Rio, saying “Adnan Januzaj tried to come in when all those guys retired or had left but he got told to sit down and go back and do a youth training scheme before he coming back into the arena.”
