Rio Ferdinand has not held back in his latest criticism of Manchester United‘s faltering stars as he labelled the dressing room ‘weak-minded’ and insisted their leaders should be singling out others who don’t care.
The former Red Devils defender has put his club loyalty to one side and not been afraid to condemn United in what has been an abysmal season.
Ralf Rangnick‘s side hit a new low on Saturday evening when they were totally humiliated in a 4-0 thrashing by Brighton. The defeat means United will finish with their lowest points tally in the post-1992 era.
Rio Ferdinand has not held back in his latest criticism of Manchester United’s faltering stars
Ferdinand (L) condemned Ralf Rangnick (R) for ‘airing United’s dirty laundry in public’
Ferdinand has already savaged his old club for ‘downing tools’ and criticised interim boss Rangnick for ‘airing United’s dirty laundry in public’ and now he’s been brutal in his most recent assessment.
He placed himself in the changing room and said he would call out players who don’t care, telling them to ‘f*** off then, get out.’
‘If you asked Albert Morgan, the kit man, he would have said there would be a lot of cleaning up to do. I would have messed up that changing room for starters. I would have gone nuts,’ he said on his FIVE YouTube show.
‘You have to question each other, asking questions of each other. Does anyone f****** care? I want to know that those questions are being asked. Because if I smelt that somebody didn’t care, I would be calling them out.’
When asked if there are less players who care, he added: ‘I would be saying f*** off then, get out.
‘I would tell them to not come and play then. Don’t get your boots laced up. If I am smelling that you don’t care – and you are not giving me the answers or the energy that we need to be a team that can at least compete in the games – then don’t come out here.
Ferdinand has given a brutally honest assessment of his former club after they hit a new low
‘You are not only embarrassing yourself, you are embarrassing me. It’s so difficult because you can’t compare. Our changing room was a really stable changing room, built on winning and success, built on the right culture and built on the right standards every day. This changing room is very different.
‘It seems like a weak-minded changing room. The results tell you that with the way they let games slip away. You need players, but you need someone driving it.’
United could still have mathematically got into the top four ahead of kick-off on the south coast at the weekend but their embarrassing display killed off any chance of qualifying for the Champions League next term.
The Red Devils are down in sixth having played two more games than fifth-placed Tottenham and Arsenal in fourth and face a challenge from West Ham three points below them for a Europa League spot.
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Ferdinand also claimed that Jose Mourinho‘s comments on finishing second in the Premier League with Manchester United have aged ‘so, so well’.
United finished in second place in the 2017-18 season when Mourinho was in charge, 19 points behind champions Manchester City.
Although the Portuguese has enjoyed a trophy-laden career, he considers finishing second with United as one of his biggest achievements due to the problems behind the scenes at the club.
In 2019 Mourinho said: ‘If I tell you, for example, that I consider one of the best jobs of my career was to finish second with Man United in the Premier League, you will say, “this guy is crazy”.
‘He won 25 titles and he is saying that a second position was one of his best achievements?
‘I keep saying this because people don’t know what is going on behind the scenes.’
Ferdinand believes Jose Mourinho’s comments about Manchester United have aged well
Mourinho was in charge of United from May 2016 until he was sacked in December 2018
Speaking on his FIVE podcast, former United defender Ferdinand said: ‘I think Jose Mourinho’s quote has aged so, so well. Me for one I would apologise to some extent in terms of the way you looked at him and judged him.
‘I still think there were flaws in some of the ways that he handled people and handled some of the situations that he was involved in, but in terms of looking behind the scenes. That was said in 2019.’
‘We can see that there’s been stuff going on that’s wrong behind the scenes, but at that time we didn’t know the extent of it. Obviously, Jose Mourinho did.
‘Like you said he wanted to get rid of numerous players and he wanted to bring in certain players. Obviously big wages and contracts were handed out to certain players, and he’s thinking “woah, woah, woah, what’s going on?” I can see the flaws in certain individuals, I can see the flaws in the way the club’s set up at the moment. I want to change things’ and he wasn’t probably afforded that.
‘I’d love to have half an hour talking to Jose about his time there just to kind of work out where he was at with a bit more detail than we’ve actually ever seen to then gauge it to where we are now. That would be very insightful.’
