Gerard Pique Quotes

I've played for England Under-21s, in the Under-20 World Cup and I've been part of the play-offs in the Championship. But in terms of helping my career and getting me ready, going to Cheltenham Town was a massive experience.

There has been a great list of players who cut their teeth in Europe.

Me being at Coventry, instead of a big Premier League club, probably helped me develop. You don't get put in the academy system, playing Under-18s and Under-23s.

I moved to Manchester United when I was a 17-year-old kid. Nemanja Vidic was five years older than me and Rio Ferdinand nearly nine years, and at the time, they were the best central defenders in the world. They never had a bad game.

My two years at Juve were fantastic. I was just a lad when I arrived, and I was a real footballer when I left.

I suppose I should have realised that the very fact I was still playing for United at 38 years old was a sign that there was not enough pressure on us senior players from those coming into the side.

I got my first taste of real professional football on loan at Northampton. I was 18 at the time, and I played only nine games, but it was a massive opportunity for me.

Liverpool give young players a good opportunity.

It's about getting experience and developing. The best way to do that is to go out on loan to play first-team football.

If you're lucky enough to get into a Premier League or Championship team straight away, well done to you, but I feel really grateful for the experience that I had at the lower end.

If I had the opportunity, I will ask every Nigerian kid to start his career in Germany. The structure they have in the Bundesliga is far from what is obtainable in other leagues.

From an early stage in my career, if you're talking about picking up knowledge, it would have been via Ian Greaves who was involved in my success as a young player at Bolton. And working under managers such as Bobby Gould and George Graham helped me to expand my knowledge at bit more.

For a player it's an amazing experience to be at Real Madrid. I matured a lot there, principally as a person.

At Real Madrid, we have many good players that the team can learn from.

Dele Alli is probably the perfect example. He played loads of games for MK Dons at a young age. He got a move and kicked on from there because he had that experience behind him.

You look at a club like Chelsea, and you know it won't be easy to get into that team. Sometimes you have to go away, play regular first team football, and show Chelsea that you are ready to play for them.

I feel like I have done a lot at United, I still have developed as a player and grown into myself, seen a lot of faces come and go.

It's very important that Manchester United have four or five young players every year from the youth system.

I think Arsene Wenger was good for me.

I first came up under Joe Royle and when Keegan took over it was even better for me because I felt his style added more to my game.

You can see the players are world-class just by the way they pass the ball. Ozil, Sanchez, and Cazorla, for example, are huge personalities. Even though the club maybe spent more money on me, I can still learn a lot from them in any respect.

I think that it is advantageous to join Bayern Munich at a young age.

When I first arrived at Napoli, I was the ball boy, which meant that I got to watch as the legends trained. Then, once I joined the youth team as a young teenager, I was a midfielder just like Tardelli.

The game shapes you. I played for 20 years at all levels, apart from the Premier League. I had a disaster at Bristol City, where in two years I learnt more about myself, the industry, fans, how you get treated, than I ever learnt in my career.

Little details about young footballers catch your eye when you have been around a big club for a long time. At first, it can be minor things, like the way certain young players stand out from the group when the academy lads cross paths with the senior team on their way to training in the morning.