Edgar Davids Quotes

I want to be the complete midfielder, someone who can defend and attack. Steven Gerrard is someone who's done that very well over the years, and he is someone I am trying to emulate.

I've always said it, and the whole football world knows that Cavani is a centre-forward and that he has proven his worth in that position. Having said that, Cavani has shown other characteristics that can help the team, like winning the ball back, helping out defensively.

Dominating the midfield is the most important thing in modern football. To succeed, you have to be good at everything.

Someone said that my coaching is a combination of Milan's defensive discipline and the Dutch propensity for attacking football, and I think that is a fair description.

This is one of the challenges we have: knowing that playing without the ball is just as important as when you have the ball.

When teams train now, it is about what they do with the ball and, if they lose it, how quickly they press to win it back.

I like to get the ball down and play, but I can always get stuck in and hold my own.

Jorginho is really suitable to the way I like to play. He is a player that has many good sides to him. He wants to work hard, and he's very fast in moving the ball, which is important for us, although there is also Cesc Fabregas, who has the same potential as Jorginho.

When you play soccer, most of the time you got to get the ball moving, but once you get into that attacking third you gotta' be creative, you gotta' let your talent take over.

When you're a kid you just think about where you are going to be to put yourself in a position for the next scoring chance. But as you develop, you start to do things that may not catch the eye of the normal football watcher, the dropping back, the closing down.

If I don't get the service or if I don't the ball in the box, where I want it, I start drifting into midfield. I go and look for the ball. I try to be important for the team in other areas.

Every player wants to be as complete as possible and goals for a central midfielder are very important.

At Ajax, I got an education in how to be confident on the ball, my technique, and then, at Atletico, I learned how to defend. It was about the details, the ruthlessness; be clinical in front of your own goal, win every duel, be clever. I learned so much and, defensively, I grew there so much.

If I'm playing higher up the pitch, it's important I don't get carried away and start dropping too deep and I stay in my position.

I'm a coach who likes to have the ball, but what I really think is, 'How can you be in charge of the game?' I think, but maybe I am the only one, that the defensive process can take care of the game. Why is that? Because teams wait to defend. If you create something where you go to defend, to steal the ball where you want, it's different.

When I first came to Arsenal, I didn't know how to defend.

I can win the ball. I can clear the ball.

I'm a striker, and I can only score if the ball gets to me.

In Europe, being fast, being strong, playing only with your quality, you are going to struggle against teams that prepare.

In the academies, people develop differently, and going into that No 10 role helped me because central midfield was always packed with big, strong boys.

I think that football has changed, it has become more complex. For example, it's faster, you have less free space, and you have to play from such small spaces.

I'm really trying to work on my defensive positioning.

Every footballer enjoys having the ball at their feet. There are times in training you find yourself without the ball. I enjoy that side of it as well. If we can spend more time working with the ball then everyone will enjoy it.

Learning to play different roles has made me a more all-round midfielder.

I spent the best part of 20 years trying to stop people like Chris Waddle from playing. Now I'm convinced that good touch and loads of movement are the way forward.