First Team Quotes

I would really like to be at Barca because it is the best team in the world. I would like to be in the first team, but also, I know it is very complicated, as there are very good players.

I changed my position when I was 16 or 17. I started in midfield or further forward as a number 10, and then in one tournament, we lost two defenders to injury in the same game, and we didn't have any on the bench. So I played at the back, and the manager of the first team saw me, and he said, 'I want this guy in the first team,' and that was that!

I left Barcelona because I believed it was very difficult to have minutes in the first team, as there are very good players.

At the age of 16, when I had my first traning session with the first-team squad, I came into the cabin and there stood Ribery and he said: 'Come here, sit down. Take the locker beside me.'

If I wasn't aiming to break into the Arsenal first team, that wouldn't be the correct mindset.

I love playing and I'll do everything to be a first-team regular.

When I went up from the youth team to the first team at Internacional, it was a risk - they were almost betting on me making it.

At City it is very hard to get into that first team.

I think the first team I ever played for was a YMCA team, probably around when I was seven years old. And really I have vague memories of it. I think, at that age, you're just trying to make sure the ball stays in bounds.

I remember my dad ringing me up and giving me my GCSE results when I was at Thorp Arch for pre-season training. A month later, I was playing in the first team. It was pretty amazing, really. I think if you stopped and thought about it at the time, it would have hit you.

I had expected to be playing in the reserves and, all going well, that I might get a chance in the first team towards the end of the season. But it has all happened much faster than I could ever have thought.

Ajax have a tradition of good football and play 4-3-3, which suits me. They also spend lots of money on youth players with the aim of putting them in the first team.

I'll always be thankful to Villa for giving me the chance to play first-team football regularly.

I'm really excited by this opportunity to continue helping develop and work with some of the great young players we have coming through in the first-team environment and to work alongside Unai and his coaching team to help Arsenal win trophies.

For the fans, for the club, for the young players, I want to show there is a pathway at Fulham for young players to go through in the first team.

I'm going to play in the first team of Real Madrid.

Out of my 22 years, I've learned that only one team will treat you the best, and that's your first team.

You always need the hunger to play in the first team.

If the Cincinnati Reds were really the first major league baseball team, who did they play?

At Palace, I feel like a first-team player, and I have got the opportunity to play every week.

To score a goal for Liverpool is always special but the fact it was for the first team makes it even better.

Goal of mine is to make first team All-Defense. The way you do that is guarding the best players.

I want to be playing competitive first-team football every week and not reserve team football.

The world is full of people who never quite get into the first team and who just miss the prizes at the flower show.