#2Sides: My Autobiography

by Rio Ferdinand

  Between Messi and Ronaldo, Messi is the more naturally talented. He’s a genius, a magician in a way that Cristiano isn’t. You can tell the difference from the way they score goals: power or precision. Messi’s goals are like fine art. He curls the ball in. He’s measured, precise, delicate. He’s all about guiding the ball into the corners. Ronaldo sometimes hits the ball and he wouldn’t even be able to tell you where it was going, except that it would be somewhere on target. He’s forcing that ball into the back of the net. They’re both great to watch, just different.

  If you wanted to build the prototype of the perfect footballer, Ronaldo would be it. He has physical power, incredible pace and uses both feet whereas Messi is mainly left footed. He scored a header against us in the Champions League but that is very rare for him. Ronaldo scores every type of goal: long-range, poaching, free kicks, penalties, headers like Duncan Ferguson or Bob Latchford. His flying header against Roma in Rome was just crazy. He jumps from the edge of the box, and heads it on the penalty spot. It took your breath away. And it was fearless too: he got hurt scoring that one. And his goal against Porto was even more amazing. I remember realising he was about to hit it and thinking: ‘No, no, that’s impossible’ because he was 40 yards out. And it went into the top corner!

  With Messi, you get the feeling that this guy was always destined to be one of the best in the world. He’s obviously had to work hard but everyone knew about Messi before he even played in the first team. I remember Ronaldinho – who was the best in the world at the time – saying in an interview that this kid was going to be the best. That was unprecedented: the world’s top player passing the baton like that. On Messi’s debut, Ronaldinho was just trying to put the kid in on goal to score a goal every time he got the ball!

  But Messi has had to fight too. He is small. He had a lot of injury problems at a young age. But he’s so good technically he can get past you in many different ways. He can unbalance you with just a drop of the shoulder. His acceleration is phenomenal. And he’s still taking the game to another level, statistics-wise and by dominating games and scoring ridiculous goals. They said 2014 was a bad year for him: he scored more than 40 goals and led Argentina to the World Cup final! He’s more reserved whereas Ronaldo has the showmanship to be the main man, to be the guy that everyone sees and looks at, and who shows all of his emotions on the pitch.

  Neither of the two dominated the World Cup in Brazil as they would have hoped. Messi got to the final but he didn’t really set things alight. He won the award for best player of the tournament although he obviously wasn’t the best player. Maybe it was something to do with the sponsors. He looked almost embarrassed when he had to go up and collect his award after the final. On the other hand, he definitely had a better World Cup than Ronnie who would have had targets he wanted to achieve, and he never got anywhere near them. I spoke to him after the tournament and I could sense he was gutted, though we didn’t talk about it directly.

  So who’s the best? It’s still hard to say. If I was the manager and was going to buy a player for Man United I’d go for Ronaldo because he’s accustomed to the Premier League, and he scores all types of goals. He can score a goal that Duncan Ferguson can score. He can score a goal that John Barnes would score. He’d score a goal that Gazza would score. He does it all.

  But then I’m biased because I played with Ronaldo for years. Thierry Henry, who played with Messi at Barcelona, had a different take on it. When interviewing him during the World Cup for my #5 magazine I asked him who was better. He said he respected and admired Ronaldo but then told me why he thinks Messi is the best … There was an incident during a practice match when Messi got fouled and the coach, instead of giving a free kick, said to play on. Messi was livid, so when the ball went back to his goalkeeper, he ran back and demanded it. The goalkeeper rolled him the ball, and Messi then proceeded to run through the entire team and score in anger. Thierry said that was what he used to do in the playground at school. I did stuff like that too against little kids. But Messi did it against some of the best in the world: Yaya Toure, Puyol, Iniesta, Xavi, Busquets. And it wasn’t just that one time. He did it a couple of times. Thierry said: ‘Can Ronaldo do that?’ I said, ‘Well, I’ve never seen him do that.’ Thierry played with Zidane and Ronaldinho but they never did anything like that. He said, ‘That’s when I knew Messi was different to anyone we’ve ever seen.’ I have to admit I was too stunned even to say ‘Wow.’

  My Foundation

  A sense of perspective

  If I hadn’t been a footballer I would probably have been a community youth worker. My Mum and Dad were always very giving people, always helping people on the estate and the estate was community-based, with loads of youth workers. So I thought: if I don’t make it as a footballer that’s what I’ll do. I’ll work for the local council with all the kids. That’s what a lot of my friends do today, so I’m sure I probably would have fallen into that kind of work myself.

  As kids, we’d sit on the stairs and everyone was always saying: ‘you know what? If I ever make it, there’s no way I am going to be a sellout and disappear. I’ll come back here and help.’ We all said that and it stuck with me. All my mates from that time help in the community one way or another. A lot of them moved away from Peckham, and have different jobs, but they’ve all kept strong ties to the area we grew up in.

  When I was a young player at West Ham there was loads of community work to be done and I got involved with the Prince’s Trust, visiting projects, giving out awards and stuff, encouraging kids to get qualifications and get their lives together. The Trust is something I really believe in. It gives kids an opportunity to start a new life if they put the effort in. A few years ago I was talking about this with an old mate and he said: ‘why don’t you start a foundation yourself. You could raise a lot of money and change a few people’s lives.’ And he was right. So that’s what I’ve tried to do. It’s developed over the years and is now called the Rio Ferdinand Foundation, and we’ve helped a few thousand children who’ve gone through our projects.

  We take a similar approach to the Prince’s Trust: giving kids the self-esteem, confidence and qualifications to start a new life. One aspect is to show them there are lots of different ways to make a living in fields they love. Lots of kids, for example, love sport and music and entertainment. They can’t all be the next Rio Ferdinand, or Wayne Rooney, or Olly Murs, or One Direction. But there are loads of other jobs in and around those industries. So we try to show them the possibilities, encourage them to explore and fulfill their talent, and open their eyes to what they are capable of. The way the foundation works is to help kids get their qualifications, and make it possible for them to start climbing the ladder and hopefully they’ll end up working in those fields. We have had a few kids working in film now. I produced a film called ‘Dead Man Running,’ and a few of the foundation kids worked as runners and now about six of them have jobs in the film industry.

  From my point of view, being involved in work like this gives you a sense of perspective. As football players we can be moaning about silly little things: ‘Hey! Where’s the shower gel! … The pasta is overcooked!’ Like everyone else, we get absorbed in our own little worlds a lot of the time. But when I go to one of our courses and hear some of the kids telling their stories, well, that really puts things in context. I remember one boy from Hull who was at rock bottom. He’d fallen into a great big hole and he didn’t see any way out. He’d been kicked out of his family home, he was homeless, he was drinking and taking drugs and he was suicidal. One of the few positive things in his life was that he loved football. He joined a community programme coaching and mentoring young kids and the transformation in him is just amazing! He got his qualifications and now he’s coaching football in the community and has become a mentor himself, helping younger kids get qualifications of their own and get on the ladder like he has. Now he’s doing well by himself and he’s just about to go to South Africa to do a coaching course. A few years ago
this guy couldn’t even imagine travelling to a different city in England. Now he’s flying halfway across the world!

  Even more harrowing, I remember a young girl from Salford talking about how she had to run away from home because she was abused sexually by her Mum’s various boyfriends and had nowhere to live. Eventually, she was taken in by foster carers and came to the Foundation. She had a lot of stuff to work through but now all the other kids look up to her and she’s an inspiration to others. She works for the Foundation as a mentor and goes around the country doing courses.

  I hear those kind of stories and think ‘flipping hell. The Foundation is doing some really good work. I didn’t realise it was going to get this deep.’ I’m very happy that it does but it reminds me of what I knew as a kid on the estate. A girl got stabbed to death once on the stairwells. Someone else got shot. I knew girls that got raped by older men on the estate. This is what I grew up around. It wasn’t ever far from my front door. I know all this. But then I got detached from all that by being a footballer, and having tunnel vision, not letting anything get in the way of me becoming a professional player. You don’t think about this stuff – then all of a sudden your memories come back and you think: that shit still goes on. And you have the urge to try and make something better for at least a few people.

  I don’t often talk about it, actually. People say ‘oh, he’s only doing it for himself, for PR, blah, blah, blah.’ On the other hand, charities do need a certain amount of celebrity to focus attention on a problem and help raise money, so when you become a footballer you’ve got to use that leverage to actually get issues noticed and make people aware that there is still some shit going on that does need help. I’d love to talk about this stuff in every interview I do but I don’t want people thinking it’s about me rather than the charity, so I don’t bring it up. You have to find a balance but that’s difficult because we live in such a cynical world.

  I was lucky to find a guy called Gary Stannett who’s now our chief executive. He’s been in this industry for years. The way it works is that he gives me an update probably every two to four weeks. He tells me what’s going on and we discuss new ideas. Should we run a new course on such and such? Should we work with this or that organization? I’m always in touch with what is going on and these days my Mum is involved quite a lot as well. She’s organised fundraising auctions and gala dinners in the last couple of years.

  It’s a good feeling. Part of it is getting auction prizes and stuff to go to my friends in the entertainment world and getting the kind of things that money can’t buy. I might ask Jimmy Nesbitt or someone to come in and do an appearance or presentation or a speech for the charity. And these guys are like me: just normal people who’ve done well in their industry but still have got their feet close to the ground.

  We run courses and projects in Salford, South London, South Africa and Uganda. We are just starting a partnership now in Northern Ireland, in Belfast. Unfortunately, I can’t get to all of them because football is my bread and butter, but when I do get the time and opportunity I do love to get more involved and have a look at what’s going on on the ground.

  It’s all part of being proud of where I’ve come from and connecting with that. I never try to hide the fact of where I have come from. I like it. I enjoy it. I love it. Growing up in Peckham made me who I am today, so I love to go to familiar places to get some Caribbean food, say, or a haircut. Certain people say, ‘What are you doing there man? You shouldn’t be around here. It’s dangerous.’ They don’t understand that I feel good in places like Lewisham in London, or Moss Side in Manchester, or Lozells in Birmingham. Why should I be scared? These places are mirror images of where I am from in London, so I always feel comfortable. There’s a big Jamaican presence, and a real mixture of people: white, black, Somalians, Africans, lots of different cultures, which is exactly how I grew up.

  There was a great place I used to go to get my hair done in Moss Side called Ritchie Barbers, which is still there. For five or six years I went to a dread guy called Raheem on Tipp Street. He’s a good guy, too, a typical Manchester lad. And then I went to Chris Rock, a Jamaican guy who’s also in Moss Side. One time in Lozells me and Emile Heskey walked into a place together and people were like ‘whoa, what are you doing here?’ So I said: ‘I’ve come to get a haircut, man. What are you doing here?’

  Life After Football

  When you’re young

  And everything’s going your way

  It comes to us all in the end – but it still takes you by surprise. A couple of days after Ed Woodward had sat down next to me in the changing room at Southampton and surprised me by telling me United wouldn’t be renewing my contract, I went shopping at Waitrose in Alderley Edge. As I walked to my car I heard chatter behind me. A Dad and son had spotted me and were having a conversation:

  ‘Do you know who that is?’

  ‘Yeah, that’s Rio Ferdinand.’

  ‘That’s right. He used to play for Manchester United.’

  Used to play? It was like hearing my own obituary. It hadn’t actually hit me until that moment that my Manchester United career was dead. But I was determined to carry on somewhere else. I love football too much to call time on being a player. Manchester United no longer wanted me but I had offers from clubs all over the world.

  I opted to connect again with my first manager Harry Redknapp and signed to play under him at QPR, where I’d trained as a teenager before joining West Ham. I told Harry: ‘I started with you and I’d like to finish with you.’ The key word of course – there’s no dodging it – is ‘finish’. Every athlete has that moment of truth where age catches up with him or her and they have to stop doing the thing they love. I’m not quite there yet, but I know the moment is not far off.

  The problem is that footballers, like other athletes, are not usually prepared or educated to deal with normal life after they retire. That’s why you see the stories of great athletes like Mike Tyson and so many others who’ve worked their whole careers and when they retire, fall into financial trouble and depression. Retirement is an important subject but it’s hardly ever talked about. It is almost taboo. But I’d like to talk about it because it can hit players hard and I wish there were more opportunities for players to think about life after football and how they can prepare for what is a massive change.

  Many footballers have a kind of ‘Peter Pan’ lifestyle and the end of their career comes as a shock. They think they are useless to society; they don’t know anything outside football and they don’t have the life skills to cope with new problems. But while their life as a professional footballer may be over, they’ve still got their whole life ahead of them. You usually finish football in your mid- or late 30s. But you’ll actually live to you’re mid- or late 80s – that’s another 50 years. So players need to think ahead, make investments and new careers for themselves.

  I’m lucky; I am well prepared. I’ve had help and been able to think about and work towards this moment for years. I’ve got my charitable foundation, my media work, my restaurant and other businesses, my social media … if I hadn’t had all these things going on in my life when I had my injury problems and was upset over losing the captaincy of England and United, God knows what would’ve happened to me. Maybe I would have turned to drink or gambling or depression might have set in or who knows what else. But that didn’t happen and for that I have to thank a number of people, most especially my friend and agent Jamie Moralee.

  Jamie and me go back a long way. He’s a great fella who’s been through hard times but has managed to turn negatives into positives for himself and others. We first met in the late 1990s when I was a teenage defender on loan at Bournemouth and he was a striker in his mid-20s with Crewe Alexandra. We played against each other a few times after that and we ran into each other on holidays. It was always a pleasure to run into Jamie: he and I would go to clubs and pubs and have long conversations as well. Then our paths diverged for a number of years and I didn’t see h
im again until our mutual friend Jody Morris’ wedding about eight years ago. By then, I was in my prime at Manchester United and Jamie had become an agent. Meeting up with him again was one of the turning points in my life; it’s worked out to be a blessing for both of us.

  My financial and managerial situation off the pitch at that time had become a mess, and I’d given no thought at all to the future. My football agent was Pini Zahavi, who I’d been with years and had been fantastic for me since I was a young player. Another agency handled my commercial deals, someone else booked my holidays, another guy looked after my finances, and there were other people for insurance and my property. It didn’t really make a lot of sense.

  Meanwhile, since we’d last met, Jamie had gone through bad times but had become a person who used his bad experiences in football to help others. At the age of 21 he’d been considered one of the best strikers in England outside the top division. He’d had a half-million pound transfer to Watford but hadn’t known how to handle the pressure. He lived too fast and succumbed to the temptations of overspending and over-indulgence in nightclubs and his playing career nosedived. I’ve always been lucky to have people outside football to turn to for wisdom, such as my best friend Gavin or my wife or my parents or Anton. But Jamie never had anyone to give essential advice on football and life. He wasn’t the only one to suffer from lack of guidance: a lot of my contemporaries were talented footballers who’d not had quite the career they should’ve done for one reason or another.

  By the time we met again, Jamie had built an agency that aimed to help players by taking a wider and more long-term view of a player’s life and career. As we renewed our friendship, Jamie talked about player management and explained the principles of things like helping players to make intelligent investments. I saw how he was around the England boys at our hotel: all the lads liked and trusted him but what drew me to him was the clear vision he saw for me in terms of building me as a ‘brand’ and, more importantly, for helping me prepare for life after football.