The Week in Quotes
© AFP
“I can’t forbid the girls singing to Neymar. I just think they have bad taste! He’s not all that in terms of beauty!”
Mano Menezes on the immense female attention received by his Brazil forward
“If you feel empty, fill yourself up. Riquelme has betrayed 75 per cent of the country, who are Boca fans.”
Diego Maradona on Juan Roman Riquelme’s decision to quit Boca Juniors because he felt “empty”
“When you have a sausage pulled away from under your nose, they will eventually snap and bite.”
Karl-Heinz Rummenigge on why he expects Bayern Munich to respond to being edged out for three major trophies last season
“I think they’ve made something that looked impossible, possible. It’s another dream come true. I’m joining a dream team, and they’ve bought the best defender in the world, Thiago Silva. As long as I have him behind me, I don’t need to look back. It’s true I don’t know that much about Ligue 1, butLigue 1 knows who I am.”
Zlatan Ibrahimovic on joining Paris Saint-Germain
“My only idol is Ronaldo. I think Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo are good players, but for me the only one is Ronaldo. I couldn’t see Maradona or Pele, so for me the best player I have ever seen is Ronaldo.”
Paolo Guerrero
“I would like it if the Ballon d'Or remains in the Barça dressing room. Hopefully Iniesta or Xavi can win the award. They would deserve it for everything they've done in recent years and at EURO 2012.”
Lionel Messi
“I never saw an England team in the last 40 years that kept possession against teams like France,Italy, Brazil, Spain and Argentina. Wake up everybody! I played for England for a lot of years and wanted to keep the ball better, wanted to be more successful, wanted a winning team – all those things. But it's disrespectful to other nations and arrogant to just dismiss them and talk about, 'Oh, we are England, we talk about ourselves'. We have to see ourselves in the light of Spain, Portugal, France, Italy, Germany, Argentina, Brazil.”
Gary Neville
“When I watch the I-League on TV, I feel like changing the channel.”
Baichung Bhutia, the legendary Indian, gives a frank assessment of the nation’s domestic league
“Leo will reach his peak this season. Regardless of everything that he has already achieved, he will now start to write history. His best is yet to come. Up till now, everything he has done was the result of his intuition and his desire to play. However, from now on the element of preparation will come into the equation as well. His choices will no longer be just based on his instincts, but also on his knowledge and experience. It's impossible to say where his limits lie. It's a mystery what he can achieve. Players like him are very rare.”
Fernando Signorini, the former Argentina physio, on Lionel Messi