Trying to live a kind of second life at Manchester United, after a loan in which he excelled at West Ham, Jesse Lingard is the latest protagonist of the chronicles on the portal ‘The Players’ Tribune’. In a text in which he begins by saying that the main element of the whole story he tells is his brother Lou, Lingard remembers the complicated moments he went through in recent times, especially after the 2018 World Cup, when injuries cut off all his evolution that had been denoting. The midfielder spoke about José Mourinho, revealed curious episodes with the coach and also left a word of appreciation for the way Bruno Fernandes always treated him.
It all starts at the start of 2018/19, right after the World Cup. “Shortly after returning to the 2018/19 season I had a groin injury. I’ve always run a lot in games, about 12 or 13 kilometers. It takes a lot, but I was always able to push myself to the limit. This time it was different. No. No. I could. After a few games I had to stop. I couldn’t play, I couldn’t train. My body had had enough. “At the time José Mourinho was Manchester United’s coach and, well, he didn’t like having his players injured. He didn’t even want to know. in general I have to admit it. Before all the injuries, he trusted me, he put me in big games. We won trophies and he made me a winner. He could take that side out of you. He would also like to have a personal connection with Sometimes I would look at my cell phone and have a random FaceTime of it. Just like that, just to see how it was. At first I thought it was weird. He would call me and just say ‘Hey Jesse, how are you?’ in that ‘well, just relaxing, watching TV (a strange silence)… and you, what are you doing?’ (laughs) I thought it was funny, but to be fair it shows how much he cares about us. But in terms of injuries it was tricky because he didn’t want to hear about it.”
“From then on I couldn’t go back to what I was. I was having problems both mentally and physically. I also had an issue because of my mother and her depression. I’ve already talked about it and that’s not what I’m talking about here, but it affected me too. It was my mother, you see? Not playing made things more complicated. But when I started playing again, even when I was physically fine, it wasn’t me. My family continued to go to the games, but they couldn’t even make it See me. They always said, ‘This isn’t you, it’s not your aura’. The games passed and I didn’t seem to be there. It was a ghost. and saying ‘today I want to see the Jesse Lingard I know’. All I was thinking was ‘Mine, I can’t, because that’s not me!’ I love football, I love it to death, but there were times when I thought ‘I can’t keep doing this’.”
Everything would change later with the loan to West Ham, where he definitely returned to being the real Lingard. To the point that even Bruno Fernandes surrendered to his exhibitions. “I talked about me being the ‘best player in the Premier League’. Me!!! Can you believe it? This from Bruno! I love him. He was always sending me messages of support while I was on loan. And getting that recognition from someone of your level was just incredible”.
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