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'Roy Keane was a problem for Sebastian Veron', says Ferdinand

Rio Ferdinand believes the reason Sebastian Veron did not succeed at Manchester United was because of then-captain Roy Keane.

The former United defender took to Instagram to have a Q&A with his millions of followers as the world stops and attempts to curb the coronavirus that has brought a stop to all sport globally.

One followers asked who the better player between Veron and Guti (former Real Madrid star) was, in which Ferdinand responded in a lengthy monologue on why things did not work out for the Argentine at Old Trafford.

"Oh, what a good question. Veron or Guti… For the older listeners, older viewers out here, Veron, Sebastian Veron, scored one of the best goals I've ever seen in training," Ferdinand said.

"The little rabona thing, bang from the halfway line, the whole training session shut down, stopped.

"'Did you just see that, what Juan Sebastian's just done there?'"

"He was an unbelievable player, great passer. The only thing I think that killed him was Roy Keane was probably a bit more of a dominant personality and was picking the ball up in his positions.

"You have to remember Veron came from Lazio, Parma where he was the main man, the whole game went through him. He came to United, that’s what Roy Keane did.

"Keane came and got it off the defenders, passed it through to the midfielders and attackers, and got in positions and was very vocal, like 'Yeah, give me the ball! Give me the ball!'"

"And out of respect probably Seba just said, 'I’ll let Roy keep doing that'. But Seba was an amazing talent. I honestly think without Roy Keane there he might have flourished in a Man United shirt."

Veron joined United in 2001 for record fee (at that time) of £28.1 million on a five-year deal and spent two seasons at Old Trafford.

However, he did not live up to expectation at the Red Devils and Chelsea swooped him up in 2003 for half of the fee (£15 million) that Sir Alex Ferguson snatched him up for.

- Compiled by Tashreeq Vardien

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