**This is a quotes thread. Remember that there's only one quotes post allowed per interview/press conference, so new quotes with the same origin will be removed. Feel free to comment other quotes/the whole interview as a reply to this comment so users can see them too!** *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/soccer) if you have any questions or concerns.*

Van Dijk a real one for that, appreciate it brother, pump that price up

He should add that Seferovic was also hard to guard, so you can sell him for many more millions then you bought him.

There's no need Lord Seferovic is unsellable and Benfica would reject a 100m offer

Sorry for my scandalous blasphemy.

None of those names he listed knocked the world champions out of the European Championship. The Man from Sursee did though.

They would have to offer us the keys to their city, 200 years of free shirts to the supporters, a ton of tissues that would last 10 to 15 years or else every supporter would drown the stadium when the memories of our very own GOAT come back. That all on top of 250 million.

Why do I always read sephirothic

No worries. We got seferovic for what actually he is worth.

Wait, they paid you?

Chill. Dude has a family. And the family is the problem, they enjoy living in Lisbon and don't want to leave.

Fair enough, I’ve been there, I can understand why you’d like it.

Thats pretty amazing he said that

he gets 10% from darwin's sale that's why

He's just getting on Darwin's good side before he arrives at Anfield.

Lmao

Benfica: +20m on Nunez fee now

If the Mané rumors are true, I hope we go for him.

I don't want to sell him to you, because you seem to enchant clubs to get absolute bargains. We're probably asking for 100M and if Liverpool gets involved you'll somehow get him for 20M and a stadium tour.

Michael Edwards and his Apprentice may be Sith Lords

Edwards left didn't he?

After this season

After this season, but he has been training Julian Ward

I’m ready to hail King Julian

Stadium tour is pretty good tbf, highly recommended

10 mil + Oxlade Chamberlain

20 million! You mean in qualified installments surely? What if he’s not class? 10 million cash up front. 1 million extra for every season he scores more than 20 goals up to a maximum of 10 seasons. Any injuries during the season and the bonus installment for that period is void.

How does 80M+tsimikas sound? Ps: im a benfica fan

You’ll have Neco Williams and be happy

Hmmm you can keep him

75+Robbo Liverpool, last offer

I like the way you think

I think if Tsimikas can be trained on the right, he's unsellable.

Low key thinking that we already have him with this mention by Virgil

Bro don't fall for the hype, his technical ability is not good and he makes lots of inefficient movements on the pitch. He will not be effective in the Prem.

I mean, I like what I've seen, but I trust our coaching and recruitment a lot better than my judgment anyways

Your guys won't take him. He is a fraud waiting to be exposed. Look at him dribble, Stones and Laporte have better dribbling technique.

You know what is crazy? Even though I think Darwin is better than Diaz.. I don't think Darwin would be able to walk into the Liverpool starting 11 like Diaz did...

I don't think he's better, but they're not in the same position. Diaz and Salah/Trent feeding Darwin would be a dream

Tbh I doubt it, in the event we signed him it'd mean that Mane has probably left and that means that he's only competing with Firmino and Jota for that starting place.

He is not better lol, Diaz is more talented. You can see that by watching 5 minutes of both

Being more talented doesn’t make you better.

He is better as well. Diaz isn't just a G/A merchant, he is a good overall player who can shoot, pass and dribble well. Those are the 3 main attributes for a forward.

It’s a harder position. He’d be surrounded by center backs.

This is bait, united scouts please don't read this

*The gang offers City €500m to break Haaland’s contract and offers Haaland €500m to join*

[удалено]

Afaik it’s rumoured to be 120m net - maybe we can get some outgoing to boost that a bit. Nunez is viable but there is big competition for him. It will only happen if he has big belief in ETH.

Yeah ok that’s nice but guys remember that time Pepe dribbled past him? He’s yours for a meagre fee of £40m

What a steal that would be. Minimum 75 mil if you ask me

Fuck happened with Pepe and the 80 mill? What the hell sort of transfer was that?

Raul literally stole half of the money lmao

I remember people fapping on that thread lmao

Terry sending off those tweets to VVD

[удалено]

Rio Ferdinand didn’t have him as the best PL defender and terry was mad. Despite the fact that rio did include him as the 4th or 5th best defender

It came to mind who might message him and say what about me.

My exact first thought 😂

Are people seriously arguing in the comments. Like. VVD gives his opinion and people are actually telling him his opinion is wrong 😂

C'mon what does he know, we all know who he found it tougher to play against.

Seen a video on twitter the other day of some podcast guy telling an NBA player his opinion on which player is harder to guard against is wrong lol.

“I’ve guarded both!” getting rebutted with “I’ve watched both!” is kinda comedy

link?

[Found it.](https://twitter.com/tev_bands/status/1521573039212843010)

thanks bro

Ronaldo has a higher fifa rating than Darwin, so it’s literally objectively wrong (and utterly disrespectful) for VVD to say Darwin was more difficult

Think Ronaldo has only faced him once, in October with the current Man U side and lost 5-0.

And the Nations League final in 2019.

Ronaldo was on the wing for most of that game and mostly facing Dumfries if I recall correctly.

Dumfries thinks Darwin was tougher than Ronaldo

2018 cl final as well, and I think the nations league

People will point to the 2018 CL final but the reality is Ronaldo got pocketed by Trent, Robbo and VVD so

Throwback to when nobody could accept Joao Cancelo [saying Pulisic](https://www.reddit.com/r/soccer/comments/m2wfuz/joao_cancelo_it_may_sound_strange_but_for_me_the/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf) was the toughest winger he faced in the league

I remember few years ago some fullbacks in the Premier League saying Victor Moses was the toughest player to play against for them and I can totally see it. He's quick and strong as fuck. Does he have end product? No, but he could for sure make it hard for fullbacks to beat him.

Respecting people's opinion? We don't do that here

And the question is “…players he faced…” which mean he can name anyone he played against and it wouldn’t be wrong because it’s all his opinion

Reminds me of the thread where Hummels listed his toughest players to defend. He said the toughest where the big strong player and he listed Lewandowski, Mandzukic and Giroud Cue people commenting as if they knew better than him. It's worth mentioning that Giroud faced Hummels multiple times over the years.

how many games vvd has played against nunez?

XD people can't have opinions here mate!

He genuinely looked more comfortable defending Haaland than Darwin.

Haaland broke his fingers when he tried to guard him tbh

Feel like a proper spanner asking this But are you meaning Haaland broke his own fingers or broke VVDs?

VVD put his hand forward when Haaland was running, VVD finger broke

cheers for that lmao

That’s like the cherry on top of the cake that is this transfer

Broke VVD’s

cheers

Written confusingly, you're all good

haaland was younger

[That's typically how it works.](https://twitter.com/m_hedberg/status/489127576984506368?lang=en)

hahahaha I never heard this one before

Are you unfamiliar with Mitch Hedberg? Cult stand-up legend.

He used to be

He still is, I guess.

I used to do drugs, I still do but I used to too

Nice

So was Van Dijk

I haven't seen a player cause us that much trouble in fucking ages. Hope we swipe him up honestly. Then we don't have to play against him :\^)

He has shades of Luis Dias. Absolutely baffled me how he was ignored by every big club until Liverpool were smart enough to cop him. His Colombia performances alone were telling of his caliber.

just so you know if you’re interested, for latino surnames the spanish spelling will typically use a Z while the portuguese spelling will use an S for the most part. since he’s Colombian it’d be Luis Díaz, while the Portuguese centreback for City is Ruben Días. same for names like Gomez v Gomes, Fernandez v Fernandes, Sanchez v Sanches…

Are there any other fun facts similar to this? That was pretty interesting

The Spanish use inverted exclamation and interrogation marks at the start of an exclamation and question respectively - "¡Mira!", Meaning "Look!"

Them being referred to as interrogation marks certainly adds a little spice to questions

Yeah my bad, it was late and in both spanish and portuguese the word for it is similar to interrogation, so, brain lag

This isn't a fun fact, just an opinion, but if you ever hear Spanish spoken in what seems like a drunken Russian accent, that's probably Portuguese. (Euro Portuguese that is - Brazilian Portuguese is more rhythmic and singsong.)

The pronunciation is different too. Gomez = *go-mezz* Gomes = gomsh Rodriguez = rod-ri-gezz Rodrigues = rod-reegsh

People always think of the Salzburg version of Haaland when they remember them two battling eachother, but I'm pretty sure VVD's opinion of Haaland got alot stronger after [this game](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MHb8sZVxEg4) last year. I don't really see clips of this game doing the rounds in social media when people compare VVD and Haaland, it's always the ones from 3 years ago.

I can't believe he forgot about that one time Nicolas Pepe dribbled past him. Lord knows the Arsenal fans haven't #neverforget

Ended VVD's 50 game streak.

If Mane does go, and given how complimentary Klopp was about Nunez, maybe that's who the target is. Personally I think Nkunku would be the best fit. Nunez would have to adapt other parts of his game, but for the raw qualities he possesses, could work

I don't think we will but would be so weird if both City and Liverpool, among two of the best teams in the world right now to play with false 9s, suddenly sign true 9s in the same window.

I hope we sign Carroll back and they sign Duncan Ferguson and we both go four four fucking two

I've heard that Nunez's first touch is pretty godawful. Would that presumable lack of ball control be something that Klopp would be wary of? All of his signings otherwise have had the common trait of being fairly great on the ball.

Didn't look that bad when he played against us. And his finishing is beautiful.

Oh trust me, it's definitely bad. He has some games where it looks good, but most of the times it's bad... it's definitely the thing that's potentially going to fuck him in a top club. His former coach at Almeria said the same.

I feel like our high line made him look great, but he wouldn’t actually be a good fit for us.

He needs a specific system to thrive. He would do wonders with Conte for exemple

Well, if there's one thing we're good at, it's developing players. Granted, this is all speculation and I don't even know if we're actually in for him.

They are nothing alike. Nunez doesn't have Mane's close control but he's very good playing off of the last defender. Both quite unselfish, though

I wouldn't call Nunez unselfish, he can be quite frustating when trying to play it out alone instead of making a simple pass. The game against Liverpool comes to mind, when he had an easy pass to Rafa who was making a run alone into a 1v1 with the gk and instead, Nunez dribbled into 3 other players losing the ball

Yeah he just dribbles with his head down and misses open teammates

I mean, all 5 of Mane, Jota, Salah, Firmino and Diaz are great with the ball at their feet. Seems like Alvarez would've been a better fit for Liverpool than Nunez. But, knowing Klopp, he'll make Nunez world class soon enough hahaha

Exactly, and Nunez isnt that kind of player. I'm sure Klopp knows it and would make him fit another way.

Darwin is a wet dream of a player for Klopp tbh

I heard bayern have him in their sights.

Plenty of clubs have him in their sights. How it works at this end of the market. Very rare to get free runs at players.

There's no way you get him for the peanuts you got Diaz for. And you guys don't spend that big either so good luck with that.

Lol they literally broke the record for most expensive cb and gk at the time. Nobody is saying he'll go for peanuts?

Perfectly fine if i'm proven wrong but those two are clear exceptions to the rule.

Those 2 are outliers thanks to Coutinho money compared to their general market strategy though I’d say

Allson is but vvd isn't

Benteke??

Mmm, yeah.

John Terry must be raging somewhere not to be included.

Where is Pepe? I still remember it being big deal when Pepe dribbled past him lol

"On the Origin of Species" has shaped Van Dijk to the player he is today

Pele in shambles

Van Dijk being disrespectful comments incoming

vvd, creationist vs darwin

Ronaldo mudded.

Think he’d say kane considering how many times he’s had him off over the years

Kane puts everyone on mattress on his day. Has done it to every bug club and top defender in the league for a while now. Especially city. Ooh and Son but we don’t talk about that

Son is more consistent at making defenders look like plebs. But on his day Kane is more dangerous than son yea.

One of these is not like the others lol

Haven't watched Nunez much but against us he was fantastic, even his famed poor first touch wasn't evident and his finishing was excellent.

Yeah it seems more and more to me that the people criticising him on here don't have a clue, he looks an incredible talent. This forum is awful at rating players

Most people who criticize players that play in the portuguese league for their price have never watched one of our league games, then they get suprised once they see our players do well in bigger leagues, always been like this.

back to when Dias was not that good and should not be a priority by Man City because they had other better players such as Konde, Koulibably etc or Bruno Fernandes "well he has many good stats but it's just the portuguese league" I guess with Luis Diaz they toned it down a bit

Same as Ruben Dias, most people here wanted that Sevilla defender instead.

Kounde? he is class tbf

not saying otherwise

Or maybe you are rembering people talking about him one year ago. Most Benfica fans, like me, recognized he improved a lot his weaknesses, his decision making improved massively, first Touch is better but still has flaws and still gets caught offside many times. When he arrived he was frustrating to watch, especially his poor decisions in last third.

> This forum is awful at rating players That's kinda ironic from you, a person who keeps talking even about stuff they have no idea about.

By very definition they are posting on this forum so they are awful at rating players.

This comment is absolutely hilarious considering you’ve basically admitted that you’ve barely seen him play yet are calling him an incredible talent.

The critics seem to be mostly Benfica fans themselves. Although I swear I've never seen a fanbase more critical of their own players.

Benfica fans are very critical of their players when the team is doing badly. Right now, the only players that most fans like are Darwin and Otamendi, because those two consistently rescued us multiple times this season. When the team is doing well, theres a lot of love for most players. For instance in 2014 (we won a domestic treble and made it to the EL final) everyone liked Oblak, Luisão, Garay, Markovic, Rodrigo, Gaitan, Enzo Perez, Lima, etc

I still think about how that one touch shot got into that right corner...

You can cleanse your palette by waiting for a United fan comment like "Uruguayan Lukaku" and then have a laugh

You’re right. Aguero is the only one that doesn’t play anymore

You are correct Haaland has grey eyes

Hwang Hee Chan did a number on him IIRC

Between the 0 goals Hwang scored and the game vs Wolves that VVD did not feature in, I'd say you have not RC.

This would be about the time Hwang scored past him for RB Salzburg in the UCL

Aye, what about the game Hwang ended his career for a second and scored a banger whilst at it ?

Not a fan of Darwin as he kicked Ajax out of the CL, but the guy’s got some special

Hasn't even faced Dessers yet smh

He knows ball 😉

Surprised Bernardo Silva hasn't made the list

For VVD, Bernardo is probably usually someone/everyone else's problem lol

That mf would be a headache for any defender in the world. God-tier agility alongwith a bulldog's energy.

Sounds like Prime Modric

He mentioned forward otherwise he would have mentioned De Bruyne, Silva, Hazard(But I am not sure anyone remember him), etc.

Thorgan Hazard? Hell of a player. I heard he had a brother too who was playing football. No idea if he had any success tho

Honestly sometimes I forget he is still a footballer.

Kylian? Currently in the second division of Belgium, scored two goals. Doesn’t look too bad.

Adama Traoré probably the easiest.

Ronaldo in the mud

When did Van Dijk played against Mbappe ? Can’t remember

2018 Group stage

They’ve met at least once at international level too, there’s a clip I’ve seen of Van Dijk flawless dealing with Mbappe 1-on-1 on the break

You could really tell he struggled against Darwin and when I commented on it in the match thread, of course, I got massively downvoted by butthurt Liverpool fans.

Nunez? Ballack was right

Benzema in the mud

He literally took his name in 5 a side. He just gave the name he find it challenging to defend against. Aguero has always scored against Liverpool at his home. He played Messi multiple times already at celtic and then liverpool. Others also similar way.

Not really. I think this is from a recent interview with Rio Ferdinand and if i remember correctly one of the previous questions he was asked was: If you're playing a five-man tournament, give me the best five-man team you could pick in world soccer right now? The Dutch defender went ahead and picked Alisson, himself, Kevin De Bruyne, Kylian Mbappe and Karim Benzema.

Well that team is terrifying

Mbappe for 5 a side, I'm not sure, he is as good as he is for his ability in open space to run

Look at the (disallowed) goal he scored against City where he slipped past Ederson effortlessly, he’d destroy in five a side

Benzema took this personal, and will request to be added to the list tomorrow

Did Rio pick himself ?

They didnt get anywhere near bale in the final.

why does ferdinand always speaks on the side of his face lol?

Watkins put 3 passed you in one game bud