Nemanja Vidic not the first footballer to feel under the weather

So Nemaja Vidic, the Manchester United and Serbia defender, doesn’t rate fashionable Manchester for its lifestyle or, more importantly, its weather. "I will never stay to live in England, that's for sure," Vidic told a Russian football magazine. "You get only a brief glimpse of sunlight before it's all cloudy again.

"The winters are mild, but in summer the temperatures seldom go higher than 20 degrees. And it rains, rains, rains. In future, I would like to test myself in another top league. I'm thinking of Spain. At least there will be no reason to complain about the weather.

"In England, they say that Manchester is the city of rain. Its main attraction is considered to be the timetable at the railway station, where trains leave for other, less rainy cities."

And the take-no-prisoners centre-half dislikes our strong work ethic compared to the relaxed outlook in two countries best known for wandering into neighbouring territories armed to the teeth. "In Russia and Serbia the people's way of life is similar,” he said. “In England it's totally different. Here they just don't have time to feel the joy of life. Throughout the week they all work so hard. They only talk to people at [their] lunch break. Then in the evening they come home and watch the telly, so they can get up early for work the next day.”

Yet another footballer griping about life in the UK, it seems. Remember these others?

Stephane Henchoz found Blackburn lacking in comparison to Switzerland. “It always seems to be pitch dark by 3.30pm in Blackburn,” the former Rovers defender, said. “And if you want to go shopping, there is nothing to buy. When I see the way people live up here, I realize how lucky I am.” Of course, he later moved to Liverpool.

Emerson, the Brazil (and occasionally, Middlesbrough) midfield player, blamed Teesside for harming his wife’s health. “My wife is ill,” he said before skipping town. “She doesn't like Middlesbrough as she feels it is too cold.” Andrea, the lady in question, who grew up in a house with no running water, thought North Yorkshire “strange and frightening”. “In my country at this time of year," she said. “everyone is at the beach and music and dancing are everywhere.” She obviously never experienced Redcar on a Saturday night. Emerson (and Andrea) eventually moved to Tenerife.

Brian Roy had few nice things to say about Nottingham after leaving Forest for Hertha Berlin. “Berlin has everything,” the Holland winger said. “It is a cosmopolitan city with theatres and the people are open-minded. They are not as narrow-minded like the people in Nottingham. There are no theatres, no cinemas, hardly anything. All Nottingham has is Robin Hood - and he's dead.”

At least Vidic didn’t have a go at the lovely ladies of Manchester. Unlike Georgi Hristov, the former Barnsley forward. "The local girls are far uglier than the ones back in Belgrade or Skopje, the capital of Macedonia, where I come from,” he said, prompting the memorable headline ‘Pistov Hristov’. "Our women are much prettier. Besides, they don't drink as much beer as the Barnsley girls which is something I don't like at all. England is a strange country and I found it hard to adapt to living here. To be honest I expected more of Barnsley as a town and a club."

Why? Even locals don’t seem to expect much. "Newcastle girls are all dogs, England is full of them," Freddie Shepherd, the Newcastle United chairman, told an undercover journalist in 1998 while in a, er, lap-dancing club in Marbella.

If Vidic fancies somewhere sunnier than Manchester, where an average of 35.4 inches of rain falls per year, he could try Milan (average annual rainfall 39”), Sao Paulo, Brazil (55”) or Miami (60”).

These people should just get real and accept the mild downside of earning all that money. And remember the wise words of Ian Rush, who moved from Liverpool to Turin to play for Juventus and then said “It’s like a different country”.

Manchester v Uzice: there can only ever be one winner

Nick Szczepanik

Comments

[Ally]

Frankly the whole article smacks of ignorance. If you took the time to go and visit Serbia and the other locations mentioned in the piece you would be able to comprehend Vidic's comments about lifestyle and weather.

I appreciate that a journalist has to take facts and construct them in such a way as to present a coherent argument. However the critical thinking and use of facts here is clumsy and I would have expected better of a Times journalist. Stop wasting your time fabricating a story out of a couple of comments, you're a better journalist than this Nick.

[John Jones]

I know this will never get posted, but just so you know.....I think you have a cheek to put in a sly dig about Vidic and his country.

He has a point about the weather, "it never stops raining".Big deal, he has thrown his rattle out of the pram...
But because he makes this point you have to hit back with , what I think is a disgraceful remark , "two countries best known for wandering into neighbouring territories armed to the teeth "...

I mean what age are you anyhow, if that is how you hit back at someone slagging off the weather in this country....

But just to fight Vidic's corner for him, I'll leave you with this...

I suppose the Great British Empire was built on just wandering into neighbouring countries and over 1/3 of the worlds territories armed with just feathers and dusters "...no they were armed to the teeth !!!!!!

You really do boil my blood sometimes with spiteful comments like that and I don't expect a reply as you won't see my point through your British Blinkers...

What an embarrassment...First Boris Johnson and now you...

[Gary Stubbs]

never liked vida as a player. Wish we'd kept Silvestre, he was so much better on the ball than clumsy Nemanja. And he never moaned about Manchester either, and he's from France, not Serbia - where they wander round with a Kalashnikov!

[bill]

How could you leave out David Ginola's famous comments about British women?

[Hugo]

Instead of the average amount of rain per year, how about telling us the average number of rainy days in comparison to those other places?
I don't know of any other country where the locals spend so much time talking about the weather. Why is it so hard then to accept that foreigners may find it hard to adapt?

By the way, that comment on Emerson's wife was idiotic. She was poor and grew up in a house with no water, so what? What has that got to do with disliking Middlesbrough and it's weather?

[Chris]

Didn't Henchoz move from Liverpool to Blackburn, rather than the other way round?

[T. Masson]

"in two countries best known for wandering into neighbouring territories armed to the teeth." What a flippant, deceitful, jingoistic comment oozing ignorance from a brainwashed brain of the writer who should stick to sport.

[Tom S]

The more you travel, the more you see that English weather really is rubbish, much of the mainstream culture is boneheaded and that life elsewhere offers different pleasures that you wouldn't know were possible if you hadn't hit the road, which explains why some people just can't see what the likes of Vidic are complaining about. Why not just take his words at face value? Even go to Serbia and have a look for yourself...

[Davy Broon]

I despair at the attitude of these guys. I'm becoming a bit like my father as time goes on...very cynical about football as a whole and in particular these over paid, under worked types who are desperate to join a Premiership side for all the cash on offer, then desperate to leave once they've had their fill.