United legend Vidic admits he almost joined Liverpool

Former Manchester United defender Nemanja Vidic has revealed that he “nearly” joined Liverpool before Sir Alex Ferguson convinced him to sign.

Vidic won almost everything possible in his time at Old Trafford, including five Premier League titles, a Champions League, three League Cups and a Club World Cup.

The Serbian signed for Manchester United from Spartak Moscow in 2005 for £7million but he has admitted it could have worked out much differently.

The 34-year-old, who announced his retirement at the beginning of this year, says he could have joined the Red Devils’ arch-rivals Liverpool but United were the more “decisive”.

“Benitez called me and I nearly went there,” Vidic told FourFourTwo. “I was interested in going, but my English wasn’t good and I was struggling to communicate.

“Then Manchester United came. Fergie called me at my apartment and said: ‘I watched you play for Serbia against France – I want you here’.

“United were decisive. Everything was done very quickly, within two days.”

Vidic came up against some of the world’s leading strikers in his time at United and he reckons Didier Drogba was harder to compete against than Fernando Torres.

“Drogba was tougher,” retired Vidic added. “Torres always created a chance to score, but Drogba was on you for the full game.

“People say: ‘You had a difficult game against Torres’, but it was just the one game. I went to head the ball but changed my mind and tried to pass to Edwin [van der Sar].

“I misjudged the distance and Torres scored.’