The best player he’s played with, what’s wrong with football these days and what he really thinks about Roy Keane.
The ex-Manchester United cult favourite Louis Saha was at the Web Summit talking about his company, Axis Stars, which specialises in mentoring and guiding professional athletes on all aspects of life.
As well as discussing business, we talked football with the former French forward, who wasn’t afraid to disclose a couple of personal gems.
@JOEdotie Speaking with @ColmBoohig at @WebSummitHQ Enjoying it pic.twitter.com/kfRuYxKkhc
— Louis Saha (@louissaha08) November 3, 2015
On the best player he’s played with:
“When I’m asked this I always think, Cristiano Ronaldo. It’s not just his ability, he is a really, really hard worker. When you see him up close you realise that he’s brilliant at every aspect of the game.
“Messi is more of a natural player, but Ronaldo runs 7, 8 km a game and still scores so many goals. It’s crazy.”
His opinion of Roy Keane:
“People see him as this really intense character, but I love that about him because it gives you value – it forces you to be competitive.
“Roy doesn’t care what people think about him, and I really respect that. He’s a great guy to chat to, more than anything. You learn a lot when talking to Roy, his biggest message is to always be yourself, no matter what that type of person that is!”
“Too many players are scared now to be themselves, I don’t like it. You see it on the pitch, everyone is the same. For example, it’s hard to find a specialised defender or forward these days, everyone sort of plays the same.”
His favourite goal:
“Against Wigan away in 2006/07. I managed to take the ball down from the air with a nice first touch.
“It was more about what that goal meant. The fans weren’t happy with me at the time and they were asking where Van Nistelrooy was (United had just sold the Dutchman to Real Madrid).
“That goal gave me the confidence to go on and the fans started trusting me more.”
The toughest defender he’s come up against (a tie for first):
“I really never liked playing against Rio (Ferdninand) and (Nemanja) Vidic, both in training and in actual matches.
“Normally against defenders my main idea wasn’t to score goals, it was to create the space in order to open the game up, and then the goals would follow”, said Saha.
“But with those two, it was really hard (laughs)! They’re very technical and I felt like they were never worried against opposition strikers.”
And finally, since he was in Ireland, we asked him what he thought of Ireland’s chances against Bosnia in the Euro 2016 play-off:
“It will be a tough one.”
“Bosnia are quite strong, especially up front. But there’s not as many gaps as there used to be between teams, just look at what Wales have done, so you never know.
“I look at France, I fancy their chances but at times they can still be quite fragile in games. Whereas, you look at Belgium, and they’re one the best teams in the world now.
“The gap is definitely closing.”
