Footballers are a aggressive bunch. The need to win is never ever consigned to the pitch.
So when Manchester United strikers Diego Forlan and Ruud van Nistelrooy confronted one another on a tennis court docket at Nike’s HQ in Portland throughout a 2003 pre-season tour, there was stress.
Sir Alex Ferguson and their United team-mates had been watching. Fergie had apparently put cash on Forlan successful the pre-training tie-break tussle.
“Everybody needed to see who was going to win. I had all of the stress,” remembers 45-year-old Forlan, who’s gearing up for knowledgeable tennis debut in his native Uruguay subsequent month.
“Ruud performed rather a lot – not as a lot as I performed, however nonetheless he knew learn how to play.”
After a number of serving jitters, Forlan beat Van Nistelrooy “in the long run”.
What the now-interim United supervisor didn’t know – the wily Ferguson had usually not missed a beat – was Forlan had fairly the pedigree.
After retiring in 2019, exterior, Forlan had extra time for tennis. Specializing in the health and social advantages, he performed with mates within the Montevideo membership league.
His aggressive spirit was sparked and, in 2023, the left-hander made his ITF Masters Tour debut. Now he’s ranked 113th on the planet within the over-45s class.
A higher reward got here when he was given a wildcard into the Uruguay Open doubles on the ATP Challenger Tour – the tier under the place Novak Djokovic et al compete.
“When you requested me once I was enjoying soccer if I used to be going to play on the ATP Tour, I’d not have imagined it,” stated Forlan, who counts Boris Becker, Ivan Lendl and Goran Ivanisevic amongst his idols.
“I did not know if I used to be going to play tennis despite the fact that it was a sport I actually appreciated.”
