Robin Van Persie, former Manchester United favorite, discloses the difficult way he was let go by former coach Louis Van Gaal.
Van Persie was signed in 2012 by Sir Alex Ferguson for 30 million pounds and played a pivotal role in securing the club’s 20th premier league title by scoring 30 goals.
Following Ferguson’s retirement and a series of managerial changes, Van Gaal took over and marginalized Van Persie, eventually informing him that he had to leave, despite the player’s reluctance due to his family’s settled life in England.
Van Gaal, frustrated with the situation, sold Van Persie to Fenerbahce for a reduced fee of £4 million before his contract expired.
“I had this chat with Louis van Gaal and he told me: ‘OK Robin, our ways will part. I’m the coach, you’re the player – you have to go, your time is up’,” revealed Van Persie in the High Performance Podcast.
“I was like: ‘Yeah but I still have a contract?’ He said: ‘I don’t care’.
“Ruthless. Towards the end of it, I saw something coming but not this ruthless. And the way he said it as well. And then a lot of things go through your mind when you get a message like that.
“I still had a contract, my family was happy, it was my 11th year in England, We love living in England. What’s next?
“My kids are going to school, they have their friends and everything. So in a split second, all these things come across [your mind]. How do you react to that?
“I said: ‘We will see what happens. That’s your opinion. But I have a contract and I’m happy in England at Manchester United. So we will see what happens’. And I stood up, shook his hand and left it.”
Reflecting on a training match exclusion by Van Gaal, Van Persie recalled trying to maintain composure and maturity.
“On the way home back I was thinking: ‘Okay, this is tough. How do you react to a message like that?’,” he added.
“That ruthless, that hard, that direct. And then loads of things came through my mind and we started pre-season. I wasn’t allowed to play in the 11 vs 11 and I was given a ball and told to do my own stuff.
“So you try to stay calm, stay cool but there’s loads of things happening. You’re playing the macho card. ‘It doesn’t affect me’ but it does. It does affect me, my family and my career. Big time.
“But I tried to stay cool, but maybe at that point it was good for me to talk to someone outside of my inner circle but I was too stubborn to do that.
“Now if I look back at it, there was a couple of points in my career where I should have done that.”