Ex-Liverpool star insists current Man Utd saga ‘nothing in comparison’ to him calling Souness a ‘liar’ on TV
Ex-Liverpool forward Craig Bellamy insists the current situation between Jadon Sancho and Erik ten Hag at Manchester United is “nothing in comparison” to his dispute with Graeme Souness.
Ten Hag accused Sancho of poor performances in training after dropping him for their 3-1 loss against Arsenal back at the beginning of September.
The Man Utd winger disagreed and took to social media to dismiss Ten Hag’s claims with the Dutchman demanding an apology for the England international’s actions.
Sancho took the post down but has since refused to say sorry with the Man Utd boss making him train away from the first-team squad.
It now looks likely that Sancho will leave the club in the January transfer window on loan with Barcelona, Borussia Dortmund and Juventus some of the clubs mooted.
But Bellamy thinks it is “nothing in comparison” to his bust-up with Souness at Newcastle with the former Wales international taking to TV to label his boss a “liar”.
READ MORE: Erik ten Hag ‘looks like a dead man walking’ at Man Utd unless he changes that system
Speaking on The Overlap, in partnership with Sky Bet, Bellamy said: “With Graeme Souness, it turned into a big conflict, which was self-inflicted. You’re talking about the Jadon Sancho and Erik ten Hag situation, that is nothing in comparison to how I left Newcastle. That situation could be solved very quick.
“I went onto TV and called Graeme Souness a liar, I couldn’t go back and apologise, it had gone too far. Graeme came into the club and in one of his first speeches, he said he was here to win stuff and that if anyone didn’t want to win silverware, then they could get out.
“Graeme was a good guy, but I didn’t feel that he handled situations well. We were creating news stories but weren’t winning anything. We were socialising quite a bit, and I didn’t like that, so I can only imagine what other people thought, especially Souness.
“He was never controlling, but he was trying to make us more disciplined as a team. We had Patrick Kluivert at the time, and he had no interest in being disciplined.”
On whether he classes himself as being angry, Bellamy added: “Very angry. Very loving, very caring – there were different sides to it, but I couldn’t fix them all together. I don’t know why I felt like this, my moods could turn so much, where I didn’t want to get out of bed. [At what point these moods were occurring] Through my injury, these were triggers for me, where you’d taken football away from me.
“Saturday I could focus on the match, the week with training, I would come in early and leave late. It was outside of football that I struggled. I had an amazing wife, amazing kids, but I wasn’t happy enough with that and I felt so guilty that I brought my wife into that, where I wouldn’t speak to her. [On whether he was a nightmare to live with] Yes, I would distance myself because I didn’t feel loved, I always felt like I didn’t deserve this and was really harsh with myself on everything.”
