'I left Man Utd without talking to Erik ten Hag - I didn't feel loved' (2024)

Former Manchester United midfielder Andreas Pereira previously opened up on how he avoided Erik ten Hag to seal a move away from the club

Andreas Pereira previously admitted that he dodged Erik ten Hag to seal his Manchester United exit after feeling 'unloved' at the club.

The Brazilian midfielder left Old Trafford in the summer of 2022 after loan spells at Valencia, Granada, Lazio and Flamengo to join Premier League side Fulham for £8million.

Despite question marks surrounding his future potential, the 28-year-old has cemented a starting place in the Fulham line-up, making 23 goal contributions in 84 total appearances - and had even reportedly caught the eye of Chelsea this summer with his performances for the Cottagers.

Speaking earlier this year, the Brazilian admitted that he refused to talk to Ten Hag - who had coached him at PSV - in order to push through a move away from Manchester so he could play regular first-team football. The Dutchman had just been appointed as Ole Gunnar Solskjaer's permanent successor when Pereira was returning from his fourth loan spell away from the club.

Ten Hag was still assessing his squad when Pereira took the decision away from him by angling for a transfer, fearing he'd only be a bit-part player.

He told Vibe with Five: "This was when I came back to England [after my loan in Brazil]. Erik ten Hag, he worked at PSV when I was 16 years old. Before leaving for United, the [PSV] president and Erik ten Hag came to speak to me and my dad and said, ‘Look everything is set up for you at PSV, if you stay here you’re going to play in the first team’. But I’d just been to United and spoke with Fergie. I was like, ‘I’m going to United’.

"That’s why I didn’t want to speak to Erik because I knew him and I knew that, at the time, it was always a conversation, like, ‘Andreas, stay here. You’re not going to play every game, maybe one game in every three, you’ll be around the squad’. That’s not what I wanted, I wanted to play."

The midfielder, who made just 75 appearances for United despite coming through the club's youth ranks in 2014, admitted he had reservations about leaving the Red Devils but took the plunge to return to Brazil where he could earn the 'love' he deserved.

Pereira said: "Leaving United, you’re like, ‘Am I really going to do this? Am I sure?’ In the end, you’re never 100 per cent sure, really. Sometimes you think stay and have another go. Other times, you have to leave.

"I wanted to play, after COVID, I wanted to play. I was going crazy, wanting to play in the Premier League. I wanted to show that I was good enough, I was very close to joining Everton and suddenly my father called me and said, ‘Andreas, you never played in Brazil, you’re Brazilian’.

"I was like, ‘Where do we go then?’ The president of Flamengo jokingly called my dad and said, ‘If he wants to come, he can come’. Everyone at United said, ‘You’re crazy, you’ll stay in Brazil, you’ll never come back to Europe’. Everyone in my family wanted me to come [to Brazil] but they were like, ‘No, what are you doing?’

"I wanted to play in Brazil and want to feel loved. I didn’t feel the love that I thought I should get. I wanted to feel loved by my own people, play close to my family and enjoy football."

Pereira has been the subject of interest during this transfer window, emerging as a target for Chelsea at the beginning of the summer. Brazilian outlet Globo reported that the 28-year-old was the first choice to replace Conor Gallagher at one point - and the player's agent had an asking price of between £30-35m.

However, this transfer has not yet come to fruition and Pereira remains one of the first names on the Fulham team sheet, having started their opening-day 1-0 defeat to United and the 2-1 win over Leicester last weekend.

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