Rio Ferdinand says he played with a midfielder at Man Utd who was even smarter than Paul Scholes

Rio Ferdinand played with some truly amazing players during his time at Manchester United.

Indeed, United won countless trophies during this period including league titles and Champions Leagues.

Speaking to TNT Sports, Rio Ferdinand has been building his so-called ‘perfect player’ made up of a number of attributes.

It wasn’t easy for Ferdinand to pick some of these attributes as he’d worked with such high-calibre footballers during his career.

However, perhaps the most interesting claim Ferdinand made was around which of his former teammates has the highest footballing IQ.

Paul Scholes is one of the smartest footballers in history, but according to Ferdinand, he played with another midfielder at Manchester United who was even smarter than Scholes.

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Rio Ferdinand picks Michael Carrick for his footballing IQ

When building his perfect player, it was Michael Carrick’s footballing brain that Ferdinand went for.

Carrick was a fantastic player during his time at United, as Ferdinand’s praise here shows.

Interestingly, Bruno Fernandes also made a similar claim about Carrick recently.

Meanwhile, others have noted that Carrick was very underrated during his career.

Ferdinand had a brilliant record alongside Carrick during his career, so it’s not surprising to hear him give him this sort of praise.

Meanwhile, Ferdinand’s other picks for his perfect player were equally as interesting.

Rio Ferdinand’s perfect player

Ferdinand made a number of other interesting selections when building his perfect player.

Ryan Giggs, Cristiano Ronaldo and Nemanja Vidic all got mentions here, showcasing just how incredible the back catalogue of Ferdinand’s former teammates is.

Interestingly, Wayne Rooney didn’t get a mention in any of these categories, despite the fact Rooney is an all-time great striker and Manchester United’s top goalscorer ever.

United’s glory days were jam-packed with incredible talents who worked their socks off for the team, and, unfortunately for the Red Devils, that level of quality and work ethic has been absent for quite some time.

United have a lot of work to do if they want to get back to the levels they were at during Ferdinand’s era.

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