Former Manchester United captain turned pundit Gary Neville was unsure of Rice’s abilities and expressed some scepticism on the high price tag quoted by the Hammers.
Prior to the start of the season, Manchester United were rumoured to be looking for a defensive midfielder, and Rice was one of the options that United were looking at. The midfielder had an impressive season for West Ham and was also a key member of the England side, which made it to the Euro 2020 final.
However, at the time, Rice was valued by West Ham at around 100 million pounds, something that Neville didn’t quite see eye to eye with. He wasn’t completely on-board with West Ham’s evaluation, and also cast doubts over the player, saying that he did not rate him as highly as some others in the media did.
The move did not materialise, and Rice is still at West Ham, currently having a fantastic season under manager David Moyes, who has made the Hammers serious contenders for the top four players. The midfielder has been brilliant on and off the ball in West Ham’s stellar season thus far. Neville has since changed his stance and has accepted his error in judgement.
“This is something that I often say to myself in punditry. You form a view on something either in haste or we always tell ourselves sayings like ‘trust your first instincts’, ‘I knew I didn’t like them after five minutes.
However, I interviewed Declan Rice this week for the overlap and I judged him as a young player at West Ham. I have to say I got it completely wrong. What an outstanding young person.
Authoritative, confident, humble and quite simply the most impressive young footballer I’ve interviewed in 11 years. He’s also a fantastic talent and I went too early!”
Neville posted on LinkedIn.
Earlier, former England international and pundit Paul Parker hailed Rice and encouraged Manchester United to ‘spend a fortune’ going after the youngster.
“If you wanted to spend a fortune on a midfield player, go and get Declan Rice. Declan is the best central midfielder in the country.
If City wants to pay £100million for Jack Grealish, if someone wants you to pay £160million [for Declan Rice], then you gotta pay it because Jack Grealish wasn’t worth £100million. They’ve set a mark now.”
Parker said, as he spoke about Rice.
