Costel Pantilimon is currently happy with his career in England, somewhere the Romanian calls his ‘second home’.
Moving to Manchester City in 2011, the goalkeeper is completely settled in English football and doesn’t seem to have any plans to move on just yet.
Playing for Nottingham Forest on loan from Watford last season, Pantilimon made the move permanent during the summer transfer window, and after a period of uncertainty in the position the Championship club now have their first choice.
Speaking to Liber Tatea in Romania, the stopper was asked how he feels in his eighth year in England: “Very appreciated! England is my second home, I feel great.”
Then he was asked if there’s any regrets about a specific transfer within England, and Liber Tatea suggested it could be when the footballer left Manchester City for Sunderland in 2014.
Pantilimon does have a transfer regret, but explained it’s not that particular move: “I regretted a transfer, the safest one to Watford. A total failure, I did not expect it. I was so sure. There was no problem with Heurelho Gomes. I had come from Sunderland, I was the goalkeeper of the year in the Premier League. I said I’d better go, for myself and for the future, wherever I wanted. But it turned out that it was not like that. It’s a chapter I went through, I’m not happy to talk about it!”
Things didn’t work out at Watford, and the goalkeeper then moved to Deportivo La Coruna on loan. That didn’t go too great either, but the Nottingham Forest loan certainly worked out and has led the 31 year old to where he is now.
