After scoring a beautiful winner against Manchester City on Boxing Day, Leicester City player Ricardo Pereira was highlighted by every sport newspaper in Portugal on Thursday.
Now this Friday, O Jogo managed to interview the former Porto right-back, and talked to him about what has been the ‘best year of his career’ so far.
“FC Porto, the national title, the call to the World Cup and the Premier League…” Ricardo explains to O Jogo his standout points.
Ricardo was one of the many Portuguese players and managers who have joined English football in the past couple of years, and he believes they’re doing a pretty good job so far.
“I think we’ve been a good business card. It’s important to show the quality of Portuguese players out there. I hope more come to England.”
On Wolverhampton Wanderers manager Nuno Espírito Santo and Everton boss Marco Silva, Ricardo Pereira said: “They (English fans) like both very much because they notice that Everton and Wolves have a different style from the others, like to play, they notice another game matrix. They say that the merit is the coaches’.”
When playing for Porto, the Portuguese international used to frequently change between operating as a winger and as a right-back. Now he’s mostly been used as a fullback at Leicester City, and claims it has been a little bit difficult for him to play as a winger again.
“When I got back to being a winger, here in Leicester, I found it difficult to change. For a long time now I was almost only a fullback. When I changed frequently, the instant adaptation is easier and it turns out to be natural, today to play fullback in the next game as a winger. This change becomes easy.”
“I no longer feel uncomfortable about jumping around. I had to adapt only to English football because it is different… There are many transitions, it is more aggressive, the game is more direct. I felt some difficulties at first because I was not used to it. I think intensity is the big difference. You can see it from the outside, but whoever is inside notices more. It’s always attack, counterattack, fast attack … There’s not much patience with the ball. And all the teams have many internationals and a lot of quality “
“The Premier League is challenging, it’s a different dimension, another culture, other environments, stadiums always full, games always difficult. I am enjoying the experience, I want to continue to improve, to help my team and later we’ll see.”
