Manchester United legend Rio Ferdinand joked that he couldn't sign a Liverpool shirt after being approached by young Reds fans at Craven Cottage on Saturday.
Ferdinand was in London to cover Fulham ’s Premier League game against Liverpool in the early kick-off. Before the match started the BT Sport pundit was walking around the pitch when he was called over by a young group of fans in the stands.
The kids were wearing a mixture of Fulham and Liverpool shirts and scarfs and were eager for Ferdinand to sign their memorabilia.
The 43-year-old obliged for those wearing Fulham stuff, but refused to entertain the Liverpool-clad supporters.
Posting a light-hearted video on Twitter, Ferdinand said: “I’ve got some fans here at the Liverpool game. He’s just asked me to sign a Liverpool shirt… are you crazy? I can’t sign it, I can’t.”
One supporter does get Ferdinand’s sought-after signature before his friend informs him of the bad news. “Excuse me, he’s a Liverpool fan as well!” the youngster is heard shouting. With a grin on his face, Ferdinand responds: “Give me it back, I can’t have that!”
As an ex-United defender, Ferdinand will be happy with Liverpool dropping two points on the opening day of the season in an entertaining 2-2 draw. Aleksandar Mitrovic gave the Reds’ defence a torrid afternoon, opening the scoring with a powerful back-post header before adding a penalty in the second half following a foul on him by Virgil van Dijk.
Darwin Nunez and Mohamed Salah grabbed goals to earn a draw against the newly-promoted side, but it was a wobbly start to the campaign for Jurgen Klopp’s side – and the manager was not happy with what he saw. "The best thing about the game is the result, that we get a point from a really bad game from my side,” he told BT Sport.
“The attitude was not right in the beginning, we wanted to fight back but we don't find it as easy any more. The result is fine, we don't deserve more than that but the performance is massively improvable."
Ferdinand believes Liverpool will be pipped to the title by Manchester City once again this season. "I think City will be the team to beat again," Ferdinand told Mirror Football.
"They've strengthened again, they've got [Erling] Haaland in and Kalvin Phillips. They've lost [Raheem] Sterling, yes, but they've got a deep squad still and players that can play multiple positions. And they've got the experience of winning. Liverpool will push them hard again." Ferdinand is backing United to break into the top four behind Tottenham in third, leaving Chelsea and Arsenal outside the top four.
