Former Tennis No1 Andy Murray is an avid football fan

Had trials with Rangers as a youngster, grew up watching *Barça *at Camp Nou

Gives his take on this year’s The Best nominees

Tennis star Andy Murray has been determined to be the best all his life. Moving to Barcelona as a youngster to receive the best training necessary to raise his game, he has fought for the No1 spot in his sport since breaking on to the scene over a decade ago, finally achieving that goal late last year.

Having become the best in his discipline, a position only rescinded recently to Rafael Nadal, he is well-placed to discuss what it takes to get there. When it comes to mixing this discussion with football, Murray is better placed than most. An avid football fan, he had a grandfather who played professional football, and even had trials for professional teams himself as a youngster.

FIFA.com spoke to Murray to get his take on this year’s candidates for The Best FIFA Football Awards™, his love of the game and how to become the best.

FIFA.com: Just how close were you to becoming a footballer? Andy Murray: Not as close as everyone thinks! I was asked to go back after my first trial with Rangers but it was really difficult to play both tennis and football at the same time. Both sports were placing different demands on my body and in the end it just became a question of which sport I enjoyed the most and which I was better at. After a lot of deliberation, I decided tennis was the sport I was more naturally gifted at and decided to move to Spain to pursue a career in that, which thankfully turned out to be the right decision.

*When you said recently that you “would like to do something in football” when you retire from tennis, did you have anything specific in mind? *I have no idea! I just find the sport really interesting, I love reading, watching and talking about football, so if I wanted to do something that wasn’t tennis that I thought I was passionate enough about, I’d maybe look at doing something in football. I’m a huge fantasy football fan, so I’d probably quite fancy myself as a manager but it’s completely different doing it in real life, definitely not as easy as everyone thinks.

*Growing up in Barcelona, did you get to the Camp Nou much as a youngster? *Moving away from home at a young age was obviously difficult, but living in a city like Barcelona, which is famous for its football, made things easier. My friends and I would go a lot as teenagers, and we saw some great matches. One that stands out in my memory, is when we saw Barcelona against AC Milan in the Champions League in the 2004/2005 season. Ronaldinho scored one of the best goals I’ve ever seen live, people still talk about that goal.

*You’ve already said you’re a keen fantasy football player, so what would be your personal World11 for 2016/17? *Gianluigi Buffon; Dani Alves, Sergio Ramos, Giorgio Chiellini, Marcelo; Ngolo Kante, Toni Kroos, Luka Modric; Paulo Dybala, Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi

*Who would be your winner for The Best FIFA Men’s Player award, and why? *It has to be Cristiano Ronaldo at number one. He won La Liga and the Champions League, and scored a crazy amount of goals in both competitions to help his team get there. I think he scored ten goals from the quarter-finals onwards in the Champions League, which is unbelievable.