It’s always better to play than train…

It’s fun to play games!

I do! Most people don’t know that but, yeah, I can score nice goals. I can!

Your partnership is going well with Chris Smalling – why do you think you seem to complement each other so well?

He’s a very good player. I think in the last couple of games, we’ve been playing okay with each other. We communicate a lot and speak to each other and cover each other’s backs. I think that’s why we’ve been doing okay in the past couple of games.

We look at who plays on the left and the right in the middle, but is there not a big difference - is it something you take in your stride?

It depends player to player. For me, it’s not a problem. I’m used to playing on the left side as well but I’ll play wherever the manager wants me to play.

Our former manager Louis van Gaal spoke of having a left and right-footer in there but there have been some great partnerships who were both right footed over the years…

I don’t see a problem having two right-footers as central defenders. I have quite a good left foot and can manage to play on the left as well so it’s not a problem.