Football Disappointment Quotes

The first World Cup I remember was in the 1950 when I was 9 or 10 years old. My father was a soccer player, and there was a big party, and when Brazil lost to Uruguay, I saw my father crying.

As a boy, I wanted to be the Peruvian Diego Maradona. Sadly, Peru hasn't made the World Cup since 1982, so I guess I did well to choose something different.

There are two things I will always remember. First, a shot against Derby that hit the inside of the post but didn't go in, and we could only draw 2-2. And then the really big chance against Bayer Leverkusen, two minutes from the end of the Champions League semi-final, when I shot over the bar. That hurt a lot.

I can remember crying in the Kippax at Maine Road when City were relegated to the old First Division in 1996. Dropping out of the Premier League seemed like the worst thing imaginable - and what didn't help was the fact United were winning just about everything going at the same time.

You only appreciate what it feels like to win the Champions League after you've seen it snatched away from you.

I played for Middlesbrough's youth team. At the age of 16, I went into a shed at the training ground and was told that they weren't signing me on, so that was the end of that dream. Football was my life. I played football when I got to school, football every break and football as soon as I got home.

The lowest period was when I was with Tottenham, and they loaned me out to Dulwich Hamlet.

I played against the Brazilians in '82, who were definitely the best team never to have won the World Cup.

At Leeds, it was to stay up. I was such a young player, Leeds were my club, and we didn't do it. That was a lot to take. At Newcastle, the expectations to win a trophy were enormous. The No. 1 thing everyone up there thinks about is the football club.

Man United, for all the doom and gloom, they're still the best club on the planet, they've got the best supporters and the best manager... United will always be United. To me, they are still the best and whatever disappointments they're having at the moment, don't worry, they'll bounce back. They always do.

Ties in the NFL absolutely suck. Trust me, I was involved with a tie against the San Francisco 49ers when I was with the Rams in 2012 and it felt pointless.

After Euro 2008, football in England was shattered for a bit, and people were losing interest in following England.

I played a lot of games for Villa, and one of my regrets is not winning a trophy there - that still hurts, and that's why the big games are important.

The horizon is a little bit blocked with Didier Deschamps as manager. I respect his choices, but the French national team doesn't make me happy any more.

The disappointment of getting relegated from the Premier League is an awful time for anybody as a footballer.

Look, in my life, I played one World Cup: the greatest thing. I used to wait in anticipation for the squad announcement. I didn't go to Argentina 78 having played throughout qualification. Now, that hurt.

Nobody likes to lose a Champions League semi-final.

When it came to football there was a certain age where I realized that my future in football was being a grease spot on the side of some bigger player.

The one thing disappointing I had coming out of college was not playing in the Rose Bowl.

When I left Carlisle United for the first time at the age of 16 in 2000, I hated football.

I don't bad-mouth football, but I also know that it has a long trail of tears and heartbreak and animosity built up by past players who feel that they put so much into the game and didn't get a lot out of it after.

Yes, yes, I know all the jokes. What else could I have expected at Highbury? But I went to Chelsea and to Tottenham and to Rangers, and saw the same thing: that the natural state of a football fan is bitter disappointment, no matter what the score.