Nunez article in The Sunday Times

[Hermes]

I know I've criticised this signing and received a lot of stick on here for not giving him a chance, but if I'd known the true extent of his top class experience I'd have been even more critical. Check the reference to the Olympiakos game.

 

Law and order

JONATHAN NORTHCROFT

Liverpool’s Antonio Nunez plans a legal career after football, but is hoping to be judged on the pitch against Newcastle today

 

 

 

A university education, is no guarantee against stupidity. The small number of current footballers who have studied for degrees includes Adrian Mutu, after all. Yet it is safe to paint Antonio Nunez as one of the game’s most cerebral participants. The Liverpool midfielder is a graduate in international law and aims to continue his legal studies while progressing in his playing career.

Born into a family of lawyers and raised in Las Rozas, a well-heeled suburb of Madrid, Nunez attended university in his home city before boots replaced books as his professional tools. “I’m a qualified lawyer. I need to gain one or two years’ experience in a firm before I can practise, but after football I hope to use my degree,” he says. “I haven’t decided which branch of the law I’ll go into, but maybe some doors will open for me in football, because having been a player gives me experience other lawyers don’t have.” For the moment could he keep his hand in, perhaps, by looking after his Anfield teammates’ contracts? “I wish!” His background explains, in part, the unusual trajectory of his playing career. He is 26 next month, but Liverpool’s Champions League triumph against Olympiakos was the first time he had played the full 90 minutes in a top-level game. Nunez’s first club was San Federico, a Madrid minnow in Spain’s regional first division, its equivalent of the Conference. He moved on, but not very far, to CD Las Rozas in the Spanish Third Division, where Real Madrid signed him at the age of 22. “Until recently he was playing football because he loves it and not because it formed part of his career plans,” his agent, Jose Antonio Martin, explained last year.

 

 

 

Nunez made 11 first-team appearances in three seasons at the Bernabeu, all in 2003-4. None matched the impact of his first: as a late substitute in Real’s second match of the campaign, he scored the equaliser in a 1-1 draw against Villarreal. It was Nunez’s only goal for a club he has supported from childhood. It represented a landmark for David Beckham as well. Beckham had provided the assist, with a beautifully pinpointed corner, and the moment was replayed over and over on Spanish television because it represented the first time the England captain had demonstrated his dead-ball ability after his much-hyped move to Spain.

 

Beckham, to some extent, was the reason Nunez was allowed to leave for Liverpool, although Real Madrid inserted a buy-back option. It is not that they did not believe in his abilities, it was more that with Beckham and Luis Figo on the roster, and the young winger Juanfran emerging, Real felt well covered for options at right midfield. Nunez realised it was time to seek a new club by last summer, but with Atletico Madrid interested, he imagined he would be staying in La Liga.

 

“From the moment I knew I could go to Anfield I had only a couple of days to decide, but it wasn’t difficult,” he says. “My agent phoned and said, ‘What do you think about Liverpool?’ My reaction was, ‘What do you think? Wow!’ I had to ask if he was serious. I’d had chances before to move away from the Bernabeu, but Liverpool was the best. In Spain it is still seen as one of the great clubs, and everybody knows about the past of Liverpool and what they did in the European Cup. It is one of the most historic clubs in the world. Another reason for coming was Rafael Benitez. I knew him as a coach, not personally but by his reputation. He knew me. I played in nearly every match for Real Madrid’s second team and he watched me there.”

 

At just over 6ft, Nunez is tall for a wide man, and Benitez believes his stature and aerial ability make him suited to the English game. He is also quick, and, on the evidence of his brief appearances for his new club, a team player, who offloads possession simply and sensibly and is perceptive with his positioning. That he has been unable to fully make a case for himself at Liverpool so far is down to the bizarre misfortune he suffered in his first training session: with nobody around him, he collapsed with a partial tear of his medial knee ligaments, an injury that required two rounds of surgery. “When I arrived at Liverpool, I was thinking, ‘Fantastic, this is my chance’, and it happened on my second or third day in England, so it was a bit of bad luck,” Nunez says.

 

He had to wait until the defeat of Arsenal at the end of last month before making his debut, as a substitute, but being out did have its benefits. “It gave me time to know the team. When you’re injured, you have the chance to look at things from the outside. It’s not as good as playing, of course, but from the stands you can see things you can’t when you’re on the field.”

 

He also became acquainted with his new city. The settling in process was helped by his impressive grasp of English. “I studied English before I started university. I learnt it at school and in the summer holidays I would go to Dublin, to study the language more,” he says, adding wryly, “I also learnt something about Guinness.”

 

Liverpool has embraced the influx of Iberians at one of its football clubs. A Spanish entrepreneur has opened a bar/restaurant in the city centre, which imports its food from Spain and sells £500 bottles of Vega-Sicilia Cosecha wine. In October a “ladies’ lunch” was held to welcome the spouses and girlfriends of Anfield’s Spanish contingent. Nunez, Xabi Alonso, Luis Garcia and Josemi are regularly spotted around town together. “Having them players here helps a lot. We socialise together and go to one another’s houses to have dinner,” says Nunez. “We have a very good relationship.”

 

With Garcia potentially available again (he will have a late fitness test after a month out with a hamstring injury), Nunez may find himself competing with one of his amigos for a place in the team to face Newcastle today. So poor has been the form of Harry Kewell, however, that Benitez could play both Spaniards, with Garcia deployed on the left. After his experience in Madrid, Nunez is desperate not to become a reserve player once more, and feels he has much to prove. In exchange for Michael Owen, Liverpool received £8m from Real plus their choice from a selection of the Spanish club’s fringe players.

 

“I don’t want to be thought of as a makeweight in that deal. I’m a player in my own right and Benitez told me he was interested in signing me anyway,” Nunez says. “My fitness is getting better, and now I’m playing again, I’m really enjoying it. I’m happy here. The atmosphere at the end of the Olympiakos game was something really amazing for me and the other Spanish players, because it was different to anything you’d get back home. In Spain there are bigger stadiums, but never an atmosphere like that.”

 

Proving himself as a top-level player is something Nunez has waited long years for. Few who do so start when they are 25. Then again, lawyers can prove anything.

[Bellflower]

Thought the Macca interview was good as well.............

[Vincent Vega]

Thought the Macca interview was good as well.............

 

Yeah it wasn't bad apart from the "if I have a son he'll support Everton" comment, no need for that lad. Oh yeah and the I'm not interested in money style comments, apart from screwing us and getting mega bucks off Real Madrid you mean. He's one shallow cunt is McManaman, he's pissing himself at the fact City pay him £30,000 a week to do precisely fuck all.

[Ronnie]

At least he showed one glimpse of his ability today when he made a decent cross into the box. No one, though, was there to convert it.

 

His first touches were better and he showed he can run a bit. Maybe we still can have hope in him?

[Tom R]

At least he showed one glimpse of his ability today when he made a decent cross into the box. No one, though, was there to convert it.

 

His first touches were better and he showed he can run a bit. Maybe we still can have hope in him?

 

Yeah, I thought he did well in his 10 minutes or so. Got a couple of crosses in actually and beat his man on several occasions.

 

But I'm not getting excited. Not after the Pompey game! Jeez, that was juat about the worst right side MF performance I've ever seen so forgiuve me if I;m not getting carried away over 10 mionutes of 'decent'. ;-)

[mni]

He looked a lot better when he came on yesterday. For the first time we saw some of that crossing skill Rafa mentioned when he arrived. Let's give him a couple of more monts before we judge him. Hopefully he'll come good and claim that right side midfield position.