Manchester United captain Bruno Fernandes has taken a clear line on criticism of his demeanour, insisting he accepts people will form opinions about him and that his visible intensity is part of his game. The remarks came ahead of the derby against Manchester City and were given to BBC Sport.<\/p>\n
\u201cEverything I include myself in I just like to go with myself at full,\u201d Fernandes told BBC Sport. \u201cI don\u2019t like doing things at half. Football was the main thing and I always wanted to go full for it.<\/p>\n
What you see on the pitch is what Bruno is like\u2014the passion I put into everything. I am much more calm away from the pitch\u2014I don\u2019t have the emotions on the skin as much as I have on the pitch. But still very passionate in everything I do.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Portugal international acknowledged scrutiny has followed him but said he will not alter the way he shows emotion during matches. He emphasised that public judgement is inevitable and that diversity of opinion is natural.<\/p>\n
\u201cPeople have an opinion about me and I can\u2019t change that. That\u2019s the way people want to judge you about what they see on the pitch or the television or interviews. I can\u2019t change that.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey have the freedom to think the way they want about me as I have the freedom to think about them. I don\u2019t judge people until I know them. They can have an opinion about me, that\u2019s fine\u2014we all have an opinion and that\u2019s why life is so good and so different. If we all think the same way it would be so boring.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fernandes also outlined how that intensity translates into the practical demands of captaincy inside the United dressing room and on the training ground. He described a focus on the team\u2019s objective during matches and the mental work required to store set-piece plans and positional details.<\/p>\n
\u201cDuring the game I just think about the goal we have for the game which is to win,\u201d he said. \u201cI remember every step that we have trained and that my teammates have to do and I remember every position they have to do.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I go to a training session I focus not only on what I have to do but what is around me because it can change, I have to play a different position or a teammate could not be aware of where he has to be or which position he should stay.<\/p>\n
\u201cOn set-pieces, I know exactly where everyone has to be. The only nervous thing is getting everything into my memory so I can remember in the game every step. Also, when I\u2019m on the ball I know every movement my teammates have to do. To be aware of, \u2018I\u2019m on the ball here so this is what we trained\u2019\u2014but you have to think that in a split second. It gets automatic because I think about that during the week until the game. When you think so many times about something your muscle memory works by itself.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Bruno Fernandes defends on-pitch passion, showing how preparation and memory underpin his captaincy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2781,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[179,969],"tags":[342,1006,1007],"class_list":["post-2782","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-manchester-united","category-premier-league","tag-bruno-fernandes","tag-captaincy","tag-leadership"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2782","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2782"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2782\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2781"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2782"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2782"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2782"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}