Wes Brown has revealed how John O'Shea panicked him the day he signed for Sunderland.
The pair were close friends throughout the career and broke into the Manchester United first team squad in the nineties.
In 2011, both Brown and O'Shea had fallen out of favour at Old Trafford and were keen to move on for regular first team football.
Sunderland came calling and they both made the move to Wearside. O'Shea would go on to captain Sunderland, while Brown was a cult hero among the fanbase.
But when Brown put pen to paper on his contract at Sunderland, he did so on the understanding that O'Shea would join him at the Stadium of Light.
So when the former Republic of Ireland international was not at Sunderland the day Brown arrived, he panicked his old mate had decided to sign elsewhere.
"We're still very close - there were a few of us," Brown told Four Four Two magazine when asked how close he was to his former team-mate.
"We both decided to go to Sunderland, but he wasn't there on the day when I arrived.
"I called him saying, 'What's going on?'
"He said: 'I might be going somewhere else'. I couldn't believe it.
"I said: 'You best not be!'
"Luckily, he signed the following day. But we've been everywhere together since we were kids."
