Sir Alex Ferguson’s letter resides in a box now, a consequence of three house moves across Europe, but Steven Defour has not forgotten the message that arrived from Manchester United when his career was in peril, nor has he had the opportunity to thank the sender in person. It would complete the circle to do so, as a Premier League player at Old Trafford having suspected the chance had gone along with his love of the game. Both have been rekindled at Burnley.
There are question marks over the midfielder’s fitness for United – he returned to full training on Tuesday having sustained a hamstring injury at Southampton a fortnight ago – though any doubts over accepting Sean Dyche’s challenge were dispelled on Defour’s Premier League debut. “The welcome they gave me was pretty special,” the 28-year-old says. “The atmosphere around the stadium was fantastic and to win against Liverpool … after the first game I could see it was the right choice.” It was a reminder of what had been lost.
The Belgium international has thrived on the camaraderie and responsibility at Burnley since arriving for what was a club-record £8m in the summer, earning a recall to the national team under Roberto Martínez in the process. It was simply a release to leave Anderlecht after two years of torment following his return to Belgium from Porto, though it is only from a distance that Defour realises how profound the impact was. Disillusionment had set in before Burnley’s manager convinced him to join a newly promoted Premier League club instead of taking the riches on offer at Al-Jazira in the United Arab Emirates.
“In the summer I thought this was probably my last chance to move to the Premier League so when the opportunity came I had to take it. I also thought a third year in the Belgium league might not be good for me,” he says, with some understatement.
“I was two years at Anderlecht and really disappointed in football because I was criticised a lot by part of the supporters. Also the Belgian media said two years at Anderlecht and no championship trophy with Defour as the biggest transfer … I was an international when I arrived but wasn’t any more. It weighed heavily on me. The UAE offer came and I was starting to think that if I go there, we must be honest, it is for fun and for money. It could be easier. There were some problems with the transfer and then Burnley came in. The manager came and convinced me.
“He came to Belgium and it was a new challenge for me to play for a club that was not competing for a title. I wanted to show myself in the Premier League and Burnley made it clear they wanted me really bad so I took a chance. I wasn’t having fun in the game any more. That is why I wanted to get far, far away from Belgium and when Burnley came I thought: ‘If this works out really well maybe I can finish what I was after in the beginning.’ It’s enough to play. The circle is complete. For the moment it is going pretty well.”
Anderlecht’s hardcore never accepted Defour on account of his Standard Liège background. Liège’s ‘Ultras Inferno 96’ greeted their revered former captain with a notorious banner that featured his severed head and the words “Red or Dead” on his return to Stade Maurice Dufrasne in January 2015. His dismissal in that 2-0 defeat, receiving a second yellow card for kicking the ball away into the crowd, prompted Anderlecht fans to hurl seats on to the pitch and condemnation from Belgian politicians and FA officials.
“At that moment I didn’t think much of the banner because I was in the game,” the midfielder insists. “But the atmosphere was really violent [the Anderlecht goalkeeper Silvio Proto was pelted with objects after seven minutes]. They were dropping [smoke] bombs. It was dangerous. I knew the game couldn’t be controlled and I spoke to the referee. Everybody said I got sent off because I was angry with the picture. I wasn’t. I saw the picture and then I was in the game. It was just certain decisions of the referee. He didn’t have the match under control. That was the big problem for me.”
It was another blow to a career that promised so much when Defour, having become captain at 19, led Standard to their first league title for 25 years in 2008. Another league and Super Cup double followed 12 months later when United were among several heavyweights tracking the young midfielder. One of the most gifted talents at the start of a new era for Belgian football, however, was also one of the most unfortunate. A week before his Champions League debut Defour shattered a metatarsal in his right foot against KV Mechelen, his hometown club. Three operations followed and while they would have major repercussions for Defour’s career, he is grateful to have one.
“It was an open fracture and you could see the bone. There was no bone after they dealt with it. There was a two‑centimetre hole where the bone should be. To fill it in they took a bone graft from my hip and mixed it with cement. It was the last phase of the experiment with me. The doctors had tried it on people with really bad fractures from accidents and the doctor said: ‘If this doesn’t work, you have to stop playing.’ If it didn’t work they said the bone would keep breaking from the impact of playing football.
“I was really down because of missing out on the Champions League and I knew that a lot of clubs were following me. I felt really, really bad. One day I received a letter from Sir Alex Ferguson wishing me well. That was a surprise because not everybody gets a letter from Sir Alex Ferguson when they are injured but I knew from a year before that Manchester United were following me closely. It was still a surprise to receive the letter and I wrote one back to him to say thank you, but I’ve not met him to say it.
“When I look back at that time now, I don’t think I got back to the level I was before. When I left Standard Liège for Porto I wasn’t ready physically because of the injury but I had to leave. I didn’t play as much as I’d hoped in Porto, maybe 50%-60% of the games. I wanted to play all the time and that is why I decided to go back to Belgium to get my level back up.”
Ferguson never followed up the get‑well letter with a contract offer – there was a chance to join Everton in 2009 but Standard would sanction the deal only if they failed to qualify for the Champions League – and team-mates Marouane Fellaini, Axel Witsel and Dante have enjoyed the career trajectory many envisaged for Defour. They remain friends – he has been in contact with Fellaini before Saturday’s potential reunion – and there is no bitterness as he considers what might have been.
“When I look at the careers they have had I just think I got injured at a bad moment,” he says. “It stopped my evolution and to get back was hard. The injury healed but I was still in pain. My big toe on my right foot is smaller than the one on my left and after the injury the physiology of my body changed. I started to run differently, I stopped using muscles I used and working muscles I had not used before, so I got several pulls and ruptures.
“I had to find a new way of running and of playing football. I was finding that in duels or in games, where I used to be 100% I was now two seconds late. That made me crazy inside. Maybe if I didn’t have the injury I would have been where they are but you never know. That is the past. Now I am here and trying to get my level back.”
Defour has Ferguson to thank for a thoughtful letter but he is indebted to Dyche for a belated ticket to English football and reawakening his passion for the game. Even Turf Moor is part of the attraction. “It is really old-fashioned, English style, I love it. The manager said I had everything to win, that you are going to play in the Premier League and everybody is going to watch you. He was really ambitious and convinced we can do something with this team. He is straightforward, honest and he wants us to be a team. It is the first time I am playing for a team that is really that – a team. There is no little group. Before I had a Spanish side or a Portuguese side or an English side, different ethnic groups. Here everybody is together.”
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