Rio Ferdinand has admitted he felt 'embarrassed' to join a Manchester United dressing room full of Premier League winners when he first arrived at the club.
The former defender opened up on his first impressions of United after a then record £30million move from Leeds United, revealing his initial overwhelmed feeling at the prospect of playing with such illustrious teammates.
He went on to win six Premier League titles, two League Cups and the Champions league with United, but hadn't won any medals in his Leeds or West Ham days.
"I'd gone from the captain of Leeds United, running that dressing room, to going to Manchester United," he told the Oxford Union.
"It's all about working out what you need to do, to be great.
"I became a student, a listener, a sponge to those players who have won, who know how to win.
"I didn't know how to win. I had no trophies at that point. So I walked into that dressing room more or less naked because I felt embarrassed at times. I looked around and thought 'Ryan Giggs has got five league medals, oh my gosh, I can't look at him... Becks has got four, Scholesy's got three or four, Roy Keane's got four or five'.
"I was looking around and thinking, 'how has he got there?' and what am I going to do to get past them?
"From then on, it was all about sacrifice. I'm getting in (to training) before them. I made sure I was going to be out-working all my rivals in that team, letting them know that I'm serious."
"Getting there is the easier part. The manager saw me, spent x amount of money to buy me. But I've seen it with 10, 20, 30 players in the time I was with Man United: they get turn up and they (relax) whereas I was like: 'right, now the fight starts'.
"We won the league in my first year. It was like getting to the top of the mountain and you go 'wow, what an achievement that is'.
"But then we had three years when we won nothing and I had to believe in the manager when he said 'trust me, this is a transition period and we'll get back'."
