With West Bromwich Albion travelling to Old Trafford to face Manchester United on Saturday evening, a special moment is ahead for Red Devils academy graduate Sam Johnstone.
In a brilliant interview with WBA TV, Johnstone discussed his career, with the 27-year-old reserving special praise for United and the impact of David de Gea on his career.
Johnstone, who has started every single league game (102 including play-offs) since he joined the Baggies from United in the summer of 2018, labelled De Gea a ‘great’ person.
Johnstone, who never made a senior appearance for the Red Devils instead being sent out on 8 different loan spells, opened up on how much he’s learnt from the Spaniard.
The stopper also revealed to WBA TV that the superstar sent him a classy message last year, De Gea – who was enduring the most difficult spells of his career – found the time to tell Johnstone that he wanted to see him in the Premier League, with Slaven Bilic’s men obliging as they achieved promotion.
Here’s what Johnstone had to say on what he learned from De Gea:
“Just watching him every day, everything, in the gym, just around the place, training, before games, when we travelled, very relaxed and very confident in his own ability and obviously very good.”
“Warm ups, watching him – you can’t get much better than that, learning from him every single day.”
“Great person.”
“We still keep in contact now, he did message me last year and he was like ‘I want to see you in the Premier League’ – it’s nice to get messages like that.
“Very good learning curve.”
This shows exactly the kind of person that De Gea is, United’s fans should be honoured to have him.
West Brom sit 18th and are in store for a fierce battle against relegation this season with three draws and five defeats so far.
The Baggies have conceded 17 times, but that number would be quite a bit higher if it wasn’t for some of Johnstone’s solid displays so far this term.
The Englishman has so far proved that he belongs at Premier League level, something that will delight those at United who have worked with the ace.