Rio Ferdinand makes public apology to Phil Jones during podcast with former Man Utd teammate after 'really poor' comments

Rio Ferdinand has publicly apologised to former Manchester United teammate Phil Jones, three years after he told the latter to "find a new club" when he was still at Old Trafford.

Back in August 2021, when Jones was still recovering from a long-term knee problem that required an operation, Ferdinand made some scathing comments about the former Blackburn defender.

As well as saying Jones was taking up a young player's position in the squad, he said he was "baffled" at Manchester United's decision to offer him a new four-year deal in 2019.

"He’s taking up a youth team player’s position in that squad right now," Ferdinand said on Vibe with FIVE. "I think he should’ve gone ages ago. He should’ve gone before Chris Smalling went. Find a new club and play some football."

Ferdinand added: "I am baffled at how he’s still been given a new deal at the club given his past few years at the club. It just doesn’t make sense to me how you get a new deal."

A month later, Jones opened up on going through "hell and back" during the 20-month injury layoff, and also touched on Ferdinand's comments.

“Listen, the respect I’ve got [for Ferdinand] is enormous,” Jones told The Times. “I’ve shared a dressing room with Rio - great professional. Loved playing with him. Great lad, good humour. Learned so much off him.

“But what he said was poor. Really poor. I’m not into disputes, not into arguments, and if he didn’t know, he didn’t know.”

After signing the four-and-a-half-year contract in February 2019, Jones started just 16 times for the Reds before announcing his retirement last year.

Jones said he "worked tirelessly" to get in the best physical shape possible ahead of Erik ten Hag's arrival but an ongoing problem with his knee halted any further progress during a "deeply frustrating" period.

Image credit: Getty

A year after retiring and Jones has appeared on the Rio Ferdinand Presents YouTube channel to discuss a number of subjects, including Sir Alex Ferguson, Jose Mourinho and Angel Di Maria's struggles at United.

He also received an apology from Ferdinand at the start of the episode.

"I have to say I apologise firstly before anything, I said sorry publicly but I'll say it to your face this time now, for criticising you," Ferdinand said.

"I criticised him about... he wasn't playing for a long period of time and I was like 'he's got to go out and play', I knew this kid when he was 18 and came to Man United, he wants to play football, why is he sitting there?

"Is it the Man United badge that he wants on his chest, is he staying for his own ego, just go and play some football [and] get out of the way, let another young kid come through because you're stifling someone else's growth maybe."

Ferdinand added: "The turning point was Ole [Gunnar Solskjaer], who text me and said Jona has been injured for a long time. And I said, 'S*** why hasn't anyone told me?' I was unaware of the situation. I just wanted to say sorry, It was never personal."

Jones smiled and said: "Apology accepted" before admitting that he was going through a difficult period in his life at that moment.

He added: "I was vulnerable because I hadn't played in so long and I was thinking 'am I ever going to play again', and having all these images and thoughts that it might be the end."