Shaun Wright-Phillips names his toughest opponent and delivers verdict on Premier League title race
His dad, Ian Wright, is one of English football's all-time greats. His brother, Bradley Wright-Phillips, is the sixth-highest goalscorer in MLS history. His son, D'Margio, is a key player for Stoke City at the age of 20 and has a bright future ahead of him. As for Shaun Wright-Phillips, he enjoyed a stellar club career spanning nearly two decades and also had the privilege of amassing 36 caps for England, which is no mean feat. All cliches aside, maybe football really does run in the family.
The former Manchester City midfielder has been in India in recent weeks owing to his role as the club's ambassador and spoke exclusively to Sportskeeda about a wide range of topics.
When asked about data protection and the role played by Acronis, Wright-Phillips was quick to point out the importance of privacy.
"It's massively important, especially for a club as big as Manchester City globally, to be able to protect people's personal details and keep them in a safe place is important.
If you don't have that in place and something goes wrong, somebody's details are somehow in the wrong hands and that's never a good thing. The key is to protect the fans, the players, the staff and everybody involved in the game. It lets them sleep easily at night, knowing that all their data is protected. I'm one of those people that they're protecting as well, so I'm over the moon."
Having represented Manchester City, Chelsea and Queens Park Rangers in England, Wright-Phillips hung up his boots in 2019 after stints with New York Red Bulls and Phoenix Rising FC.
When asked to name the toughest defender he locked horns with in his career, the 39-year-old didn't waste too much time in narrowing down on former England teammate Ashley Cole, while he admitted that it would be hard to just name one player when asked about his best-ever teammate.
"The toughest opponent would definitely have to be Ashley Cole. He never dived into tackles and liked to run a bit too much for my liking, so he would definitely be the hardest defender I faced. It's hard to pick the best player I've played with because there were so many and they were all excellent in their own way. So there wasn't just one person, it was over 10 or 15 of them."
In August 2004, Wright-Phillips was called up to the national team by then England manager Sven-Göran Eriksson and had a debut to remember as he scored the Three Lions' third goal in a 3-0 win against Ukraine. For a professional footballer, playing for ones country is about as good as it gets and Wright-Phillips echoed that sentiment, describing his England career as one of the best things he's ever accomplished.
"It's something that's really hard to explain because when you're a kid, the first thing you want to do if you're into football is it to become a professional footballer. I kind of took it in stages after I got there, and then it was about consistently playing. The more people spoke about me, I basically said 'okay, let me try to get into the England squad now."
"Its one of the best things I've ever accomplished in football because to be able to represent your country and do well for them is a massive achievement."
After being released by Nottingham Forest at the age of 17, Wright-Phillips joined Manchester City in 1999 and became a key player for the club under Kevin Keegan, who deployed him as a right-wing back. Despite being deployed in a rather unfamiliar position, the nimble-footed winger showed his class consistently and was named Manchester City's Young Player of the Year four times in succession between 2000 and 2003.
After a topsy-turvy spell with Chelsea between 2005 and 2008, the Englishman returned to Manchester City in the summer of '08, months before Sheikh Mansour's headline-making takeover of the club. In September 2008, the takeover was officially completed and the Cityzens were immediately linked with a host of big names.
Wright-Phillips, though, revealed that he had no idea about the impending takeover at the time and also explained Manchester City's transfer strategy in detail.
"When I re-signed for the club, I didn't know that the takeover was happening. I just signed because I promised all the fans that I would come back before I retired - I got the opportunity and I just didn't think about it. I just went for it. But then we did find out that new owners were coming in and certain player names started to be linked with City. They didn't really go out and splash bucket loads of money - they hand selected all their players that suited Manchester City as a club. They've done that perfectly in the past 10 years or so - look where we are now!
If somebody had said Vincent Kompany would become one of the best defenders the Premier League's ever seen when they first bought him, I bet you over 50% of the people would have turned around and laughed at you! I just think whoever they bring to the club, they seem to make the players better."
Wright-Phillips opens up on nature of Manchester City-Liverpool rivalry
Manchester City and Liverpool have been arguably two of the best teams in world football this season, with Pep Guardiola and Jurgen Klopp pushing each other to their limits in the Premier League. The title race is tantalizingly poised at the moment, with the Cityzens just a point ahead of the Reds after 32 games. With just six games left, it's fair to say there isn't too much margin for error.
In the Premier League era, there have been a handful of iconic rivalries, most notably the one in the late 90s and the early 2000s between Arsenal and Manchester United. When asked if Manchester City vs Liverpool is the greatest rivalry in Premier League history, Wright-Phillips offered an interesting response and touched upon the nature of the competitiveness between the two sides.
"Right now, I don't think there is any other team that I think could challenge them and they both want to be among the best teams in the world. And to do that, you have to win Premier League titles on a regular basis and Liverpool are trying to cause that problem against Man City. So for me, in the Premier League, I would definitely say it is the biggest rivalry. That said, both managers have so much respect for each other as you saw after the game - the way they congratulated each other and the players as well.
It's not really a nasty rivalry. It's more of a 'we can play better football than you' or vice versa sort of thing. That's great, I love it."
Finally, the former Manchester City star gave his verdict on the Premier League title race. Unsurprisingly, he tipped the Cityzens to go all the way but admitted that Liverpool are still in the running as things stand.
"There's still a lot of tricky games to come for both sides, so it's not as cut and dry but for me as city always approach one game at a time, as do Liverpool. We're still in a good position to win it and I think we will [eventually win the PL title this season]."